Me and my husband are thinking about purchasing a Summa D-60 plotter to do vehicle lettering and masking stencils for custom paint jobs, and vinyl graphics. I have been looking at the Summa D-60 plotter and am pretty sure we are going to purchase that one as our start-up plotter. The place where I am going to purchase it has thier own cutting software called JSI-cut (? something like that), it's only $195. We can't afford to get Flexi, and I don't think we would need anything that fancy right now. I am familiar with Adobe, although not too familiar with Illistrator, but I can learn. My question is does anyone know if you can pretty much design what you need in Illistrator (keeping in mind that I don't have all that much experience with it, but am pretty good with teaching myself, taught myself how to use photoshop and pagemaker) with the software that comes with the plotter or do you think that we would need some sort of cutting program to go along with it.
We can't afford much more then a couple hundred on the software right now, just starting out and my husband is trying to grow his custom painting business, so have to start small. If you think it would be easiest to start out with a software program what is the best low expense program that you have used?
Thank you in advance for any advice you can give me.
Debra
Posted by Curtis hammond (Member # 2170) on :
get corel draw, Ver 9 is going for around $35 bux.. and then look around for a used copy of cocut pro 9 (about $200 bux). Post around like i did and you will get it. You will not lose..
Corel draw can do anything that you need to make good graphics for signs
Posted by Greg McRoberts (Member # 3501) on :
What Curtis said.
Edit: I have a Summa T-750 and couldn't be happier with it. Good stuff. A 60 should be just fine for you.
[ June 15, 2004, 05:01 PM: Message edited by: Greg McRoberts ]
Posted by Dan Streicher (Member # 4515) on :
I agree as well Corel Corel Corel, and you are set
Posted by Jeff Green (Member # 3508) on :
Just to be different, Illustrator can use cocut as well! And if you are already know an adobe product, stay with it.
On a side note, I am not sure that you know this, but I believe the adobe product that you are familur with is Photoshop? This type of program creats bitmaps. No matter what program you choose, you need one that produces vector artwork. Such as Illustrator or Corel Draw!
Posted by Terry Baird (Member # 3495) on :
I've heard that CoCut is good, but... on the advice of a few folks here, I downloaded a driver from Roland (I've got an old Camm1) and I design and cut directly from Corel. I really haven't had a problem that I couldn't solve getting what I want to the plotter. There are bells and whistles in most programs like CoCut that make them well worth the money, but so far I haven't missed or needed them. The rep that I spoke to at Summa when I was looking said that the same thing could be done with their plotter (but you know how sales reps are...).Good luck in whatever you chose.
[ June 15, 2004, 05:40 PM: Message edited by: Terry Baird ]
Posted by Dave Grundy (Member # 103) on :
Summa does provide Windows drivers for their cutters. And with EITHER CorelDraw or Illustrator, you can cut directly to the Summa cutter. Summa recommends their cutting software but also admit that it can be done direct from the abve mentioned progs. My preference is Corel...but if you know Photoshop, maybe Illustrator might be the better choice for you.
Posted by Henry Miller (Member # 4751) on :
Thank you everyone, we do have both Illistrator and Corel (I think 8) so I could use either of them, maybe since I would have to learn which ever one I use I will go ahead and learn the Corel since it seems to be the more popular program to use.
I appreciate all the feed back to my question, you guys have been most helpful. I'll check and see if I can find a used version of CoCut from somewhere.
Debra
Posted by Bill Cosharek (Member # 1274) on :
Good luck on finding a used version of CoCut, but remember that it requires a dongle and the security code to run it. Just make sure they are included.
Posted by Curtis hammond (Member # 2170) on :
yes a dongle.. and a serial number when you install it. But, it runs so trouble free. I never had to call for help using it. Very easy to operate, and has some features that really saves me a lot of hassle, time and aggravation.
Plus, I only paid a couple hundred bux for it. And when I posted around for it I got at least 7 replies. I bought three of them and resold for enuf to pay for one for me. But yes, it took a couple weeks to get responses.
Posted by Ron Costa (Member # 3366) on :
Henry, I cut from Corel 11 to my D-60 thru wincut which was supplied with the summa. If you use Corel 11, wincut installs a plug-in to the corel draw window. Just a click and you're in the wincut window ready to cut. No need to convert files or export. It also has a plug-in to cut by color too. Hope this helps.
Posted by Henry Miller (Member # 4751) on :
Does it only work with Corel 11, or will it work with earlier versions (such as 8)?
Thanks, Debra
Posted by Ron Costa (Member # 3366) on :
The plug ins are for Corel 11. I have used Wincut with Corel 9 but had to export to wincut as an eps or ai file
Posted by Henry Miller (Member # 4751) on :
Guess I better look into getting a copy of Corel 11 then huh.
