Digital Craft Cutting
My latest fad is a Digital Cutter so I though I would put a dedicated page on line so anyone interested can find my cutting files and other stuff easily.
I started out with a Craft Robo cutter, which I found to be just a little too limiting with the materials it can cut. It is fine for most light craft work but I found it was just not up to cutting some of the thicker materials I wanted to cut so I have replaced it with a 15 inch BlackCat Cougar which is a much more capable machine.
It is very rare these days to find a product which really stands out from the crowd but I can assure you that the BlackCat Cougar definitely does.
I can also promise you that the before/ after sales service you will obtain from Dawn at Thyme Graphics is absolutely second to none! If you have any problems or any need to contact her you can be assured of a reply on the support forum within minutes, day or night, I don’t think she ever sleeps! If that is not enough for you then fear not, if Dawn cannot help you via the forum/ email she will talk you through the problem on the phone and if all else fails even take control of your computer via remote connection and take you through it on your own computer. I cannot stress strongly enough how superb the support from Thyme Graphics is!
The BlackCat Cougar cutter is every bit as good as the support, it has a cutting force of 950 grammes with 255 adjustable steps and a cutting speed of up to 600mm/s both of which can be changed in the software or directly on the machine LCD display. You can even pause the cutting and change the cutting force and speed on the fly. If your cut settings were not quite right you can simply make adjustments to the blade length, adjust the force, and hit the repeat button to cut again over the original cut – No wasted material.
Cougars come in various cutting widths from 13 inches to 24 inches and unlike some other cutters on the market that is the actual cutting width not the media width. They can cut a range of materials from thin vinyl up to 1mm chipboard or 1.5mm mount board, metal foils, shrink plastic, paper, card etc.
The Cougar has a built in laser alignment system so you can perform contour cuts. Basically you can add cut lines to a picture/ photograph ect within the software, then you can print the file on a normal inkjet/ laser printer and put the printout into the Cougar and automatically cut out the shapes around your image. This is often referred to as Digital Die Cutting or Print & Cut. The process is not quite as automatic as it is on the Craft Robo, but at the same time it is less limiting – with the Craft Robo the limited cutting size is further reduced by having to avoid large areas around the page so the system can locate the special registration marks, the cougar does not suffer from this problem and will allow you to still cut up to the full size of the media when doing contour cutting.
That’s not the end of the matter by a long way, not only does the Cougar cut but with an optional tool it also embosses card, velum etc. The tool has interchangeable tips from 1mm up to 6mm diameter for outline or filled embossing. I have the embossing tool and the results are really quite fantastic 
Had enough yet? because there is more, much more! There are a number of other optional tools available, such as an engraving tool to engrave metal, detail blade holder for cleaner cuts on very fine detail cuts such as lattice work, click adjustable blade holders for quick and easy blade adjustment, cutting tables which attach directly to the machine to hold the media steady while cutting and a number of other tools are currently being developed including a rotary engraving tool & hot foil transfer pen among others.
Software wise the Cougar comes with the excellent Inkscape editor and Signcut Pro which takes care of actual cutting. Inkscape is a free vector editing program which uses the SVG file format, it is a VERY capable editor indeed and offers pretty much all the tools you would ever need to produce superb cutting files. It may appear a little daunting at first as there are lots of tools and options which will take a while to absorb, but after a short time you will pick up enough of the basics to create very usable cutting files. The advantage of Inkscape is that once you have the basic knowledge you can then progress onto more advanced tools & techniques to produce some stunning bespoke cutting files. If you are dead set against Inkscape then Dawn can offer some other software solutions instead if you contact her to discuss it.
Even if you are not interested in designing your own cutting files Inkscape is still a good choice; as the software is a free open source project it has a wealth of free SVG files for you to download, not only from the BlackCat forum but all over the web, and it will also load up a multitude of other programs files such as Adobe Illustrator AI, EPS, BMP, JPG to name just a few. By the way the BlackCat forum is one of the friendliest communities I have encountered and well worth a visit before deciding on a cutter
The BlackCat Cougar is the Porsche of cutters, it may be more expensive than a Craft Robo but the difference in quality and ability far outweighs the extra cost. If you are thinking about purchasing a cutter then think very hard before making the same mistake I did by opting for the cheaper machine, if you obtain a Craft Robo/ wishblade type machine you may well find your creativity being limited by the machine, if you purchase a Cougar you will find the machine driving you to producing bigger and better things.
If, after reading that, you are still heading for a cheaper machine, there is the Craft Robo/ Wishblade machines.
The Craft Robo is a computer plotter/ cutter which can be used to cut vinyl sheets, paper, card etc and is mostly used for crafts such as card making/ scrapbooking etc.
It can perform normal cuts such as cutting vinyl lettering for signs etc or print & cuts (contour cuts) where an image is first printed using a normal computer printer and then the image is cut from the sheet with the cutter – also known as digital die cuts. Some of the Craft Robo range do not do print & cut so if you are just thinking about obtaining a machine and want this facility make sure the machine supports it.
Cutting wise the machine is designed to cut material up to 0.3mm thick, this range can be extended with various tricks and cutting multiple times but your mileage may vary. The blade depth is set by fitting different colour caps to the end of the blade holder which give 0.1, 0.2 & 0.3mm of cutting depth, but depending on the density of the material it may not be possible to actually cut to these depths in one go because the maximum cutting force is only 230 grammes. The cutting speed is also quite low with a maximum of 100mm/s.
The Craft Robo/ Wishblade cutters come with RoboMaster software which is basic, very basic, if you are at all interested in creating your own designs you will very quickly find this software too limiting. I found the software pretty close to useless within a matter of hours, it is really a next to useless software bundle that is going to mean you will need to buy an upgrade pretty soon after buying the cutter! There are other software packages available for these machines which will give you more editing capability, but they are not free so this closes the gap between the cost of the CR & the Cougar.
The Craft Robo/ Wishblade machines are basically home/ hobby machines, not suited to extended use, and only really effective for quite thin materials. If you just want to cut a bit of light weight card once in a while then they are fine, if you want to cut lots of card, or heavy card/ dense materials you will find they are far from ideal.
If you are thinking about obtaining a craft robo, or already have one but are not a member, then you should join the Yahoo Wishblade Group. The group is an invaluable source of tutorials, cutting files, help, support and friendly banter for a range of cutter machines not just the Wishblade The members include some extremely talented crafters with a wealth of experience they are all to happy to share. Joining the group also gives you access to the www.GSDfiles.com which is a superb archive of free cutting files, fonts, tutorials and all things cutter related.
The cutting files for the Craft Robo are also usable by Wishblade cutters so if you have a Wishblade you can use my Craft Robo cutting files too.
I will be adding tutorials and cutting files to my website which you will be able to find using the appropriate subjects in the Subject navigation links in the sidebar (Craft Cutter – Tutorial/ Cut File/ Print & Cut) I am also working on coding a sort of gallery page with thumbnails of the example pictures which link to the full size image and also provide a quick description plus link to the article & zip file, it may take some time though so for now you will have to do it the hard way 
The cutting files on this site will be in the form of a ZIP archive, most of which will contain the cutting file in Craft Robo/ Wishblade GSD format and Adobe Illustrator AI format or SVG (Inkscape) format. The zip file will also contain a ReadMe.HTML file, example photos in JPG format and other files as required.
Please note, I am producing these files for the benefit of the craft cutter community, and unless indicated otherwise in the ReadMe.html file they are:
Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.
You are free to modify the files as you like, but if you wish to distribute modified files in any manner they must be licensed under the same or similar licence and also be attributed to the original work and myself by including the following line:
Based on an original design by Louise-Paisley (www.bratpack.org.uk)
If you find any of my tutorials or files useful or have any suggestions regarding them please take the time to leave a comment on the relevant page to let myself and others know
Hi, boy am i glad i found you as you seem to know your stuff. Im new to this but im looking for a machine that will enable me to download fonts from my pc and print and cut onto vinyl. Any advise would be very much appreciated. Thankyou.
The Craft Robo, Wishblade, or Cougar would all allow you to do this.
The software for all the machines use the standard true type fonts installed on your computer and will cut them on vinyl or card.
The main issues are how much editing you want to do and what materials you want to cut. The Craftrobo/ wishblade software is VERY limited, and they will struggle to cut thicker card or dense material.
I would think carefully about not only what you want to do with the machine now, but what you may well end up wanting to do later once you have ‘played’ around with it and realised it’s potential.
I would have no hesitation recommending the BlackCat Cougar, as I said on this page the after sales support alone is worth the asking price and it is really a VERY capable machine.
If all you will ever do is cut a few vinyl letters up to about 7.5 inches high max, then the Craft robo/ wishblade machines will work out a bit cheaper.
Louise
Hello. Please can you help me. I run childrens messy play art and craft groups and spend my evening cutting out lots of different shapes and feel that a cutting machine would help me. The problem is I dont know anything about all the different ones available and was hoping for some advice. I need to be able to create my own templates and down load templates from the internet and also cut about 100 shapes a time. Any ideas as to what would best suit me. Thank you in advance.
Wendy
Sorry for late reply but I have been rather busy lately.
Regarding a cutter it is one of those “you get what you pay for” issues, the cheaper models like the craftrobo and wishblade are OK but limited in the size and materials that can be cut.
I have a craft robo which is sat collecting dust basically, it was fine when I first got it but then quickly found it just could not cope very well with the card I wanted to cut and the size limitation of A4 was too small and the software was absolutely next to useless for design work so I bought the cougar.
The Cougar I have is 15 inches wide and with the supplied software can cut up to 24 inches x 24 inches (well 15 inches by 24 inches on my machine) and it can cut a much wider range of materials, fabric, fun foam, thick card, shrink plastic, vinyl, metal foils… the list goes on and on. Dawn at thyme graphics is an absolute saint when it comes to after sales service, she will literally stop at nothing to help you if you have a problem.
Buying a Cougar also gives you full access to the blackcat forum where there are lots of people, including myself, who help ease new owners into cutting with the Cougar. If you have a specific template you require posting the request on the forum will undoubtedly result in one of us either having it to share or making it for you. The Cougar cutters use Inkscape (a free but very very good design software) which has thousands of free templates available on the web and hundreds on the blackcat forum free for download.
I would strongly recommend that you give Dawn at thyme graphics a call and discuss the matter with her, she will give you honest advice and is very knowledgeable with most cutters including Craft robo/ wishblade etc. She will bend over backwards to help you make the right choice but won’t pressure you into it at all.
Contact details can be found on her website http://www.thymegraphics.co.uk/contact.asp Also ask her for guest membership of the blackcat forum, you will then be able to ask other owners about the Cougar and cutting in general
Thank you for you review, I have been trying to plough through the mine field of cutting machines as this will be a birthday present from my family. You have given me all the informations I was looking for and also things I wanted but did’nt know I could get with a cutting machine such as embossing, which I find fustratating with the little hand machines.
Thanks very much once again
Hi April,
I am glad my quick review helped you choose a machine.
If you don’t mind me asking what have you decided on? If it is a Cougar you will be very happy with it I can assure you
If you do decide on a Cougar let Dawn at Thyme graphics know you saw the review on Loupy’s website 
I hope you have many hours of happy digital craft cutting, better do a good spring clean before you get one though because they are quite addictive and normal domestic chores seem to slip away into the background LOL
Louise
Hi,
I have been looking at the craft robo/pro but I am really put off my the carry mats I have had an xyron which lost its tack way to quick and now I am reserved about the alternatives as I don’t want to be replacing cutting mats it gets expensive. Someone told me that I would need to change a cutting mat every 4 months/100 cuts. Just wondering if you could advise me on what you have found.
Also can you get on none full sheets of paper?
Thanks for letting me pick your brain.
T
The craft robo is toy like compared to a Cougar, I don’t know much about the craft robo pro but in all honestly I would doubt it measures up to the Cougar.
Regarding cutting mats:
You do not need to buy new mats when they loose their tac. Often washing them with a drop of washing up liquid in a cup of water and leaving them over night to dry will restore the stickiness, when that fails you can just spray them with a re positionable adhesive and they are good as new. You only need to replace the mat if it becomes badly scored by cutting with too much pressure (The cougar on full force will easily cut right through a cutting mat).
I am not sure how many times you can cut on a mat before it loses tac as it would depend on the material you are cutting. If you are cutting a more fibrous paper/ card then the mat will lose tac much quicker than if you are cutting a smooth shiny paper/ card. It all depends on how much fibre gets permanently stuck to the mat.
I don’t buy cutting mats at all any more, I buy heavy duty template plastic sheets and spray them with re positionable adhesive to make my own, very much cheaper and I think they are better than bought mats. The adhesive I use is Krylon Easy Tac 7020 and the tin will refresh a mat hundreds of times for about £5
Using offcuts of paper/ card/ vinyl on the Cougar is very easy indeed, you put it on the carrier and load it into the machine, then you use the controls on the Cougar to move the blade to the front right corner and press the origin button. The Cougar then starts cutting at that exact spot. With the craft robo it is not as easy as you cannot change the cutting origin at all so you have to make sure the paper is positioned correctly before cutting.
My advice would be to contact Dawn at Thyme graphics via phone or email and discuss your requirements with her, she will not attempt to pressure you into a purchase but will be more than happy to give you honest free advice.
Personally I would recommend a Cougar over a craft robo. The Cougar will not let you down at all, the software it uses is fantastic and you will be able to do very much more with it than the software that comes with a CR, the Cougar machine is a professional cutter at an affordable price and will cut practically anything you throw at it. Yes it is more expensive, but it is worth every penny, and you may well find the cheaper option becoming frustrating with its limitations very quickly.
How glad I found your page, I was about to sell my craftrobo but now after you detailed explaination on how to use it, I have just this minute got it out of its dusty box, many many thanks for the tutorial
your in friendship from N. I reland. Shireen
Just a quick note to say that an Adobe Illustrator plugin is available free of charge from the Craft Robo website.
This allows you to create your design within Illustrator and then send it directly to the Craft Robo which removes the limitation of the poor/very simple RoboMaster software.
Sadly this doesn’t help the problem of cutting right to the edge of the paper/card…
Yes that is true Bob, however if you start adding the price of illustrator into the equation the low cost solution is getting much closer to the price of the professional one
Hi, Louise. Thank you for your review. I live in Nicaragua where I have asmall business of handmade gift boxes and gift bags http://www.facebook.com/kraftesania. I have an urge to buy a cutting machine and the Cougar seems to be what I´m looking for, but I´m not sure if it cuts and scores al the seme time so that boxes come out ready to glue. Do you know where can I download an instrutions manual? I would appreciate your help so much as I´m planning to buy this cutter on my next trip to US. Thanks.
I sent you an email directly with a long winded answer, the quick answer is yes you can cut, score and MUCH MUCH more
Just looking at buying a cougar have not read a bad review. Would love the long winded answer to the cut and score that you sent to Louise as this is one of the features I like about the cougar.
thankyou
I am looking at buying the cougar for creating quilt applique….do you have any experience in cutting fabric…mostly quilting cotton and some felt.
Thanks in advance for any information you may be able to provide
Tammy
I don’t myself, I was intending cut fabric but the idea got shelved due to a million and one other things I want to do LOL
I know there are people who do cut fabric, I think depending on the fabric It may have to be stiffened first, and cutting felt is possible too as I have seen examples on the forum.
You really should contact dawn @ thymegraphics.co.uk (remove spaces) and ask for details of and guest membership to the BlackCat Forum, you will be able to see examples of things you can cut and also ask the members questions.. They are an extremely friendly bunch and will help with any questions you might have.
If you buy you get full access to the forum, it is HUGE, as a guest you only get to see a fraction of it. There are thousands of templates, if you need a template you can almost guarentee someone will have it and share it for free, the forum is worth as much as the machine!!!
I am looking for didgital cutting machine but can not decide between your Blackcat Cougar and the Lynex can you help me
Ken thank you
Lots more i would like to ask as i have always wanted to get into this side of craft and card making
Ken thank you
It all depends on what you intend to do with it.
The two machines are pretty much the same, the only differences are the force and number of steps for force and speed. The Cougar has 950g or force the lynx has 500g, basically the Cougar will cut thicker materials in one pass such as 1.5mm chipboard. You can still cut thicker materials with the lynx but it may require 2 or 3 passes, so if you would only occasionally need to cut chipboard or similar heavy materials then the lynx may well serve your needs.
Either way is is a significant purchase, I would REALLY urge you to contact Dawn (dawn@thymegraphics.co.uk) and ask her for details of the blackcat forum and a guest membership and ask as many questions as you can before taking the plunge – there are hundreds of very devoted crafters on there who will be more than happy to explain everything you could wish to know.
If you buy you get full access to the forum, it is HUGE, as a guest you only get to see a fraction of it. There are thousands of templates, if you need a template you can almost guarantee someone will have it and share it for free, the forum is worth as much as the machine!!!
I just saw the Cougar machine on creatandcraft and it nudged me to look at available machines as I’ve been toying with getting, (or saving for) one and had only seen the cartridge based machines before, which don’t appeal to me as I think it mean you are forever having to buy more and more cartridges and I cannot afford to do that.
I count myself lucky to have found your site from my first ‘google’ as you have put so much helpful information on here. I must admit that the price of the cougar is rather daunting – I am partially disabled due to having M.E. for more years than I want to think about – so my finances are very restricted but I may ask for money for Christmas and birthday etc.
I am going to email Dawn and ask for a guest membership to the blackcat forum before I make any decision but I do feel drawn towards the Cougar and it’s lack of limitations. I use graphic packages to create elements of may of my cards, as I can’t afford to buy all the necessary dies and other items I would need to enable me to make the things I want. I mainly make cards but would like to be able to make boxes and other, more ambitious items.
I have a large family, including 10 grandchildren and numerous great nieces and nephews – all the children, nieces and nephews are adults now but I like to make things for them too and I try to make individual cards for all my family and friends. Christmas is a real challenge too as I made all my cards for that last year, for the first time – they weren’t ALL individual designs but a lot of them were. My illness is often the biggest limitation but I think I would find it all much easier with a cutter – You can see I am talking myself into this.
I’ve been far too long-winded already, so will cease and desist now, except to say a big THANK YOU, for all the information.
You will not regret joining the blackcat family
Hi
like all of the above , and was thinking about a craft robo. I have a cricut imagine
But I saw the cougar on create and craft and was intrigued. Im so glad I found your blog
with so much informatiion im sold I think its got to be the cougar. and im glad I did not waste
my money because these are all substantial buys at one time or another. I have made templates
by cutting out card but need a machine to do the work. thanks
and I will add you to my crafting buddies
The Blackcat machines are incredible
As I say to everyone though, ask Dawn for guest membership of the forum before you purchase. Ask the members as many questions as you can think of, everyone will be happy to help. These machines are quite expensive so it is best to be absolutely sure it is what you need before investing.
Hello and many thanks for your kindness and for the help you provide to all of us looking for info in these confusing matter. I’m writing you from México and I have cero experience with die cutting machines. Still, I need a machine that can cut and draw shrink plastic. Precisely what I need is to be able to make some pre-cut, pre-draw pieces of this material to make charms for necklaces and bracelets. So my machine will have to allow me to use my own designs, use files available in the web, cut shrink plastic, use ink that will be permanent on this material, out-line and draw, make many cuts and do it fast, and so on. (Sure hope I have explained myself). Could you please give me some advice as to what machine you consider proper for the job? My best regards, Marisol
You will be able to use any of the Cougar machines to cut Shrink plastic.
As for drawing, that would depend on the design. You can use permanent marker pens in the cougar cutter to draw your design, however you would need to manually change pen colour if you needed more than one colour, providing the plastic is not removed from the machine this would be quite a simple matter of swapping pens and selecting the next colour to draw.
I would strongly encourage you to contact Dawn at http://www.thymegraphics.co.uk/contact.asp and ask her to grant you guest membership to the blackcat forum where there are hundreds of very helpful crafters who will answer any questions you may have regarding the cutters, software and how to draw and cut shrink plastic
Thanks a lot Louise!!! I have contacted Dawn and she has answered. You 2 are great!!