We are finishing up the Trace panel today by exploring the options of Magnet Trace. The Magnet trace is a feature that is unlocked when you have the Designer Edition upgrade to the software.
You will find this feature on the 3rd tab of the Tracing Panel, that is found on the right side of v4.
While there are not many options on this Panel, it still has so much potential. Let’s take a look.
- Magnet Trace – Select your object to trace & then “Magnet Trace” is available. Click on it and you will get a red circle with a red dot in it. This is your trace tool.
- Size – Change the size of your Magnet Trace tool by using the slider bar, the arrow up or down keys or highlighting the numbers and typing new numbers in.
- Trace – After your Magnet trace is complete, click here to create your cut lines. You can see the red cut lines around my flower below.
Note: this photo is on the Send tab, to get the bold red cut lines to show up.
- Trace & Detach – Choose this option if you want your design to be detached from the background. This works great if you are wanting to do a Print and Cut project with your design.
This is a really neat feature and it took me a bit to think of what I would do with it. You can see that the edges of my design are not perfect and I would do some clean up on this image. So let’s do a little bit of point editing to clean it up.
First, check out these edit points, double click on the image to bring up the Point Editing window. All those little dots, those are edit points. Now, edit points can be intimidating but they can also be fun to play with. If we were to cut this as it is, it will sound funny as it cuts because the Silhouette machine has to hit every single one of those edit points when it cuts.
Let’s zoom in and check out the edges.
As you can see there are some edges that can be cleaned up.
You are able to move and delete edit points to your desired effect. I can say that this cleanup took only a few minutes. The more you play with the edit points, the better you will understand what they do. Just by moving the edit points in towards the flower, I eliminated the excess background that the trace grabbed.
You can select multiple edit points by holding down the Shift key and dragging your mouse over the ones you want to highlight and then you can move them all at once or delete them all at once.
What a difference a little edit point clean up makes.
Now here are all the edit points after I’ve cleaned it up. Since this is a flower with lots of curves, it will still have many edit points so you can keep the realistic look of the flower.
But, it has a lot less than the original trace.
Now, I’m sure as you read this you have asked yourself, what would you do with this? I’ll be honest, I did the same when I started looking into it because I have never played with this before. And now ideas are hitting me about all the possibilities.
If you do not have Photoshop or access to photo editing software, you can use the Silhouette software and this is one way to grab something from a photo.
Or you could use your own photos that you’ve taken and make Print and Cut stickers. These are photos of flowers I took at a friend’s poolside last summer. I think they would make gorgeous stickers that you could add to your planner or calendar to enjoy everyday.
To learn more on how to set up a Print and Cut check out the Page Setup Panel – Registration Marks post.
You can find all of the Let’s Explore v4 post HERE.
I hope you enjoyed exploring the Magnet Trace feature in the Silhouette Studio v4 software. This program is amazing and I learn new things every day!
Enjoy !
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Thanks for being clear! I tried this tool the other day and could. Not get it!
I had to play with it a bit to understand it and then I was blown away…. so many ideas!
Thanks so much, very clear and helpful. I found that I had to do the trace and detach before I edited points, it may have just been the image I was working with. I’m going to love this tool.
You are welcome! Thank you for reading!
Yes, for it to work correctly, you will need to trace and detach the image first and then start on edit points. It will also make it easier to see, once that background is moved away from the object.
I tried to use the magnet tool by tracing with my mouse. Is there a better tool then my mouse where I can do a better trace.
I have a trackball mouse so it has a little more control or you could try a tablet like a Wacom tablet……. I think no matter what tool you are using, it takes practice…..
The magnetic trace functionality has stopped working for me. It was working and now will only do a straight line. I opened a ticket with silhouette and they haven’t even bothered to respond after more than a week. Any ideas?
What version of the software are you using? Under Help > About Silhouette – what are all the numbers?
The fastest way to reach Silhouette support is through their chat feature on the website. They are open M-F 8 am-4 pm MST.
I am looking to ‘cheat’ an offset, so I looked into the magnet trace feature. I kerned a phrase and want to offset it so I can cut the original letters AND cut a slightly larger background to place the letters on. Thank you so much for your post. I am new to the magnet trace feature…. When I do a magnet trace, the trace line appears in green. For the life of me, I can’t figure out how to make that green line a red ‘cut’ line. You briefly mention it in your post, but I can’t get it to turn into a cut line. Maybe it’s not possible?
Are you clicking on the Trace button on the very bottom of the panel to complete the trace?