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I was thinking about getting a Wishblade, then I saw the ads in the magazines for Pazzles' cutters. I wasn't able to find too much info on them, but I just went to their web site and saw the prices on them (so I'm thinking I probably can't afford it anyway).
Just checking to see if anyone has actually used a Pazzles cutter or both and and can sa whether it is a good buy or better than a wishblade.
I have a pazzles and can cut out any font on my pc and tons of free files out there. Pretty simple to use if you know your way around a pc. It can cut through cardstock without a problem but not chipboard unless you get the expensive one which i think i paid near $600 for mine or a little over but that was a year ago and i am sure they have gone down in price.
My friend has the Wishblade and loves it. It was way to expensive for my taste. I have never heard of the other machine you mentioned. Have you considered the Cuttlebug? I have it and love it. Much more affordable and does not require an tech know how.
I have a Craft Robo (same machine as Wishblade) and love it. as far as I know the biggest difference between pazzles and CR is the price. I know that they also come with different software, and don't know what the differences are though. also CR has an optical eye for doing print and cut things (this is a neat feature!). pazzles doesn't have an optical eye, but I hear some people have figured out how to do print and cut anyway. I looked into pazzles also b-4 making my decission, but decided on CR because it was $399 vs $650. you can now get CR for $339 at www.scrapbookdiecutter.com
HTH
Michelle
Thanks so much for all of your comments! Glad to read good things on both. I'm a computer junkie / techie so I'd rather go this route where I don't need to keep buying dies or cartridges. I'm a shopping addict so it would be like stamp sets where I would feel the compulsive need to buy it all and not even have the time to touch it (because I spend so much time shopping ). So in the long run, this would be more affordable I think.
Michelle: I know there is a large user group on Yahoo or somewhere that has a lot of templates for the wishblade. Can you use it on the Craft Robo? What do you mean by the Optical Eye? I thought pazzles was also a cutter so doesn't it do print and cut as well?
Michelle: I know there is a large user group on Yahoo or somewhere that has a lot of templates for the wishblade. Can you use it on the Craft Robo? What do you mean by the Optical Eye? I thought pazzles was also a cutter so doesn't it do print and cut as well?
Thanks!
Amy
Amy,
yes, CR can use WB files. some WB files are in a differnt format, but there is a program that can convert them easily. so CR and WB can pretty much share all their files.
on the optical eye thing, you can print registration marks that the CR will read so it knows where to cut on your print and cut items. it's kinda hard to explain. but it uses some sotr of gizmo that they call the optical eye to read the registration marks. that's as much as I know, but it works like a charm, and it's pretty cool.
I really don't know much about pazzles except that it costs more and doesn't have an optical eye, so I don't know how the print and cut works. but I've heard that some pazzles users can still do the print and cut. I just don't know how it works. it's still a good machine. I just couldn't see spending more $$ for something that as far as I could tell did the same thing.
Thanks for all the great info! I am also looking at wishblade/CR/pazzles and wasn't sure witch one I wanted. Now I think that I am leaning more towards the CR. Now just to save up the money for it!
Yes, thank you! I can't wait to get one now! Although now the delimma will be between this or a wide format printer. :-D
I have a cannon I9900 printer which is a wide format printer I love it - i bought the warranty with mine at comp usa and brought it in after 2 years because the heads were dirty and they gave me a brand new one. I love their warranties
I have a cannon I9900 printer which is a wide format printer I love it - i bought the warranty with mine at comp usa and brought it in after 2 years because the heads were dirty and they gave me a brand new one. I love their warranties
Oh nice, I was eyeing between the Epson and the HP mostly because I think the Canon was the first one out so I figured they've made some improvements over time.
Our LSS has a pazzles. You tell her what you want and she cuts it. One feature she just figured out how to do was make small scrapbooks which have die cut letters at the the end of each page. So the book is like 4" wide and 12" long. The one is saw spelled "skiing". She used double sided paper. The pages come out perf'ed so they the letters space out nicely. VERY COOL. It is hard to explain. There are a whole host of words that are programmed.
It took me the longest time to figure out what LSS meant. I think the concept you mentioned was really neat!! I'll have to figure this out some more. I think for the price difference I'd have to lean towards the CR.
I'm also looking at the wishblade/pazzles/craft robo. What confuses me is that all I see about the craft robo is that you have to print whatever it is before you cut. Can you just cut something from colored cs instead of printing it on white? I feel like I'm missing something.
Annieworm,
I don't own the WB, CR or pazzles, but have been looking at them for a long time and have been reading the posts on the yahoo groups for a couple years.
There's a few more minor "steps" and details in the following description, but my explanation will give you the gist of what the WB or CR can do. From my understanding, the WB and CR have an additional feature that allows you to do print and cut due to it's ability to scan registration marks with it's optical eye that are printed on the cardstock or paper first. For example, if you were to find a really cute color clipart that you want to use on a card or scrapbook page, you download that file and print that out with registration marks from a program like Illustrator on a normal piece of cardstock or paper from your regular printer. Then you open the file in the WB or CR program, insert that cardstock/paper into the WB or CR, instruct it to look for the registration marks and tell it to cut. It will find the registration marks and cut around the clipart that you just printed from your normal printer. I'm not 100% positive about the Pazzles (due to it's price, I haven't been following this tool very closely), but I believe all three machines have a pen holder (I know the WB and CR do for sure), where you can use the WB or CR directly to outline your clipart or font and then cut it out at the same time without having to remove your paper. Then you can color in your cutout however you want.
If you just want a just a diecut or letters for a title, for example, you open up the file in the WB or CR program and cut it out on any cardstock. So it's not limited to just white paper. You can use any true-type font out there, just click "outline" for the letters, and it cuts it out for you. There are tons of free shapes files that WB and CR users share with one another. Other WB and CR users charge a small fee for some of their creations. From my understanding, it does take some time (but not long once you get the hang of it) to find a dingbat or clipart, trace around it and save it to a file format that the WB or CR uses to cut with - hence the small charge for some files from other WB or CR users. WB is coming out with new software in March that will apparently simplify this whole process considerably, perhaps I will purchase one then after hearing some reviews about it.
Sorry to be so long-winded, but I hope that helped you out with your question.
-June
WB and CR are the same machine, WB just has the WB label added. For these machines, you do not have to print anything if you just want to cut out something on cardstock. The print and cut feature is for when you want to print a design like clipart as was mentioned above. Any TTF file can be cut with these with no added steps. There are many dingbat files that are TTF files, and these cut the same as fonts. No additional software is needed, just the software that comes with the machine. You just click on the button for text, pick your font or dingbat file, and use the keyboard to select the letters/dingbats you wish to cut while having the "outline" box marked. The machine will cut them out just like that. You don't have to use the optical eye or print anything for that. If you use some sort of clipart that is not a TTF file, you would need to trace around it yourself. CR software now has an autotrace feature that is supposed to come out in March for WB. CR is sold by Graphtec, and WB by Xyron. Xyron gets the WB from Graphtec and has the WB label on it. The two companies do different things with their software, and usually CR software is a little ahead of WB when new features are introduced. The new WB software is supposed to have the abiblity to make scripted letters connect to form one word for cutting in a single piece. The CR software does not do that to my knowledge. I have the WB and bought it prior to the CR being sold in the US. If I were buying one today, I would probably buy the CR.
I just got a wishblade for Christmas and was playing with it last night and I have a few questions. How do I get it to cut out a template--I have a template (jpg file) from the Stampin' Up website that I want to cut out. So far the only way I have been able to figure it out is to sit and sort of "trace it" with the lines, however, when it cut it wasn't very straight. Any tricks to doing it different? Do you know if it will cut 12x12 paper?
Also, have any of you looked/own the Klic-N-Kut?
DCNM,
I don't own one (yet), so I can't help you. I'll bump this up and hopefully someone who owns one can help out. Or, if I might suggest (I hope it's ok to do), perhaps you can do a search for "wishblade forums" and register with one to ask your question. There's some good ones out there. (Again, I hope this didn't overstep any rules.)
Annieworm,
You're very welcome! Like I mentioned before, I don't have any of these yet, but have been looking at them for a long time. Maybe this is the year!
I just got a wishblade for Christmas and was playing with it last night and I have a few questions. How do I get it to cut out a template--I have a template (jpg file) from the Stampin' Up website that I want to cut out. So far the only way I have been able to figure it out is to sit and sort of "trace it" with the lines, however, when it cut it wasn't very straight. Any tricks to doing it different? Do you know if it will cut 12x12 paper?
Also, have any of you looked/own the Klic-N-Kut?
Thanks! jc
I just bought a KNK--not out of the box yet. But I do know that there are some Yahoo groups for the Wishblade and these different machines, and they are very helpful to each other with using them.
If you want to know any more about the KNK, Sandy McCauley (email addy is [email protected]) is extremely helpful & knowledgeable. Actually she has owned or used just about all of these machines.
Happy cutting!!
__________________ Melody ****** That's Punkin in my avatar--my sweet little shadow--I really miss her!
Hi! I got the Craft Robo about a month ago and have just been playing around with it for the past couple weeks and I love it! And I still haven't even tried the print and cut feature yet.
Someone earlier in the thread was asking about using WB files with the Craft Robo and about the software that converts them. You don't need the software to convert WB files anymore to CR files. If you download the newest version of Robomaster (2.4, I believe), you can open WB files directly into Craft Robo. I bought my Craft Robo at paperthreads.com and they have a forum there where I learned everything I know (which isn't much!) about the Craft Robo - there are some very knowledgable ladies there that are happy to help.
There is also a program called Inkscape, which is free to download; this program allows you to create welded words (like for titles and such) and even put clip art in the title and attach it - you can also create mats for your titles. It also lets you open up clip art in the program and there is a function that will make an outline of the clip art for you to cut out. It's very neat and pretty easy to use. I'm still learning though!
Thanks Chris! I finally purchase a pink wishblade a month ago, and I'm still working through all the tutorials to learn more about it. It'll be great when I can create things on my own. I have downloaded free files and have cut them out successfully, so I am off to visit your blog. TFS!!! -June
I am taking classes from the Scrappin Path for the pink wishblade. They have been so helpful. Also on yahoo there a few groups that are really helpful.
Do any of you know if the CRobo will do embossing, bleaching, needle work holes, and pen work?
I saw the Pazzles at a scrapbook convention and it had all these things that it could do so I wonder if the CRobo can do this too.
thanks,
Marian
I believe that the CR Pro can do these things. it's like $1000 or so, but it can also cut up to 12" wide too.
I also believe that Klick N Kut can do this, don't know the price though.
but I don't have either machine, just the regular CR, so this is all just what I've read.
the regular CR doesn't emboss that I know of, but can do pen work, and I guess if you can get a bleach pen that fits the pen holder it could do that too. and I don't see any reason why you couldn't cut needle working holes in CS or paper.
Wishblade or Pazzles?
Wishblade Question
