Some images from the making of 'Decisions':
The box it is based on. I liked the curly 'D' but couldn't find a similar font, so had to draw it using vectors. Ick.
What the file looks like for laser cutting. Red areas for engraving, blue lines for cutting. There is no easy way to delete overlapping lines so that they don't get cut twice over, so laying out the file is the part that takes the most time - Illustrator notoriously defies all common sense!
The pieces and box, fresh from the laser cutter. The MDF was masked with blue tape before cutting, so that the engraved text could be sealed and painted without bleeding.
A few different tests with colouring the pieces. Left to right: Inked with printmaking ink and a roller (too much bleed); painted in acrylic (too shiny/tacky/sticky); edges filed on the right 2, tried inking using screen printing (no luck), and one successful attempt using thin layers of eco-friendly ink and a roller. I found that it worked better to seal the edges with GAC but not to prime the MDF.
One of the measurements on the box's edge was 1mm off, and this was enough to make me start over! It also bothered me that the wooden box opened on the left side instead of the right. And the sliding lid would sometimes get stuck, so I wanted some angled/tapered edges to guide it into position. In hindsight I also realised 'Colourings' and 'Flavourings' should just be 'Colours' and 'Flavours, so I made another file...
Above: trying to decide on a new lid design
And there we have it. Decisions: Version 2!
