Help with Intarsia

[Jim Rodman]

Hi Folks
I have done some other Intarsia projects before the “Eagle “those being, Sunday Hat, and two Teddy Bears. The Sunday Hat was segmentation and the Bears where Intarsia.
What I am facing on my current project is that the edges of the pattern do not fit that closely to each other. I need advice on how Intarsia should be cut out.

What I do at the moment is take the image and import it into CorelDraw. Trace each piece of the image, making sure that all lines match to the other image next to it.
Once the image segments have been traced the hole pattern is then exploded so that all segments are on there own. Then I take each segment and cut it out.
Now that all segments are cut out I take them and mate them together. The problem that I have with this method is that the cuts do not allways fit tight together.

Is there a member that works with Intarsia that could walk me through the proper method of doing Intarsia?

Do I keep cutting the way I am or should I cut on piece and apply that to the next piece of stock and trace its edge to make the second segment and so on.
I have attached some images to help understand what I am looking at.
Jim for Ontario

[Janette]

I think what may possibly be happening is your pieces are ending up the wrong size once exploded. Occassionally I have this trouble in pattern wizzard (program I use). Sometimes if I remove an adjoining line - it shifts the line of the pattern piece I'm going for. Try printing your pattern as a whole several times and cutting them up instead of exploding them. That should help solve that problem - if that's what's happening.

[Bob in Whitby]

Jim:
For all intarsia patterns, I make several 8 1/2 x 11 copies to capture all portions of the origional pattern. No portion of the origional pattern is ever enlarged. Many sections overlap but that is OK. All of these copies then allow me to cut out each piece seperately. When I cut a piece out I purposely cut into the adjacent piece so that I can use the actual line to cut on. When I do an adjacent piece, I also cut into adjacent pieces but I also cut on the same line again. This is a real help especially when two colors of wood are adjacent - which is usually the case. After cutting adjacent pieces. if they are not mated as tight as I want then I simply hold them together and recut between them with a 3 or 5 blade to bring them together. I have attached a pic of a project that I am working on to hopefully show you what I do. Hope this helps.

I see you live in Ontario. Is this Ontario Canada or a city called Ontario in the U.S.? I live in Whitby Ontario Canada - where are you?
Cheers
Bob

[jim_mex]

Hi Jim - could be I'm looking at this from a different angle, particularly as I'm a complete newbie to Intarsia, but maybe this comment will help.

PS - It could also be that this is similar to what Bob is saying - so sorry if I'm duplicating stuff

When i first started cutting Intarsia and Segmentation pieces my cutting was horrible and caused bad fitting. One problem was that I first started on Segmentation work but dived in feet first without reading up on the subject and as a result got the technique all wrong and cut all my pieces individually as in Intarsia. To compensate for resultant badly fitting pieces I used the following approach:

First I printed lots of pattern copies - note that I print my copies in red ink.
I cut my first piece out using the first pattern copy.
I superimposed the cut piece on top of a fresh copy laying it as exactly in place as possible.
With a very sharply pointed 2H pencil I carefully drew the outline of the piece against the adjoining edge of the next piece I wanted to cut. This allowed me to check for any discrepancy between the pattern line of the next piece and the actual line of the cut piece. Note - heres where printing the originals in red helps so you can easily distinguish the black penciled line when check for discrepancies.

If a discrepancy showed (and it often did!) I then cut the next piece to the new penciled line along with the rest of its pattern line (that part not yet in contact with any cut pieces) - Note I always try and cut to the outside edge of the line to get a really tight fit with the previous cut piece allowing for a minimum of light sanding to close up the fit

Having now got two pieces matched up I superimposed them on another pattern copy and repeated the check for errors on with the next pieces to be cut, again adjusting my cut to the penciled line if necessary.

To save on having x-amount of pattern copies I found myself starting cutting different sections around the design so for example i might cut 3 or 4 pieces from opposing sides of the first pattern copy and work in on these on the next copy if the design permits

Logically i tended to finish by cutting the center pieces last but I could just have easily worked down from top to bottom with the same techniques

I'll be honest by saying I don't know if this is acceptable practise, it was just a way to give me better results and seemed to make sense.

Only worry i have now is whether I've confused you more - LOL!

[groverd]

I use tracing paper and just trace a portion of the pattern, using red ink, i cut a piece then cut the next using the edge of the paper as the line. For me it works because i do not have to worry about cutting the same linw exactly the same twice. first cut is "close enough" the mating piece i knucke down on and make it as perfect as i can. After i get the portion cut i traced, i put them together with a dab of hot glue then trace end edge for the next portions.. . Hope this is understandable

[KtownScroller]

Nice advice Bob. You have a lot of good ideas.

[ecarve]

Welcome Jim, when using Corel check your snap to setting to see if the boxes for snap to object ond or snap to grid are checked. These setting can change the position of lines in the project. Also watch how much you use smoothing when tracing. Play with these settings a bit and you will see what I mean. Smoothing will smooth out some of the curves in the curved lines. I also use the help index window to see how to use the various settings.
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