Print-and-Cut: Love You A Latte

It's been a while since I last made a Print-and-Cut (PNC) card. To be exact, the last PNC card that I posted was this Thanksgiving card that I made back in November 2010. I chuckle when I think of my earlier PNC cards. I was pretty annoyed by the concept of the Cricut Imagine and the hype that surrounded it that I decided to make a whole bunch of PNC-type cards (Faux-magine? LOL!) without the Imagine. 

Once I got the cards out of my system, and I was satisfied that I didn't need nor want the Imagine, I stopped making PNC cards. Cards that are partially printed are pretty to look at but they are not really my thing. I really prefer making the traditional paper-pieced cards. 

The release of Make-the-Cut v.3.0 last November included a Print capability. Kay of CleverSomeday made this quick video to illustrate the concept of PNC using Make-the-Cut. 

There are many ways to do a PNC card with Make-the-Cut. From my low-tech double-sided tape method, to Kay's Hinge method, to the cutting on color blocks method, MTC's print capability has allowed us to create PNC cards not only without the Imagine but it has also enabled us to do so without any other software that has a print capability (like Adobe Photoshop).

Today's card was made using a new and exciting technique of PNC. Instead of pixel-tracing a textured graphic and creating the layers from it, I combined the graphic image with it's SVG version. 

 
In other words, I brought the texture onto the mat and stacked the SVG version over that texture. For this card, I brought in the GRAPHIC image of the cup (from LD's Sweet Nothings GRAPHIC set),and then I imported the SVG of that same cup (the Sweet Nothings SVG set). I stacked the two together to make sure that they align and I adjusted them until they are the same size before printing and cutting the layers out.

I did waste some ink printing the image 3 times (for cutting out 3 different layers) but I thought it was well worth it considering that I did not waste time trying to pixel trace and creating the layers from that trace.

Cutting out was a breeze as I had previously figured out the paper alignment for my Cricut. I took less than 20mins to make this card. In fact, I took a much longer time writing this post up to this point. Having the SVG version of the image makes PNC so much easier especially when the graphic matches and fits within the SVG perfectly as in this case.

By the way, the card base was also printed. I used a pattern from the Sweet Nothings Paper Pack and layered the sentiment (also from the Sweet Nothings GRAPHIC set) over it.

Even though today's post isn't a full PNC tutorial, I hope that those of you who are already familiar with, or have made your own PNC cards, will find today's tips useful. 

Have a super weekend, everyone!