Butterfly card

[Darren Null]

It's a simple idea, and only slightly tricky in execution:

You cut the card shape, and at the same time burn through the 'white' dots on the butterfly.

Then burn a black outline, which you stick on.

In the CDR, the outline is mirrored, because it was shiny card and I was burning through from the back, but if you are using non-shiny card, you can burn everything with no mirroring needed.

Just remember that if you need to resize the butterfly, to do the dots and the black cutout at the same time.

[Margaret Turco]

Thanks for sharing; that came out really great!

[Phil Garcia]

Great job, looks great. Thanks for sharing the file, I going to give it a try.

[Dan Hintz]

At first I didn't get it, then I thought I did, now I don't think so. My first look at the image made it appear as if the butterfly was cut out of black-coated white posterboard and laid on top of the blue material for the pic. Then I realized the white spots were actually holes... but that now I can't figure out how you made it black if you were lasering from the back.

[Darren Null]

The black bit is some black card stuck on the front.
The blue is the inherent colour of the main card.
The white bits are matching holes drilled through both the stuck-on black outline and through the card itself, so it shows up as white (both when the card is closed because the interior (in this case) is white; and when the card is open as light shines through.

The real thing gets a 'hang on a moment' second look too.

I cut the shiny blue stuff from the back because I don't want even the chance of the laser bouncing back up the tube. The stick-on black outline was cut from the 'front' hence the mirroring. It doesn't really matter in this case as the black card was the same both sides; but there was also some text on the actual card, so the mirroring was to help me get my act together, as much as anything else.

Sorry for any confusion caused.

[Robert Alexander]

Darren nice design thanks. I got the wow factor when I showed these around. I changed the design a little. I cut 2 outlines in black card stock. And 1 orange for the filler piece between the the black cards. This would make a great business card.

[Darren Null]

You're welcome. You get slightly more wow if you drill through everything to make up the white dots that go round the edge. But business cards- there's an idea...

Those are very pretty as is though.