Free photo to laser engraving converter
Prepare a photo for laser engraving, free and in your browser, with nothing uploaded: set the width and DPI, pick the material, and download a dithered PNG that burns dot for dot on wood, slate, leather, acrylic or metal.
Faster with the free Chrome extension: right-click any picture on a website and send it straight to the laser engraving converter. Add to Chrome · what it does
Extension installed. Right-click any picture on a website and choose Makerfern → Open this picture in… to bring it here.
Dot for dot, at the size you burn
Most photo-engraving problems come from resampling: a photo dithered at one size and then stretched by the laser software turns into moiré and mush. Here the photo is resized first to the exact dot grid of your job, the width you set at the DPI your laser uses, and only then adjusted and dithered. Every pixel in the download is one dot on the material, and the DPI is written into the file.
What the settings do
- Material: our starting points for tone, sharpening and dithering. Slate inverts; clear acrylic inverts and mirrors for engraving the back.
- Mid-tones: most materials burn darker than a screen shows, so lifting the mid-tones keeps faces from going muddy.
- Actual dots: the preview at one screen pixel per dot, to judge the pattern before you burn it.
Getting a good engraving
- Start from a big, sharp photo. The tool warns when it has to stretch a small one.
- Remove a busy background first with the background remover; empty space stays unburned.
- Burn a small test patch, then adjust mid-tones or contrast, not speed and power alone.
Questions
Why dither a photo for a laser?
At each dot a laser either fires or it does not; it cannot burn "a bit". A photo's greys have to become a pattern of dots whose density matches the grey, which is dithering. Done here at the exact dot size of your job, the laser software can burn the file dot for dot instead of guessing.
What DPI or line interval should I use?
Use the same number here as in the laser software: 254 dpi is a 0.1 mm line interval, 318 dpi is 0.08 mm. Wood and leather usually engrave photos well between 254 and 318; finer is not always better, because burns overlap. Your machine's spot size decides the useful limit.
Which dithering should I choose?
Jarvis is a smooth, safe default for portraits. Stucki is a little crisper. Floyd–Steinberg is finer but busier. Atkinson is light and crisp, good on dark woods that burn easily. The ordered grid gives an even, printed texture. Greyscale leaves the dithering to your laser software.
Do the material settings set speed and power?
No. They are our starting points for the picture only: tone, sharpening, dithering, and whether to invert or mirror. Speed and power depend on your machine and material; set them in the laser software and test on scrap.
Why invert for slate?
On slate, dark stone and many coated metals the laser mark comes out lighter than the surface. Inverting the picture makes the laser burn the light parts, so the result looks like the photo instead of its negative.