Cricut Settings and Notes
Hardware
I bought a Cricut Explore Air 2 in matte black + the "everything bundle" which mostly seemed like a good deal for getting extra mats, the slide cutter and the deep cutter blade + some misc tools and materials I may or may not ever use or care about.
Free shipping in december + some sort of black friday deal = $295 USD or about $400 CAD all in. Shipped from california in about a week.
I'd recommend it, overall. It was a good deal and I'm making / importing my own vectors anyway so I don't have to care about or deal with the whole cricut subscription clipart nonsense. It seems to convert / trace image outlines reasonably well, perhaps better even than Inkscape.
The hardware ecosystem seems reasonable. It's slightly hackable but even the name-brand bits seem cheap enough on amazon (not at Michaels, for obvious reasons). I only feel slightly constrained by some of the software stuff. Being bluetooth is nicer than I gave it credit for originally.
All the tutorials are mommy bloggers, so there's tiny bits of information out there, but rarely anything technical at a hardware or project level. Hopefully I can add my own findings to that knowledge base.
Settings
Vinyl cutting: I use one tick higher than 'vinyl' is listed on the dial
The dollar store poster board is one higher than 'poster board' depending on the shapes / sharpness of cut shape angles. if it's too deep you can lightly mar your cutting board, no big deal, but it can also drag corners over and that'll ruin the actual finished cut quality.
There's basically no reason to ever use 'fast mode' - it seems too sloppy for both cutting and pens
Pens seem to be forgiving on dial settings. I use 'vinyl' or one higher, I dunno. If it's too firm you're mushing the pen tip into the paper.
Observations
the faux leather does not hold pen ink well
I use this transfer paper, seems to work the best so far.
I use cheap vinyl for generic colours - it doesn't seem to matter much. The expensive vinyls are really only for finishes like metallic or holographic, etc. We're making stickers, who cares.
The local Michael's prices for consumables isn't *terrible* but not great. Coupons are often Cricut-excluded which doesn't help much, but they do have Cricut-specific sales occasionally.
Materials
White dollar store poster board
Costs: 2 big sheets for $1, they measure a bizarre 22" by 28"
Cuts well on the highest stock setting, one notch above "poster board" named.
Use ruler edge to scrape off flat, otherwise it'll curl upon removal by peeling
Seems like a good candidate for big papercraft model making / cosplay with the resin idea?
Could also be a hardy material for spray paint stencils - it's strong enough to hold thin stem areas well and stiffer / tougher than paper.
Corrugated Cardboard - 2mm
Costs: free / scrap / recycled a box for it FAILURE even with 'deep cut' blade and various settings - I think the drag knife just doesn't swivel well enough for that thickness and there's seemingly no way to slow the machine movements down into something a little more patient.
I assume that's why the Cricut Maker has the swivel knife thing. Scoring tool was hit and miss - not sure how to specify the pressure on it, but it seems random even inside the same job with multiple score lines? However, I think both the deeper and lighter scoring is useful for getting the bend started, it doesn't require much to tempt the cardboard into place when you're bending it anyway.
Plain Cardboard - cereal box type
Costs: free / scrap / from a cereal box
FAILURE with some basic cutting experiments - it seems like you should be able to eventually make it, but it's a wee bit too hardy for the cutter(s). Maybe try multiple passes? I was hoping this would score well for bending, the tool glides over it mostly uneffected.
Vinyl
Costs: varies. amazon is like $15-$20 a roll, 12" x 7'+ see 'observations' above.
You can buy the big rolls on ebay if you want to commit to a colour and wait for shipping.
Transfer paper is about the same price, and is reusable once or twice sometimes. Pretty cheap overall.
Easy. Straightforward. That's really what this machine was made for.
Cut vinyl
Pull off the 'bad' vinyl you don't want (called weeding)
Put transfer paper over the positive shapes, pull them up with transfer paper
Stick that whole thing onto desired clean surface, peel off transfer paper
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