Stencil Studio

• Vector artwork only. The file must contain real path geometry. Photos and embedded bitmap images cannot be cut and are removed from the preview.
• Closed, connected outlines. Every cut-out must be a closed shape. Shapes with tiny gaps may cut ragged — we auto-close small gaps, but clean files cut best.
• Single-colour silhouette. Everything is cut as one colour. Artwork that relies on colours, gradients or white-on-black overlaps is flattened to a plain silhouette — exactly as the preview shows it.
• Mind loose islands. Any enclosed piece (the middle of an O, a ring centre, a panel inside a border) falls out when cut unless it is bridged. Leave “Add stencil bridges” ticked and the website bridges these automatically; we confirm placement before cutting.
• Minimum feature size. Keep strokes, slots and gaps at least 1 mm wide on mylar and polypropylene, and 2 mm on rigid acrylic or aluminium, at the final stencil size. Bridges should be 2.5–6 mm.
• Tell us the real size. Set the stencil width and height on the quote form — artwork is scaled to fit, and all minimums are checked at that final size.

• Convert text to outlines/paths before saving (Illustrator: Type → Create Outlines; Inkscape: Path → Object to Path). Live text is drawn with substituted fonts and will not match your design exactly.
• Expand strokes that represent shapes. A stroked line previews as a thin slit cut. If a thick outline is meant to be a cut shape, outline/expand the stroke to a filled path.
• Plain SVG 1.1, one design per file. No linked external images, fonts or stylesheets — scripts and embedded bitmaps are stripped automatically.
• Donut/ring shapes should use compound paths (even-odd fill) so the preview reads the holes correctly.

• Supported entities: LINE, CIRCLE, ARC, LWPOLYLINE and POLYLINE. Explode SPLINEs, ellipses, blocks/inserts and hatches into polylines before export (most CAD packages: EXPLODE, then FLATTEN).
• No TEXT/MTEXT entities — convert lettering to outlines in your CAD or design program.
• ASCII DXF, R12/R14 export, millimetre units, 1:1 scale, drawn flat in the XY plane.
• Closed shapes should have the closed flag set (or ends meeting) — a closed path means the material inside it drops out; open paths cut as slits.
• A rectangle drawn around the whole design is treated as the sheet edge, not a cut.

• Joins loose line segments into connected shapes and closes near-closed loops.
• Removes duplicate and zero-length lines (prevents double-cutting).
• Detects every loose island and adds bridges (2.5–6 mm, scaled to your stencil size).
• Flattens colours to the cut silhouette and strips anything that cannot be cut.

Anything the automatic repair changes is listed under the preview. If your file needs work beyond this — splines, text conversion, redrawing from a photo — choose Layout cleanup on the quote form and we will prepare it for you.