With the holidays coming up my hubby has mentioned he was thinking about getting me one. I wanted to know if it is easy to use, and do you use it often? Can someone quickly explain to me how it works? Thank you!
Die cutting machines reviews and resources
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Well to give you the other side. I have heard from many scrapbook friends that the Cricut has a learning curve to it. You are not going to take it out of the box an start scrapping. Many have said it took them quiet a while to learn how to use it. And you have to have a place for it to be set up and plugged in. Otherwise you are dragging it out every time you want to use it and that is a hassle. If you do buy it try to find a Cricut class in your area. The more you know about, the easier it will become to use and the more you will use it. My sister in law has every scrapbook die cut machine out there. Some of her friends had the Cricut gathering dust on the shelf. So she had a “class” at her house to teach them how to start using it.
You may want to look into the Slice first. You need to determine what you are using it for and how you scrap. If you can go to a scrapbook store and demo it for yourself first. Achiever’s has the Slice and will demo it for you.
Also check out the Silhouette
I have the tiny cricut and LOVE it so far. You have to set the needle depth, pressure, and speed. Once you’ve mastered this, it’s really very easy to use. Next cut your paper to fit the mat, load paper, set the paper size, then select what you want to cut and hit the cut button. If you’re into scrapbooking, you know it’s expensive to buy letters and sometimes you want different sizes, so this machine is great. I know the expression is much better, but I preferred this one based on the cost, especially since cartridges are so expensive. But you can get some of them now at Walmart for only $17 or on Amazon for about half price most of the time. Watch some of the videos on their website or on youtube to get a better idea.
I have both the Cricut Bug, and the Expression. I use my smaller machine much more often, and it’s cheaper for mats and stuff, but if I could have only 1, I’d get the Expression.
Instead of buying a lot of cartridges, I use the Sure Cuts A Lot software with mine, which allows me to be able to download 10′s of 1000′s of designs and fonts off the internet and use them. It has allowed my creativity to really flow. I’ve read that it voids the warranty on the machine to use the software, but I bought my machines 2nd hand (Craigslist has lots usually) and saved myself a lot more money.
The machines are very easy to use, and I use mine every time I scrapbook and make cards. If I were you, I’d go to a crop at a local store that has one available to use. There’s also some yahoo groups with Cricut and SCAL software that you can read up on projects and really learn a lot.