Making a letter shaped card

There was a post on the cricut.com messageboard asking for help making a letter shaped card.

Here's how you do it using Design Studio.

This tutorial is brought to you by the upper case letter A and the cartridge Blackletter!

First decide how tall you want your card. I'm going to make mine 5" tall. That way it can be created on the 6 x 12 cricuts if you don't have the Expression.

If I set the default size slider to 5" my card will actually only be 4.194" tall. That's because it's cutting the A in proportion to the Y which is the 'Key Height Character' in Blackletter. All letters on the cart will cut proportionally to the letter Y. (Different carts have different Key Height Characters. The cartridge manual shows which character is the Key Height Character. Look for the page on Real Dial Size in the front of the manual.)

 The right hand picture here has Real Size selected.

 

To ensure that the A is in fact 5" high you need to select the Real Size Option.

So, to get started:

• Select Real Size
• Move the Default Size slider to 5"
• Press the Shift Lock button on the DS keypad
• Move your cursor so it is to the left size of the mat
• Type the letter A so it appears on your mat
• Click the Welding box

• Press Enter to deselect the A
• Type another A
• Click the Welding box 

• Select the first A
• Select the Flip Objects box

Now it should look like this:

• Select the right A and using the horizontal move selection handle (that's the middle left handle) move it to the left till it is just slightly overlapping the left A. (Using the horizontal move handle means it won't move up or down).
• Use Ctrl + left arrow on keyboard to move the object in small increments if needed.

Now it should look like this:

Now all you need to do is cut it out!

Use this method to create any type of shaped card.