The Next Advance In Home Handicrafting - The Cricut Personal Electronic Cutter

The Cricut Personal Electronic Cutter has revolutionised the world of home handicrafting over the last five years. Forget scissors and stencils, forget complicated equipment and software - the Cricut range of cutting machines is designed to automate some of the fiddlier cutting jobs whilst keeping the fun in your craft - all from compact and portable machines that are light enough to be carried with you wherever you need to take them. These are truly revolutionary devices, with all of the technology packed on-board, meaning that there’s no need to attach them to a computer in order to realise your designs. In this article, I'll be looking into how the Cricut Personal Electronic Cutters actually work, and the different models available in the range.

The primary thing to note is that the machines essentially operate using the same basic principle. Since there is no PC involved on which to store information about the cutting shapes and designs, the Cricut cutting machines use special Cricut cartridges, each of which houses a set of such designs. Every Cricut cartridge groups together designs with a particular underlying theme - you can choose from subjects as diverse as cars, weddings, Chinese pagodas, birds, kitchen - whatever shapes you're after there is more than likely a cartridge for it. In fact, there are literally hundreds to choose from. There are usually either one or two Cricut cartridges packaged with each Cricut Personal Electronic Cutter to get you started. You will find some places offer to sell you bundles of cheap cartridges when you purchase one of the electronic cutters from them. Once you've bought your machine, any extra cartidges you require will have to be purchased individually at a later date. The cost of cartridges can really add up, and I recommend you try to expand your selection slowly as you go on, and make the most of the ones you have at any given time.

With your cartridge installed and your design selected, there are two other things you need to decide. The first one is - which material are you going to cut your pattern out of? With any of the Cricut Personal Electronic Cutter machines, you can cut paper, card, vellum or vinyl on the replaceable cutting mat. The second one is - how big (or indeed small) do you want your final cut-out to be? Depending on which cutter model you have, you can cut shapes varying from a quarter of an inch high up to twenty three and a half inches (in the Cricut Expression model). Decisions made - all you need to do is make your selections using the machine's keypad, press go, and see Cricut spring into action. The final product is a perfect cut-out to your specifications, produces quickly and effortlessly with minimum fuss and mess.

Does this tempt you to do some more research into the Cricut Personal Electronic Cutter? If so, this Cricut Personal Electronic Cutter website is a great Cricut resource, with loads of information and videos showing the machines in action.