Vinyl cutter

This week I learned "computer controlled cutting" on two machines- vinyl cutter and laser cutting machine. I first started on the vinyl cutter and I have to say it was a lot of fun...
I chose a photo of myself.

I opened it on GIMP program and trimmed it to the size i wanted , then I chose the threshold option.

I played with the black and wight contrast until I gat to the point I was satisfied with and I imported the picture to Illustrator program (you don't have to use the same program as me you can use INSCAPE)
I used the image trance option .

Then I used the expand option and changed the fill to empty.

I changed the stroke thickness to 0.01.

I started to clean the image from double lines and features that I don't want on my picture/print.
Now I uploaded the file to the pc that's connected to the vinyl cutter.
I set up the cutter and I made sure that the pressure of the blade is set correctly.
After the machine finished the cuting you pule out the matirial you dont want to use.
I started to cover the print with masking tape and pull it out.

After I found a place I wanted to stick it to, Ipill the masking tape off.

In the end it looks pretty good.