Often overlooked are the many potential uses of Cricut vinyl.  Of course by the specific design of Cricut vinyl it is typically intended to be used for sign making.  I suppose that when it comes down to it this is really what it is always being used for.  However it does not always need to be used in a traditional sense.

 

Positive or Negative

For starters you can really change the look of your project by using either the positive or negative image of your vinyl.  For this decision it doesn’t really matter how you cut it or if you cut it with a Cricut or Silhouette or any other machine.  The decision comes into play with the weeding.  You just have to determine which part of the vinyl you will remove and which part you will use as you can see in the example below.

Example of Positive and Negative image with Cricut Vinyl

In this example you can see the first two lines utilize the positive color of the vinyl.  Whereas the third line uses the vinyl color to surround the negative white background.

 

Stenciling with Cricut Vinyl

 

The vinyl you use doesn’t always have to be the finishing material either.  In the examples below the vinyl is being used as a stencil.  This way you can actually etch an image into glass or use an interesting paint technique to make your finished item.  That way you don’t just end up with potentially another boring looking piece of vinyl stuck to something, not that there’s anything wrong with that :) .

Using Cricut Vinyl as a stencil

 

As you can see in the examples above we used the Cricut vinyl to make a stencil.  The color and grain of the wood then show through the paint for a nice effect.

Printable Vinyl

One of the newest Cricut vinyl products out there now is the printable vinyl.  With this material you can make your vinyl as wild or mild as you want it to be.  This is only limited by your imagination and the capabilities of your printer.  Now for some projects with printable vinyl the Silhouette machine is actually the better machine to use because of the registration mark feature allowing you to print and cut.  All vinyl is compatible with all machines, the Cricut vinyl references are sort of just a force of habit.

Image printed and cut on printabel Cricut vinyl

In the picture above the printable vinyl was used to print an image with a regular inkjet printer.  Then a machine cut around the image to make our own nice custom made sticker.

Printable Cricut vinyl patterned printPrintable Cricut Vinyl patterned print

I these two example it shows that you can print any pattern you want onto your printable Cricut vinyl.  Then you can cut out lettering or any shape you want and get the printed pattern effect to it.  You can even just use a square of it as a background.

 

T-shirt Vinyl

 

And of course lastly we have T-shirt Cricut vinyl.  This is its own unique vinyl product since rather than a traditional pressure sensitive adhesive it uses a heat activated process.  This vinyl product is specifically designed to adhere to cotton and polyester, but can be ironed on to several other surfaces as well.  It does not stick well to nylon, but will work good on many other fabrics.

 

Example of Iron on T-shirt Cricut vinyl

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