Die cut machines can be electric or manual and each work in a different way.
Electrical die cutting machines work a bit like a printer but they don’t print. They have pens and cutting tools instead of inks. They take an image or design and cut out it for you with exact precision, or if you want them to emboss, score or draw a design they’ll do that too.
You tell them what you want them to do through their software. Simply choose your designs from their library of images or use your own software programs like Adobe Illustrator or Photoshop to create your designs from scratch, then importing compatible formats in.
In stand-alone machines like the Brother ScanNCut series, you can select your design directly from the machine’s LCD display or even scan in your own artwork.
Manual machines don’t have blades, they instead use dies. Dies are like cookie cutters. You sandwich your material along with the die, in between two mats, and then roll them through the machine by hand to make your cut. You can emboss with them too.