Don’t sweat it with DIY
Silhouette Studio is a free graphic design software that enables you to create designs and send them to the supported machine to be cut properly. Developed by Silhouette America, Inc., this multimedia program is the official companion software for all Silhouette® electronic cutting machines.
Similar to Cricut, Silhouette Studio can only be used with its brand’s products. However, it offers extensive online documentation for both beginners and advanced users and it often comes as a free installation CD when you purchase a Silhouette machine. Mostly, the only issue you’ll find is that it doesn’t offer a feature that its rival programs do.
What is Silhouette Studio used for?
Silhouette America, Inc. is a graphic design and DIY crafting company that manufactures electronic cutting tools and a variety of other products related to the crafting industry. Its well-known for selling precision machines, software, digital content, and materials for anyone interested in working with crafting, home décor, and DIY projects. Its cutting tools, in particular, are top of the line in the market.
Thus, as their companion software, Silhouette Studio is also a powerful application that features intuitive design tools to encourage creative freedom. You can either draw up your own designs to be printed out and cut via the supported Silhouette machine or simply access its free library of ready-made content from the Silhouette Design Store. It also offers installed fonts and allows importing of images and converting them into cut designs.
There are four editions of this program available. The Basic Edition is completely free and has all of the features mentioned above. However, it doesn’t support SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) files, which rival programs have with their free version. To get this feature, you must upgrade to the Designer Edition. This and the next two versions, Designer Edition + and Business Edition, let you access additional software tools and support more file formats.
A powerful software as your ally
All in all, Silhouette Studio is a must-have software in your arsenal if you plan to use Silhouette machines for your design endeavors. While it falls short of some features compared to its competitors, it’s still a highly recommended program to use since it offers versatile and flexible features design tools that can work for any DIY project you want to start.
