Cricut Design Studio vs. SCAL

[tinkryansmom]

Which one do you have? If you have both, which one do you use the most?

Can anyone pro and con them for me? Likes and dislikes.

I got CDS for Christmas and was going to play with it today. So excited about the welding feature!!

I have SCAL talked about here on the boards. And everyone seems to really love it.

Wondering if maybe I "need" that also!

 

[morgansmom2000]

I have both. I love love love SCAL. CDS has a few "quirks" that are not so fun. I use it for certain things, like when I want to cut just one part of an image on a key. You know how on certain things they have say for a tree, some leaves and the trunk on one image? You can "Hide Selected Contour" in CDS and just cut the leaves and then just cut the trunk.

It takes about a day and a half to open CDS (okay, more like 3 minutes, but still).

SCAL has recently come out with an update that makes filling a page easier, and breaking apart images. You should download a trial and play with it.

www.craftedge.com

This is a favorite blog of mine for Cricut Creations Capadia Designs. And this site has lots of neat projects too. Custom Crops. There are probably a few SCAL projects on there.

Either way, have fun!

 

[tinkryansmom]

Thanks Jennifer! I will try it out! And I bookmarked those sites!

 

[hopemax]

I have both, and use both frequently. CDS is certainly more "quirky" but I like to use to take images and weld them to make borders. SCAL, I use for making paper piecings, so much faster than by hand. And it's also nice to be able to cut titles in a larger variety of fonts.

 

[laura&fam]

I cut with the trial version of CDS tonight to try out the welding feature. I didn't like it.

It jumped all over the place, did I do something wrong? I was cutting out "Super Readers" and it cut out "sr" then "eR" then "puS" then went back and did "er" and then finally "ade". It was jumping all over the place and it seemed like it cut some letters twice. When I cut straight from the Cricut it's not that neurotic. Also it only welded pairs of the letters together instead of welding the whole word.

I need to try SCAL because the weld feature is one of the main reasons I want to buy software. Can you actually cut with the trial version of SCAL?

 

[New England Eeyore]

I SCAL. I have never had the paid version of CDS, but when I had a PC I had the free version on my computer. I just was not impressed with it. Now that I have a Mac, I don't have the option of having it even if I wanted it.

I always say that SCAL is worth every penny, when you consider that it is less than you would pay for 1 Cricut cartridge, and it opens you up to literally thousands of fonts. When I switched computers, I had to re-buy, and I got the newest version, which is even better than the original. Paper piecings are incredibly easy, and it's just so incredibly user-friendly over all. I do think you *need* it.

 

[morgansmom2000]

SCAL cuts with a watermark until you purchase a license.

 

[laura&fam]

SCAL cuts with a watermark until you purchase a license.

Thanks. It should still give me an idea of how the program works and cuts though. I'll just use junk paper. That bright orange I got in a multipack may actually be useful.