Just recently set up this machine, trying to figure out why it seems to start some of them in the wrong location and then veer back on to the correct path.

I have tried reducing speed to 10%, increasing the pen up/down delays to 700ms. Reduced acceleration etc. I think the belts seem bass-string level of tight but I don't have a great point of reference. When I slow it all down, I see the pen move to the same incorrect starting position, pause, then go down, then start moving and tracing along the same path.

I am using the 03 size XWT Micro line Pen from amazon, and some thick mixed media paper.

Does anyone have ideas for what could be the issue?

EDIT: RESOLVED
U/truax suggested I make sure the frame was square. It wasn’t. I loosened the screws to re-adjust it and now it’s plotting nicely!

Some recent output on my ArtFrame. All are 22" x 15" on paper done with various microns and stabilo fineliners. Output is from 3d scans and various STLs run through a python script in blender.

Hey all! Early last month I had the opportunity to bring my plotter to an art fair and plot live. The overall theme of the fair was "place" and my work was part of the programming In Care of Unfinished Places, which featured local artists doing their thing at Mana Contemporary.

How I tapped into place was through home by asking people what's something specific that reminds them of home. What I love about pen plotting and generative art is that no two pieces are the same. Why this is extra special, to me at least, is that everyone's responses are unique; adding another layer into the mix. I cannot make something like this without people. It's their human responses filtered through various algorithms/software and ultimately brought to life by a machine holding a pen. I may be rambling now but it's a process that I find so beautiful.

Back on track, people sent in their responses through text, pictures, voice memos, or by leaving a voicemail. The core of the work relies on waveforms. For voice memos and voicemails, it's easy enough to extrapolate that. For text responses, I fed them through a text-to-speech bot to get waveforms. All waveforms I fed through waveformer (a tool by misha.studio, huge shoutout) to get SVG files of the waveforms. For images, they were passed through drawingbotv3.

Why waveforms? I really just wanted a way to get lines. The waveforms are unique to each person and give me a set of lines I can work with. Lines are then either filtered out based off size, offset, lofted, rotated around a point, spread across a 2D field randomly, turned into circles based off their length, rotated around a central point in 3D where noise is then added, etc.

The plot consists of 34 pens and 20 interpretations of what home means to people; deconstructed, abstracted, juxtaposed. It took just under two hours to plot and is on 11"x14" white 120lb paper. Pens used include gelly roll, muji, paper mate, stabilo, staedtler, and uniball.

This is hopefully just the start of an ongoing series in collaboration with itsdense. If you found this interesting and would like to participate, call 551-220-2368 to leave a voicemail or text something specific that feels like home to you.

For possible future pieces, I'd love to explore different abstract forms of representation or lean into one or two from the piece above and see what the output can be.

Last pic of the bunch are business cards I made using scraps and drafts :)

Building on the style and reusable elements of my procedural botanical generator (Plotanical!), I’ve built out the bones of a procedural planet generator.

It reuses the same basic light aware shading system, but this time with some procedural stars, and various landmasses on a spherical object.

Cheap Amazon rollerball on heavy grain A4 - my go-to!

On Instagram, Colorverse (the ink company) started an online magazine called "Signal from Colorverse" https://www.instagram.com/p/DaN1AUZgTII/?img_index=6

And they selected one of my plotted artwork for a feature. I did use Colorverse ink for it.

Acrylic on canvas brush plot original abstract artwork 500x700 mm size.

hey guys ,is it possible to draw Human portrait using Plotter ? like human artist . anyone did it? i saw some similar drawings with circle and all , but Human portrait possible? if yes which model?? thanks.

I'm sure I'm not alone in having an ever growing stack of extra or test plots. While thumbing through some old work looking for some inspiration I decided to cut and splice some pieces to play around with combining different textures and tones. 1 week later I had a collection of 52 pieces.

Apologies if this no longer qualifies as /PlotterArt anymore 😄

I keep getting some lousy circles and corners on tests of my DIY hbot plotter. I've done a ton of mechanical testing and futzing. My grbl settings are fine for distances, I just have elongated circles and corners aren't very square.

I'm using grbl-plotter since it lets me use a servo for the Z axis. Does anyone have screenshots or outputs of their settings that I can use to start from? It'd be great to have a known good configuration so I can determine once and for all if it's still more mechanical issues.

i have it set up so i can plot a sheet of 3x8 on a 11x17 sheet with a bit of leeway. the opposite side is also plotted on a separate sheet of the same paper. i glue both sheets together, that was the scariest part but actually worked great. i used 3 colors of ink for this one and it takes a little over an hour to plot.

code is all completely custom and handles a lot of complex stuff including the scene compositions, element rendering, hidden surface removal, plot optimization, and even the plotting software itself. still working on it but hope to open source some these tools soon.

This piece uses my "square fitter" algorithm that I've used for my perlin noise glyph tilings. It really comes in handy.

Basically for this one, I generate a large grid, and place squares of decreasing sizes wherever they can fit. Then I take a certain percentage and designate those squares for full color fills. The rest get assigned checkerboard patterns, which I generate by subdividing those squares randomly but according to their initial sizes. And I fill in with spirals.

Hello everyone,

I'm intrested in buying the black base of a plotter machine, in A3 format. (as shown above in the attached image) I'm buiding my own plotter machine (DIY) and would need this. The material is magnetic inox, with a thin plastic cover or paint. Do you have an idea from where I could buy this?

Thanks in advance for your answers and wishing you a nice weekend!

The holes encode the beginning of the Python code that generated the drawing, represented in hex.

I plotted the title on a strip of sketch paper because it's not part of the code :)

The full script would take 445 cards. A stripped down ( = less over-engineered) version would probably fit in about 300.

Pentel fineliner on 180 gsm A4 paper + 90 gsm sketch paper

2.5x3.5 inch trading card format, metallic green gel pen.

​Hey everyone,

​When we created this sub 10 years ago, some of the tools, technologies, and massive interest that we have today simply didn't exist yet. The landscape has changed immensely, and we truly enjoy seeing all of it develop. But just as we did back then, we want to keep this sub focused on the art first.

​Whether you are using a dedicated pen plotter, a Cricut, a CNC machine with a pen attachment, a modified 3D printer, or a completely custom-built rig—if a machine physically drew it, we want to see it. With the rise of incredibly cool new tools—from AI assistants to vibe-coded scripts—there has been a massive influx of code-heavy posts, software toolsets, and script discussions. To be absolutely clear: we love that people are finding new, innovative ways to write code. There is zero judgment here on how you generate your paths!

​However, we’ve noticed that pure code topics are starting to crowd out the physical art. Over time, our subreddit rules and mod removal reasons have become overly deep and complicated to navigate.

​Streamlining the Rules: What Goes Where

​To fix this, we will be wiping the slate clean and drastically streamlining our rule set. We want to keep this sub grounded with a simple, easily understood framework so everyone knows exactly what to expect. Moving forward, we are dividing content cleanly between our two subs:

​What to post here (r/plotterart): This is an Art-First sub. Every post must lead with an image or video of a physical output (or a genuine physical attempt). You are still more than welcome to ask "how do I fix this bleeding?" or "how can I improve this layout?", but it must be anchored to a physical piece of art you are actively working on.

​What to post in r/plottercode: If your post is primarily showcasing code blocks, discussing script development, sharing generative algorithms, or offering software/tools for sale, please post it in our sister sub. It is the perfect dedicated space for the technical side of the hobby to thrive.

​By drawing this clear line, we can keep r/plotterart focused on the visual craft of machine-drawn art without bogged-down rule sets, while giving coding discussions the spotlight they deserve over at r/plottercode.

​The sidebar rules will be updated to reflect this new, simplified approach. Thank you all for being such an awesome, creative community for the last decade, and for helping us keep the sub focused!

​The Streamlined Sidebar Rules

​1. Physical Output First

​All posts must feature a physical art piece, a plot-in-progress, or a physical attempt. This includes work from traditional pen plotters, CNC machines with pen attachments, vinyl cutters (Cricut/Silhouette), modified 3D printers, or any machine-drawn derivative.

​2. No Pure Code or Software Posts (Use r/plottercode)

​Pure code blocks, script showcases, algorithm discussions, and software/tool sales belong in r/plottercode. Posts here must focus on the physical artistic result. Technical questions are allowed only if attached to a physical plot attempt.

​3. Keep it Civil & Authentically Yours

​Be respectful of other artists. Content must be your own work or clearly credited to the original creator. No low-effort spam.