mapx Laser — Lake Maps (layered SVG + bathymetry)

MapX

Project notes

Private working notes — saved with the map (never printed or exported).

1 Location & source

2 Output size

Size

Finished width in

The real printed/cut width of this design. Height follows the size ratio above. Exports (SVG/DXF/PDF/CNC/3D) use this size.

Cut margin — all sides

Or set each side — blank uses “all sides”

Topin

Bottomin

Leftin

Rightin

Blank margin around the map. Every layer — roads, water, golf, ski, topo, bathy & activity — cuts off at this inset. Set a side to override “all sides”.

🖼 Add a frame border

4 Appearance

Look Template

A template is your standard wording, font and icon layout: the title, second line, EST. line, facts and which motifs sit in which corners. Manage templates in Account → Map templates.

Land / background color

Fills the land (everything outside the water) with a photo/texture — screen & PNG poster; the cut-ready SVG stays line-only.

🪵 Wood-grain background

Adds an engraved wood-grain texture over the background color — for a wood look on proofs & previews (it's its own layer; excluded from cut-ready SVG).

Use your own photo (e.g. a woodgrain) as the sheet background. Fills behind the whole map; shows on the PNG poster — the laser-cut SVG stays line-only. Saved as your standard background and applied automatically to every map (Street & Print too). “Remove” clears it everywhere.

🔄 Map rotation 0°

Spin the map within the frame. Double-click to reset to 0°.

5 Advanced

Map quality

Fast/Detailed speed up preview while you work. Final loads everything — exports always use full detail regardless of this setting.

Reference basemap

Shown under your design on screen to help you line things up — never included in the export.

🔒 Lock map — zoom & pan the view without moving the map

Keepsakes & Ornaments

Pick a shape, choose how many layers it cuts as, and decide what goes on it — a map, a photo, or nothing but engraved names. Everything here exports as true-size pieces, red = cut, black = engrave.

🎄 Ornament hanger Hanger tab size 18% Hanger hole size 7% Map edge — white border 100%

Map content stops at this inner circle (like the clock face) — below 100% leaves a clean blank band to the cut edge. Disc ornaments only.

The hanging tab + drilled hole at the top are part of the cut outline — sized as a % of the ornament's width, so they scale with it (at 4″ wide, a 7% hole ≈ 0.28″ ⌀ — fits ribbon or an ornament hook). The heart ornament drills the hole straight through the heart (no tab).

🧩 Layered stacked ornament Cut it as a 3-layer stack (water · land · face)

The Laser SVG / DXF comes out as the three pieces side by side — red = cut, black = engrave — all true size, all sharing one outline and one ribbon hole so they line up when you stack them.

Shoreline rim — keeps the land in one piece 3.0 mm Smallest water void to cut 4.0 mm² Face frame width 5.0 mm Window bottom — the text panel starts here 62% Window bottom angle 0° Cut the map pin as a separate glue-on accent Accent size 14.0 mm Gap between the pieces 6 mm Red cut lines, black engraving (LightBurn-ready) Stack view

Cut layout and Exploded show the real pieces — same outlines, same order, same true size as the downloaded file. Switch back to Guides to move and resize the map inside the ornament.

In the Guides view the dashed red ring is the face window and the dashed green ring is where the water stops — both are guides only; the real cut lines live in the exported file. Raise the rim if a lake reaches the edge of the ornament.

✒️ Engraved text (on the face) Show the text

My Designs

Save your whole look — colors, layers, frame, fonts, layout — and reuse it on any map.

Text & Markers

Text

Font

Size in Legend caption — what this pin means

Align

Style

Color

Letter spacing 0" Line spacing 1.10×

Only does anything on a label with more than one line (press Enter inside the text to add one). A multiplier of the text size, not a fixed gap — so it holds when you resize the label, and it is the same number the cut file uses.

Curve / arch text 0

Bends the label along an arc — right = smile, left = frown, 0 = straight. Curves in the export too.

Erase gap behind this text 0

Extra gap cleared in the roads/lines behind this label (0 = tight to the letters). Needs “Erase roads behind text” on.

Type a label and press Add, or click one on the map to restyle it here — everything previews live and exports to the cut file.

Markers — drop a pin, heart, star…

Items drop at the centre — drag them into place. Click to select, double-click text to edit it.

✂️ Erase roads behind placed text, icons, title & nameplate (street names have their own toggle in the Roads panel) ✂️ Erase roads & tracks behind place, park & peak names too (cities, towns, parks, land-use areas, peaks & bays) ✂️ Erase topo & depth contour lines behind them too ✂️ Erase building footprints behind them too (houses, blocks & clubhouses a title would otherwise engrave through) ✂️ Erase the water fill behind them too (lake/sea fill, depth tint & golf hazards — on any map, not just “Weld all”) ✂️ Hug the lettering tightly (off = clear the whole word box — best for script / thin fonts) 🔗 Weld the gap into the roads — the gap becomes a road-colored plate that follows the lettering (curves & script too) and fuses into the welded streets, like icons do (needs "Cut roads at their width" or "Weld all"; welds to the frame too when the frame weld is on) Gap padding 3

Per side: ↑ ↓ ← →

Cuts a gap in the road lines around each label, icon & uploaded image so nothing engraves behind them — real geometry that exports to the cut file. Raise the padding for a bigger clear zone. The per-side boxes add (or, negative, trim) extra gap on one side when it looks uneven — they follow each label's rotation.

Double-click any label on the map to edit it in place. Upload custom fonts in your Account settings.

🅰 Match ALL text on the map

One click sets this font on every label, placed text, the title & the nameplate — so the whole map matches.

Cover blocks — a clean panel for the title Map lines cut into the block (off = block fills around them — clean cover) ⛓ Join blocks into the cut outline — one cut piece; a block over the edge merges into the border (won't stick out past the map)

Drops a block on the map — drag to move, corner to resize, and the red ✕ just outside its top-left corner (or the Delete key) removes the selected block. By default it fills the area with the land color (closing water) and erases the roads/lines behind it. Tick “cut into” to keep the map lines engraving through the block instead. Tick “Join” so a block at the edge of a shaped map becomes part of the same cut piece.

Icons

🎨 Logos & graphics (engrave)

Upload PNG/JPG/SVG icons (saved in your browser), click one to drop it on the map, drag to position, click it to resize. They embed in the SVG for engraving.

🧷 Icon & marker padding clears streets around each one On welded street maps: weld the padding into the streets (off = carve the padding OUT of the streets instead) 🧷 Icon & marker padding also clears topo & depth contour lines Icon padding 8

Clears a gap in the streets (and, if ticked, the topo & depth contour lines) around every icon & marker so nothing engraves behind them. Set to 0 for no gap. On welded street maps the padding welds into the streets by default.

Decorations

Map-maker's ornaments — click one to drop it on the map, then drag, resize and spin it like any marker. They cut and engrave as real vector art, and on a welded map they fuse into the streets like icons do.

Venue Maps

Stadiums, NASCAR ovals, F1 circuits and airfields as the subject of the piece — the structure engraves in detail and the streets step back. Type the venue, then pick a format.

🏟 Raise the venue — also cut the stadium / grandstand / terminal as a separate piece to glue proud of the map (its own DXF layer: cut from a second sheet) See it raised (3D preview)

Shows the glue-on piece standing proud of the map, with its edge and shadow, so you can see the finished depth. Preview only — never exported or cut.

Runway & track width 6 mm (0 = hairline)

Landing strips, taxiways and race tracks draw as real welded pavement at this width on the finished piece instead of thin lines. Taxiways come out a third as wide, race tracks about two thirds — and crossings fuse into one piece rather than cutting twice.

Seating tiers 3 (0 = none)

Steps the stands between the stadium wall and the field, so the bowl reads as seating. OpenStreetMap carries no seats, so these are drawn from the real gap between the structure and the pitch — they follow a horseshoe or an oval on their own.

“Venue raised” also cuts the stadium / grandstand / terminal as a separate piece on its own DXF layer — cut it from a second sheet and glue it proud of the map. The coaster format frames the venue tight in a round blank.

Cruise Route

Add your ports in the order you sailed them — the map draws the legs between and numbers each stop. Works for ocean and river cruises, and the same route cuts in wood or prints as a poster.

Press Enter to add. You can also paste “lat, lng” for a spot with no name.

Real satellite imagery fills the land while the water keeps your style — public-domain NASA imagery, safe on a sold print. Print/PNG only, never in the cut file. Remove it under Water → land image.

🎨 Print style

Name plates — dark boxes behind the port names

✍️ Personalize the bottom

Nautical miles — measured along your drawn route

Drops these as a real title block under the map — then drag it, double-click any line to edit, stack more lines, and align left / centre / right under Title & Nameplate. Nautical miles are measured along your drawn route. Adjust the space under the map with Cut margin → Bottom in Setup.

🏔 Poster finish

Shaded relief — 3D mountains from real elevation

Hillshades the land from the same elevation data the contour lines use, so it costs no extra download. Print/PNG only — never in the cut file.

Relief depth 2.2× Light direction 315° Relief strength 0.75 Drop shadow — float the map off the paper Shadow depth 3

The shadow falls away from the light above, so relief and shadow agree. Print/PNG only.

How the legs connect

A road trip joins each stop along the roads this map has drawn, so the line stays on real highways. At wide views the map carries major roads only, so the course follows the big routes; if a stop sits off the network that leg falls back to the curved connector.

🌊 Stay in the water — route legs around land automatically

Each leg finds a path through the sea instead of cutting across land. Drag a leg to take over its shape yourself — a dragged leg always wins. If no water path exists (a river too thin to map), that leg falls back to the curved line.

Round trip — close the loop back to the first port Number each stop Port names Dashed route line Route width 1.6 Port dot 1.6 Curve of each leg 12%

A curved leg reads as a voyage; a straight one reads as a ruler. 0% gives dead-straight legs.

Port name size 0.19"

Legend & Scale

A distance line answers "how far is it?" in real miles, and the key explains what your symbols mean. Both engrave into the cut file.

❄️ Arctic Circle line

Draws the dashed parallel at 66.56°N with its name wherever the map crosses it — its own layer, cuts and engraves like any line.

Line & text size 0.24"

Drag the middle to move the whole line, an end dot to re-measure, or the number itself to reposition it. “Scale bar” draws a proper cartographer’s bar in round distances.

🔑 Show a key for the icons on this map Key heading Key text size 0.24"

Rows appear automatically for every symbol you place on the map — just type what each one means. Use “Add a row” for anything else. Drag the box on the map to place it.

Nameplate

Lake name, location, an Est. line, your lake's facts and a compass rose — placed as one composition. Every line stays editable, restylable and draggable on its own.

Style

Family / house line Est. line Rule flourish Compass rose

MapCuts standard designs

The shop's eight standard nameplate layouts — faces, wording slots and alignment. Apply one, then edit any line; Copy… saves your own editable version.

Show nameplate 📍 Lake name & lake facts Show lake name & facts

Family name, “Lake House”, an Est. year + your lake's facts — each with its own font & size. Drag the block on the map to place it.

Add shapes with the Shapes tool in the left rail. Select one on the map to edit its properties here; drag a side dot onto another shape to connect them.

Shape, Title & Caption

Template / Shape

Custom cut shape

Fill the shape with a chart or map

Fills the whole cut outline with the chart of the view you are looking at — a crab, a sailboat, a state, cut from the water you sail. Screen & PNG poster; the cut-ready SVG stays line-only, so the shape still cuts as one outline.

Upload an SVG outline (house, heart, a state…) — the map clips to it and the outline becomes the laser-cut boundary. Drag the ✛ handle on the shape to move it, the ◢ handle (or the slider) to resize.

Title above + caption below the shape

Title sits above the shape; the quote, name + date and coordinates (deg·min·sec) go below. Every line drags on its own — grab the title, saying, est. line or coordinates and drop each where you want it; shrink the shape (size slider) to make room.

💾 Layouts — save the shape size + text setup to reuse on any map

Draw & Trace

Trace image or PDF (draw over it)

The trace image is a screen-only guide — never included in the export. Lock it so clicks go to your contour lines, not the image.

Trace depth contours over the image

✍️ Freehand — hold & drag to draw the line (releasing pauses, not closes) instead of clicking each point Line detail — new traces 100% Color match 38 Cross thin lines 0 px

A border or label drawn across the water cuts the band in two and the trace stops there. This steps over lines up to this many pixels wide instead of loosening the color match (which would swallow the land).

Each finished contour is saved at its depth and engraves & exports as bathymetry — build a lake layer-by-layer from a scan.

Save these contours to the lake library

Depth charts shared for this lake

📡 Import sonar log → depth contours

Contour interval ft

Turn your sonar recordings into depth contours — they engrave & export with the bathymetry (and in the GIS / CNC files). Import multiple trips: tracks merge and the contours re-interpolate from every sounding. CSV & GPX work now; .sl2 / .sl3 is beta.

🗺 Import elevation / depth raster

Upload a DEM or depth raster (state LiDAR, USGS, your own survey). Depth → contours at the interval above; elevation → drives the Topographic layer and the CNC relief export. GeoTIFF in lat/lon, Web-Mercator or UTM.

🌐 Import KML / KMZ / GeoPackage

Google Earth paths & shapes, GIS layers (.gpkg), zipped shapefiles / file-geodatabases, DXF & GeoJSON (via the import server — any CRS), property lines, trails. Lines & polygons engrave (and export in the GIS package); pick “Depth contours” when placemark names or a depth column carry the depths.

Click each corner of your parcel and close the loop — it becomes a bold outline with a live acreage label. Set the color/width with the Draw controls. Not survey-accurate.

Click to drop points, or hold & drag to draw freehand — releasing pauses (drag again or click to keep adding). Close with a double-click, clicking the first point, or “Finish line”. Mouse, finger or stylus. Each line engraves & exports.

Import bathymetry from an SVG

Pulls the depth contours from a previous export into this map as editable lines — click a line to select, drag to move, ✕ to delete. They engrave & export with the map.

Import a LightBurn project

Brings the vector shapes out of a LightBurn project and drops them on this map as editable lines at their real millimetre size — click a line to select, drag to move, ✕ to delete. Bitmaps and text without stored outlines can’t come across; you’ll be told what was skipped.

Places & Areas

📍 Add a place — address or coordinates

Label Gap

Type an address or “lat, lng” to drop a pin (and label) at that exact spot. Add as many as you like — each one is draggable to fine-tune.

📌 Import points — drop a pin at each

CSV with lat,lng (or latitude/longitude) columns — an optional name/label column becomes each pin's label. Or a GeoJSON of Point features. Every point drops a draggable pin using the icon & color chosen above.

Show places & areas

Topographic

Elevation contour lines 🖼 Frame border (the outline around the map)

Land elevation contours from terrain data — one SVG layer per level for stacked cutting, same as bathymetry.

Contour spacing Contour layers 10 Skip lowest layers 1

Hides the lowest near-shore contour lines (the shoreline already comes from the water outline). 0 = keep all.

Line width 0.01" Smooth contours 2 Declutter — hide tiny specks 0

Drops the smallest isolated contour rings (little bumps & dips) to clean up busy terrain. 0 = keep every contour.

Min spacing between contours 0"

Real-world gap for laser cutting: any topo (or depth) line running closer than this to another line — or to the map border — is dropped, so packed contours never burn together. 0 = off. 0.125" = 1/8". Holds at any poster size. Shared with “Min line spacing” under Bathymetry.

Preview detail — simplify 3 m

On-screen contour simplify tolerance (metres). Lower = smoother, denser preview. A sub-pixel floor keeps wide views fast.

Laser export detail — simplify 0.6 m

SVG/DXF export re-renders the contours at this metre tolerance (no preview cap) — smoother, slower export for cutting.

Lines terminate at the border (off = fill in / close along it) Layer colors Elevation units Elevation numbers on each layer White backing behind the numbers Clip contours to land (no overlap onto water) Tint elevation fills (preview)

Golf Course

Show golf course layers

Fairways, greens, bunkers, tees, holes & cart paths for a golf course in view — each its own SVG layer.

Activity (GPX)

Pick several files at once, or import again to add more — each extra track gets its own color, its own layer in the cut file, and a stats button that puts that ride’s numbers on the map. The elevation profile follows the first one.

Import a run/ride GPX to engrave the route on top of the map — same files as the Print Maker activity poster.

Ski Resort

Show ski resort layers

Lifts, downhill runs (colored by difficulty) & slope areas for a resort in view — each its own SVG layer.

Print

The printed version of this design — its own artwork settings, separate from the cut file. Nothing here changes your laser exports.

Print size

Loading print sizes…

Show cut lines on the print (piece edge, cut margin, seams)

Off by default — those lines exist for the laser, not for a poster.

Background Border / margin — all sides

Blank border printed around the artwork, on the finished print — in whatever unit the Size section is set to.

Print preview

Generate a map to preview the print.

Printed to order and shipped to you. We render the print file at the best resolution this device can paint (up to 300 DPI) — the size list shows what will actually be printed.

🖨 Print at home — a card you print on your own printer

Pick a card size in the Size dropdown above, then download a PDF with the card at true size and crop marks to trim. Best on cardstock.

Page Layout

Include a cut outline (a vector border for a cutting machine — Cricut, etc.)

✉️ Postcard back (live preview — this is what prints on page 2)

Stamp box Address lines Divider

Export

Pick a format below, then the options control the output. (Set the map name in the bar at the top.)

Export preset

Layered, cut-ready SVG — works in every laser app.

Exports at the design's finished size (set under Size in Setup).

3D layer / base thickness

Relief height (CNC)

GeoPackage coordinate system

Cut-ready: outlines only, color per layer Stacked layers: closed water + land cut-out (for layered cutting) Show inner padding line (designer guide ~0.5″ in) — the exterior edge is always cut Cut the full sheet border too (shape cuts) — the outer rectangle at map size exports as its own layer Text as vector outlines (works in all laser software) Icons as vector paths (crisp cut/engrave lines) — uncheck for raster image engraving. Photo icons always raster. All text stays editable (LightBurn / Illustrator) — every label AND the title/captions export as movable, re-typeable text in their real font name (install the font to match it exactly; straight, not curved) 🗺 Include the live basemap in the SVG — the reference map embeds as an image layer (for proofs & positioning; not for cutting) Machine colors: one laser layer per operation (LightBurn / xTool / Glowforge)

⚖️ Data licenses — roads, water & names are © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL): attribution required, commercial use OK. Bathymetry/elevation: NOAA & USGS (public domain) or state surveys. Attribution is included automatically in GIS exports.

Each feature — and each depth level — is its own Inkscape/Illustrator layer. With "Text as vector outlines" on, road names (parallel to their streets), place names and your custom text are converted to real glyph paths — LightBurn & co. show them directly. (Georgia/Arial outline as Montserrat.)