Mirrored Signage: Laser Cut Mirror Acrylic
Mirrored signage is accomplished at CNCROi.com by laser cutting mirror acrylic and in this case, paint filling the back to make a colorful branding option that literally fits in any environment.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kz56loszh0s/
For this specific project, the job was to make small mirrored signage that could be glued onto other items with customer branding, acrylic mirror is a great choice for this because it’s light weight, easily customizable and sticks to anything with double sided tape.
When it comes to your engraving options, they are as endless as your imagination, any combination of vector images and font sizes and type work totally fine for this application.
If you are looking for unique signage, CNCROi.com can produce it using a wide variety of materials, metal though MDF.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TThHgeoadTg/
CNCROi.com had done a lot of custom mirrors for a wide variety of applications, from unique mirrored cake toppers to mirrors and branding hand-outs but mirrored signage is really where this material shines best.
The laser engraving process isn’t fast but the results are well worth it after we’ve completed the paint filling in the back of them, as a result, everything for this mirrored signage must be reverse engraved.
Laser engraving the front rather than the mirror doesn’t remove the mirror coating, and produces a double frosty look rather than a clean mirrored signage esthetic most CNCROi.com clients are after.
Acrylic provides a wonderful media for laser engraving, just to give you an idea of what’s possible, here’s a coaster I made for myself using a vector of my logo.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-goog1LXmE/
You can see in the image below that the mirrored signage has had the reflective backing removed by CNCROi.com‘s laser, the grey is what was mirror, the lighter color just the transparent acrylic left over and the dust is what you see from the actual engraving process.
After laser engraving the mirrored signage, we spray paint the back of it, I’ve found this to be best for solid colors and do the hand fill when multiple colors are required.
The spray paint also protects the non-engraved parts of the mirrored signage as well, so it’s a two for one deal.
You don’t need to go with mirrored for signage by the way, CNCROi.com is perfectly capable of production items using just paint and acrylic as well.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xmfVf66fd7w/
Removing the protective masking on the front, you can see the results of the laser engraved and black paint filled mirrored signage.
Time for some smaller mirrored signage, the process is the same as the bigger ones above.
A wonderful cake topper made using mirrored acrylic, same process as these signs.
The sparks are the results of our laser engraving and vaporizing the mirrored material on the back of the mirrored acrylic CNCROi.com had for this specific job.
Mirrored acrylic is the only acrylic that does this, there must be something in the mirrored surface that causes sparks, it’s all good, we’ve done a ton of these without any issues though the years.
CNCROi.com isn’t limited to a single product, we can mix and match items in the same production cycle.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c1wdBqs9nQE/
The reason for the wood in the machine during the mirrored signage production is due to the heat, it tends to warp acrylic during the engraving process so the easiest solution is to hold it down, I got tons of live edge and dimensional lumber in the shop, easiest solution I’ve found thus far.
Inner parts are cut out first then outer elements of the mirrored signage in order to maintain precision and accuracy across the entire production cycle at CNCROi.com.
What you don’t see in these picture is the huge flame shooting down under the acrylic, acrylic is essentially solid gas, put a high energy beam of energy through it and you generate quite a bit of heat with a serious fire!
I’m so proud of this custom mirrored cake topper, it was just so awesome and unique!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACP1dv7hU2A/
I wouldn’t attempt this type of work without all the bells and whistles I have invested into CNCROi.com‘s laser cutter and auxiliary equipment, this is a great way to burn down a shop if you don’t know what you are doing, it can go out of control incredibly quickly.
When it comes to mirrored signage, we can produce signs as big or as small as you wish, paint filled or solid, it’s totally up to you what we do and how we do it in the volumes you require.
Vector imagery is important though, bitmap mirrored signage will come out jagged and rough looking, we need things smooth and crisp to produce a result that’s legendary for our customers.
Mirrors don’t need to be fancy, just a layer of MDF still looks great, again, another mirror I have to this day in the shop.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9nXcRz6Zqo/
After all the parts of the mirrored signage job are cut out at CNCROi.com, it’s time to spray paint them, again, same process as their bigger cousins.
Just though the finished MDF backing looked cool after this paint job, sometimes the residuals are as interesting as the product themselves.
This was a fun job that’s been in the shop ever since, I manually paint filled my own mirror, just can’t beat the esthetics of paint filled mirrors!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qY0jDKXCKiY/
Here are the finished results of the mirrored signage production, from various angles no less.
Mirrored acrylic looks great in any light, any environment and condition, there really is nothing that comes close to it’s esthetic and that includes polished stainless steel which I’ll cover in a future video.
Each time you look at these from a different angle, it’s like looking at it all over again, just love mirrored signage and our clients love it too!
Need mirrored signage or cake toppers out of this material as well? Contact CNCROi.com right now!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUFcwtjE62E/