Questions, answered

No. Shadow Forge produces the files; how they get cut is up to you. Plenty of users send the DXF to a commercial foam shop or a local maker space. If you do own a router or laser, the files are ready as-is.

No — that is the entire point. If you can lay tools on a sheet of paper and take a photo, you can cut a shadow board. There is no sketching, no constraint solving, and no drawing of outlines by hand.

A phone, your tools, and a sheet of paper. Use any standard size — Letter, A4, Legal, Tabloid — or set a custom size for bigger layouts. There is no special background to buy or print.

Any phone from the last decade is fine. Because the app scales from the paper's known size and corrects perspective once you mark its corners, you do not need a tripod, a lightbox, or a steady hand.

Accurate enough that pockets fit first try. The paper's known size gives the app an exact scale, and marking its corners lets it correct perspective and lens distortion, which is where naive photo-tracing goes wrong. You can always nudge a point by hand — most people never need to.

Your cutter removes material as it travels — that width is the kerf. Cut an outline exactly and the pocket comes out oversized by one kerf and the tool swims. Shadow Forge offsets every outline by the kerf you set, so it fits.

A router bit cannot cut an inside corner sharper than its own radius — it is a circle. Rather than let your machine improvise, Shadow Forge fillets contours to your bit radius so what you see is what gets cut.

Yes. It does not know what a wrench is; it traces outlines. People have done it for instruments, camera gear, medical kits and firearms cases.

Three, from the same trace: a DXF of the kerf-offset, filleted cut line; an STL of the 3D foam pocket; and a PDF ANSI-B shop drawing with a bill of materials, balloon callouts and a QR code.

During the 7-day trial you can trace, design and preview a drawing PDF. Downloading the cut files — DXF and STL — and the request-for-quote PDF needs a paid plan, so you can build your whole tray before you pay for the outputs.

It is a standard DXF of closed polylines with no self-intersections or stray segments, which is what CAM packages want. Users run them through VCarve, Fusion 360, LightBurn, Mastercam and Rhino.

Any closed-cell foam you can cut — PE, EVA, polyurethane, Kaizen-style layered foam. You tell Shadow Forge the thickness and pocket depth; it does the rest.

Let's be reasonable about this. The Service is intended for individual users. If you're selling your designs, you likely qualify as an Enterprise user. If we feel like you're abusing the service, we'll give you a call and work through a reasonable pricing structure that works for both of us.

Not yet, we are working toward offering this service. We are currently testing and working with a supplier to finalize processing and pricing. Stay tuned for updates!

Yes, even though the tracing, offsetting and mesh generation all run in your browser, and the geometry never has to leave your machine to be computed, we do store the images of your tools in the cloud. This allows you to edit a trace and view your tools in 3D renderings and .pdf generation.

Not really, while the geometry engine is client-side, and the work itself does not need a server. Signing in and syncing do.

You keep every file you have already exported — they are yours, with no license attached. Your library is preserved; resubscribe to Basic or Pro any time to keep editing. See Refunds & Cancellation.

No. The Trial does not take a card and will never convert on its own. When your 7-day trial ends, you choose Basic or Pro to keep going.