Image Modes & Dithering
Lightburn ships eleven image-rendering modes available on every controller, plus a twelfth (3D Sliced) exclusive to the galvo edition. Pick wrong and your photo looks like a smudge. Pick right and a stainless dog tag looks like a magazine print.
The eleven universal modes (exact UI labels)
| Mode | What it does | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| Threshold | Pure black/white cutoff at a chosen brightness level. No grays. Has a Ramp Length option for soft edges. | High-contrast logos, line art, sharp graphics. |
| Ordered | Bayer pattern dither, predictable repeating grid of dots. | Stylized retro look. Rarely the best choice for photos. |
| Atkinson | Error-diffusion dither, classic Mac look. Lighter overall, fewer dots in shadows. | Stylized prints, vintage posters. |
| Dither | Standard Floyd-Steinberg dither. (Yes, the menu literally says "Dither.") | General-purpose photos. Solid default. |
| Stucki | Error-diffusion dither, smoother gradients than Floyd-Steinberg. | Photos with lots of midtones; portraits. |
| Jarvis | Jarvis-Judice-Ninke dither. Smoothest gradients of the error-diffusion family. | Photos on metal, the community-standard for fiber photo engraving. |
| Newsprint | Diagonal-line halftone style. | Comic / vintage newspaper aesthetic. |
| Halftone | Dot halftone with adjustable Cells per Inch and Halftone Angle. Like print magazines. | Pop-art / Lichtenstein style; comic effects. |
| Sketch | Line-art conversion, turns a photo into a vector-style sketch. | Stylized portraits, fast engrave times. |
| Grayscale | Per-pixel power modulation between Power Min and Power Max based on pixel brightness. | Continuous-tone surface marking on flat materials. |
| Pass-Through | Disables Lightburn's internal resampling. Image is sent to the controller as-is, at the image's own DPI. | Pre-dithered images you've prepared in Photoshop; sending exact pixel-for-pixel control. |
The galvo-specific bonus: 3D Sliced
Lightburn galvo edition adds 3D Sliced mode, the magic for relief coin work. Slices the depth-map image into discrete depth layers, engraves each at decreasing power for layered depth, without needing a live Z axis. See Relief Coin Engraving for the full workflow.
Dither comparison: which to pick
- Sharp edges, no gradient: Threshold.
- Photo on stainless / anodized AL: Jarvis or Stucki. Jarvis has slightly smoother gradients; Stucki engraves slightly faster.
- Photo on wood (CO2): Stucki. The wood's natural grain interacts well with its dot pattern.
- Stylized poster look: Atkinson.
- Vintage / comic / pop art: Newsprint or Halftone.
Common image-mode settings
| DPI (Dots Per Inch) | Resolution of the engrave. 254, 318, 423, 508, 635, 1016 are the round-mm-equivalent values. 318 DPI = 0.08 mm interval. 1016 DPI = 0.025 mm interval. |
| Line Interval | Same control as DPI but in mm. Lightburn keeps them synced. |
| Negative Image | Inverts black/white before processing. |
| Number of Passes | Repeat the image engrave N times. |
| Z Offset | Per-image Z shift. |
| Bi-directional Scanning | Default ON. Turn off for highest-quality fine detail. |
| Scan Angle | Engrave direction in degrees. 0° = horizontal. |
| Angle Increment | Rotates scan angle slightly per pass, spreads scan-line artifacts so they don't read as bands. |
| Dot Width Correction | Beam-width compensation. |
| Overscanning | GCode-only. Extends scan past edges for clean acceleration. |
The "Adjust Image" tool: pre-engrave tuning
Right-click an image → Adjust Image. Per-image tuning without editing the source file:
- Brightness / Contrast.
- Gamma.
- Sharpen / Unsharp Mask.
- Apply preset presets per material type.
This is a non-destructive layer over your original, adjusting it doesn't touch the file on disk.
Verified against LightBurn 2.x. Source: LightBurn official docs. CutSettingsEditor / ImageMode, Collections / LightBurnForGalvos (3D Sliced), Adjust Image tool.