Wizard corners?

Jay H

PFG, Picture Framing God
Joined
Dec 8, 2003
Posts
9,908
Loc
KY
With the busy season coming up I have been counting and planning my Wizard corners. I’m trying really hard to not run out Thanksgiving weekend. I’m gonna need them! When doing some figuring I found that the software has very strange ways at counting corners.

Their manual describes a corner as “For every 90 degrees the head turns, or for each time the head has to pick up and plunge in a different direction, it counts that as one corner.”

That’s clear as a bell to me. So by that definition an oval should be 4 corners and it is. A circle should be 4 and it is. A hexagon should be 8 and it is.

For some reason an opening with rounded corners is 8 even though there is the same amount of plunges and degrees as an oval. What ever you do, don’t use the letter “O” (all letters in this post is Photo font #2) instead of a rounded corner because that’s 10 corners. These are exactly the same shapes.

Now look a cut they call Palisades. It’s the exact same shape as a “D” turned on its end and is for some reason charged at the rate of 6 corners. I don’t know why the extra two but the real concern is in the actual letter “D”. It’s 7 corners. (sigh).

If we are to go by their definition of what a corner is “R” should be 10 instead of 12 and P should be 6 instead of 9 and don’t even get me started on the letter “S”!!!!!!

Even with the discrepancies in different corner counts for virtually exact same shapes, I don’t think a technical answer will suffice. I’m not really concerned why the software miscounts corners. I just would like to know why I’m charged for corners that I’m not using if I were to go by a definition that THEY set.

I know many of you now are thinking “Why don’t he just call Wizard and ask?”

I did. I was told that in the case of rounded corners “the line and the object count each as a corner.” I don’t know what that means nor could I get an explanation as to why a rounded corner is 8 and a letter “O” is 10. If the answer is too technical for me to understand, FINE. But I do understand their definition of a “corner” and that’s not what we are being charged.

I have only dealt with the Wizard office a few times. That’s because the machine rarely ever fails. Any questions are typically answered so darn fast, you forget the conversation immediately. I’m sad to say that this wasn’t the case this time.

I asked for Steve but he was unavailable. I know he helps out here a lot with the Wiz’s. Maybe he will see my question here. I’m just confused how an opening with one plunge and 360 degrees is 10 corners? Or why amazingly similar shapes can have different corner counts.
 
I agree and anybody who consitantly runs out of corners would be silly to not upgrade. However the corners were figured properly how many people would not have ever ran out consistantly?
 
I was told that in the case of rounded corners “the line and the object count each as a corner.” I don’t know what that means nor could I get an explanation as to why a rounded corner is 8 and a letter “O” is 10. If the answer is too technical for me to understand, FINE. But I do understand their definition of a “corner” and that’s not what we are being charged.
Technically Jay, that is the right answer, however it might have been explained a little easier.

The rule is we charge a minimum of one "corner" per line / arc segment. If the segment is an arc, we charge an additional corner for each 90 degrees that arc traverses.

The 104 Rounded Rectangle opening is therefore more like an octagon than an oval, where instead of a flat chamfer line (1 additional corner charge) you have a an arc instead (also 1 additional corner charge since the arc is only 90 degress).

Now with other shapes it can get a bit tricky. Sometimes, especially with fonts, we add an extra line segment at a particularly troublesome juncture to minimize feathers and heinous overcuts. But in general we design all the fonts, CutArts and templates with this rule in mind and keep the corner charge as low as possible.

And merging openings throws an additional kink in, as sometimes the merge code has to split an arc into two or more pieces, which therefore results in a few additional corner charges.
 
I upgraded my rental to the per month charge only. Hands down it is the way to go. I cut over 100 8 x 10 mats today and never once thought about corners.
This is good advice if you find that you're frequently using more than the minimum amount of corners with a Standard rental. But if you're staying well within 4000 corners a month it's better to remain with the corner program as the new Time based rental does not offer the "Platinum" status. The Standard corners rental (which is no longer offered) drops down to a lower monthly fee after a few years, while the newer Time based rental does not. So there's a bit of a trade-off. If anyone has any questions or is utterly confused by this please give us a call 888-855-3335.

And this does not apply to the Junior rental program, which remains corner based.
 
Well once again you guys have come through with flying colors. Just so that everybody knows, after Steve posted he called me to explain further. It was totally unnecessary and just shows how far the folks at Wizard will go.

What I have learned is about what I had expected. The miscalculation occurred primarily in arcs and never angles that required the machine to replunge. I understand that the purpose of all the extra arc lines is to smooth the image. That’s great. But I still see this as a miscalculation or a “glitch” in counting corners. To me allowing this to happen is akin to selling a suede lined shadow box with a few more tiny specks and fuzzies than I’d really like to see in there. It probably won’t make or break the sale but I don’t like em. While the customer may still come back, they might always remember the speck in the shadow box. To me this is a speck. I’d be most grateful if they weren’t there but can probably live with em.

I still love ya.

Thanks guys.

Ohh and Steve, I was told that I get 1/2 credit from the JR rental toward reaching "Platnum" status. I think that happens at 30 months with a regular rental. I'm nearing my second year with Wiz and so I would have 12 months credit if I were to change over now.
 
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