Meet dotte.ai (say "Dott-E")
Key takeaways
- dotte.ai is pronounced Dott-E, like WALL-E. Two syllables, the stress on "Dott".
- It turns a customer's photo into a production-ready point cloud for subsurface laser engraving in crystal and glass.
- It is built for engraving businesses, not for 3D artists: upload, check in 3D, fit to the block, download.
- Previews are free. You pay per finished order from a prepaid balance, with no subscription.
First, the name
We get asked this a lot, so let's settle it on day one: dotte is said "Dott-E", the same way you say WALL-E. Not "dot", not "dottay".
The name comes from the thing we make. A crystal engraving is not a picture. It is thousands of tiny dots, each one a micro-fracture the laser leaves inside the glass. Everything you see in a finished crystal, every cheekbone, every whisker, every bit of glow, comes down to where those dots sit and how closely they are packed. So: dots, plus an E. dotte.
The problem we built it for
If you run a crystal engraving business, you know this order. A customer sends a phone photo of their parents, or their dog, or the whole family at a wedding, and wants it "in 3D" inside a block by Friday.
Getting from that photo to a file the laser can engrave has usually meant one of three things:
- A 3D artist, who can take hours or days per portrait and is hard to scale in peak season.
- A flat 2D engraving, which is fast but loses the depth customers pay extra for.
- Generic photo-to-3D tools, which are made for screens, not glass. Their output fogs, bunches up or turns the background into a grey cloud once it is in the block.
Glass does not print pixels. A good engraving file has to be planned as points from the start: how bright each area should glow, how deep each feature should sit, and where the glass should stay clear. That is the work dotte.ai does for you.
What dotte.ai does
You upload the order photo. In a few minutes you have a 3D point cloud that is ready for the machine. Along the way, every step can be checked:
- Upload. Choose 3D for faces and pets, or Flat (2D) for text, logos and large groups.
- Cut-out. The subject is lifted off the background automatically, so only what matters goes into the glass.
- Point cloud. The photo becomes a dense 3D point cloud, shaped for the way glass is engraved. Noses, ears and paws sit at different depths, so the engraving changes as your customer walks around it.
- Check it in 3D. Turn it around, brush away stray points with the lasso, box or brush tools, and set the depth anywhere from 50% to 200%.
- Fit. Pick the block shape and size (rectangle, cube, heart, iceberg), place the design, and add a name or a date.
- Download and engrave. .DXF or .CAD for green-laser crystal machines, and .PLY for UV lasers (beta).
Nothing to install. It runs in the browser, and you sign in with your Google account.
What makes it different
It thinks in points, not pixels. One point is one laser fracture. A crystal gets its brightness from how densely points stack up, so we turn the photo's tones into point density and layers. Faces glow instead of fogging.
The glass around the subject stays clear. Only the subject is engraved. Backgrounds don't turn into haze.
You stay in control. The result is never a black box. You see every point before you pay, and you can fix stray points, adjust depth and fit the design yourself.
It is made for a shop, not a studio. Orders sit in one list, with the customer's name, the design and its status, so a busy day stays manageable.
Who it is for
dotte.ai is for businesses that already engrave crystal and glass, on green-laser or UV machines, and want to offer 3D photo engravings without hiring a 3D artist or saying no to tricky photos. If you sell personalised crystal gifts, memorials, pet portraits, wedding or anniversary pieces, it is built for your orders.
Pricing, in one paragraph
Every new account starts with $5 free, no card needed. After that you pay per finished order from a prepaid balance: $2.99 per 3D photo and $1.99 per flat photo. Previews in the point cloud are always free. Top up with PayPal; as a launch offer, a $25 top-up adds 10% extra and a $50 top-up adds 20%. Optional extras at upload: Enhance photo ($0.20) and Clean up photo ($0.30). No subscription.
Try it before you commit
Not sure how it will run on your machine? Download our free sample, a real portrait straight from our engine: engraving files for your laser plus the 3D mesh they were made from (50 × 80 × 50 mm, 6 layers). Engrave it, look at it on the LED base, and judge for yourself.
What's next on this blog
This is the first of a series of practical guides for engraving businesses. Coming up:
- What is SSLE? Subsurface laser engraving explained: how a laser draws inside glass.
- How to choose and prepare a customer photo for a 3D crystal portrait.
- 2D vs 3D engraving: which style suits which order.
- File formats explained: DXF, CAD, PLY and what your machine needs.
- Point spacing, layers and cracks: safe settings for K9 crystal.
Welcome to dotte. Say it with us: Dott-E.