Print Preview

Print Preview

This page will describe the multiple options available on the print preview screen:

Surface Height

You can print on top of the dish that comes with Foodini, or any other flat surface: another plate, a cake, etc. 
In all cases, the Foodini plate/dish should always be in place when printing. 
It is important to print on a flat surface.

In the print preview screen, before printing, make sure that you have the correct base height selected. The base height tells Foodini at what height to start printing.

Foodini Dish

The glass dish that comes with Foodini.

Silicone Mat

Default selection. Refers to the Foodini silicone mat. If you use another mat, you may need to adjust the print surface height.

Custom...

If you know the height of your surface, you can enter the number directly. Decimal points are accepted. (For example, a surface height of 10.5.) The maximum height is 110.

If you want to save the height of a custom print surface, tap the star ().

If you do not know the height of your surface, use the Automatic option, described next.

Automatic...

Foodini can help find the height of your custom surface, either automatically as described here, or using the Manual Method. Note that the automatic method may result in a result of +/- 1mm from the actual height - which is fine for most print scenarios. 

Put your plate or at least one of your objects (like cookies!) on top of the Foodini dish, making sure at least one item is in the center of the Foodini dish as Foodini will automatically use two laser cross-beams to help measure. These cross-beams meet in the center of the dish. 


Shut the door, and tap Automatic... Foodini will automatically put the result in the surface height box.
 
After Foodini measures the height, you can move the item out of the center of the dish if desired, and add more items (cookies!)

Special Nozzle Height

For printing with Nordson nozzles - requires a Nordson nozzle adapter from Natural Machines. Please write to us if you would like to enquire about purchasing. Go here for specific instructions on how to use Nordson nozzles with Foodini.

Multiple Copies

Once you perfect your print, you can print multiple copies of it on the same dish without having to copy it multiple times in the dish layout.

There are several options:
  1. - = no copies
  2. Find... = Foodini can automatically find multiple foods placed inside and print on top of each one... like cookies! Make sure you first set the Surface Height by either the Custom or Automatic feature above. Note that if you are using multiple items, like more than one cookie, the items must all be the same height. They do need some space between each one (cookies should not touch one another), and they must be on the Foodini dish; not on the silicone mat or any other surface. Foodini will outline all items it finds in green. If the print design isn't sized as you would like it, you can resize it using the size feature. Not getting the results you expect? You may need to adjust the camera or retake the background image.
  3. 1x (Center) = center print
  4. 2x = 2 copies
  5. 4x = 4 copies
  6. 6x = 6 copies
  7. 8x = 8 copies
  8. 9x = 9 copies
Note that this will copy all the shapes in your dish. For example, take this dish of 2 shapes:


If you choose 9x, you will get 9 copies of both shapes.

You can also adjust the size of the prints:


Print x2 90° 

With this feature, Foodini will print the shapes, rotate the plate 90° (90 degrees), and then print the shapes again. This is designed to make better use of the plate space available. 
When using this feature, you cannot have a shape in the center of the plate.
This will not work with locked dishes that you cannot unlock, as you cannot move the print to the appropriate place on the dish (leaving the center empty). 

Example: Place the shapes horizontally, leaving the middle of the dish empty.


Result:

Ingredients/Capsules Required and Capsule Bay Numbers

Below the image of the print, Foodini will tell you how many capsules are required, what ingredients to use, and what capsule bay to use for each capsule. 


Foodini has room for up to 5 capsules holders that will automatically exchange as needed. They are numbered from left to right as 5-4-3-2-1. (Image is with the door open):



Virtually See Your Print

You can tap the image of the dish once to see a larger view. Tap the camera icon on the top left to activate the camera. Tap the camera icon again to toggle off the camera. Tap anywhere on the large image of the dish to go back to the full print preview screen. 

Use AR (Augmented Reality) to Align Prints

To perfectly align your prints, you can use Foodini's built-in camera to see your print in augmented reality (AR) on top of your real print surface. 
Set your base height prior to using the AR feature.



To activate the camera, tap on the print preview area:


Tap the camera icon:


You may have to wait several seconds for the image to fully appear. 


When you have finished aligning your print, tap the image to go back to the print preview screen.

Save

You can save your individual dish to share with others or to add to other Foodini accounts. First you'll need to download the dish, and then upload it into the other Foodini account. Both processes need to be done from a laptop or computer - see Connect to Foodini from Another Device.

Download the dish 

Tap SAVE:


A file will download to your computer. The file name will be named similar to this:
dish_100.json

Upload the dish

In the receiving Foodini account, go into dish gallery, top menu bar, and tap  = Choose file. Select the file, and Foodini will add it to the dish gallery. 

Sharing all dishes

You can copy all of your dishes in dish gallery to another account: See Backup and Restore Dishes. This is useful for when you want to move all your dishes from your local account to a cloud account, or share all dishes with another account.

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