Which Side To Cut Vinyl

This is confusing i know.

Which side to cut vinyl.

Whatever mat and machine you are using put your adhesive vinyl paper backing side down onto your mat so the colored vinyl side is facing up see image below. Stick a piece of vinyl to your cutting mat making sure the paper backing side is down. Once the mat is loaded the screen will tell you to press the flashing go button. Cutting vinyl with a cricut machine.

Feed the vinyl under the pinch rollers and on top of the roller bar and then release the rollers to hold the vinyl in place. Refer to kiss cut guide below to adjust machine settings. For my craft queen shirt i used a smooth gold htv. For my decal i decided to use expressions vinyl series 31 removable vinyl in bright berry.

Then load the mat into your cricut machine by pressing the flashing load unload button. But remember that your vinyl is mirrored and will be applied face up onto your final surface so when you look at the vinyl side you are seeing the bottom of the vinyl the part that is going to stick and melt into your surface. This side will be more matte. Basically vinyl material is roll fed into a vinyl cutter and hangs off the back side of the cutter on rollers or on a roller bar.

If your vinyl came on a roll you can cut off a piece to fit on your mat. Generally adhesive vinyl has the colorful vinyl on one side and is backed by a paper carrier sheet that is most often white. Select images and size and load the mat into the machine. Remember we are cutting on back side of the vinyl where the heat sensitive adhesive is.

This white side is the vinyl side so you want this side up on your cutting mat. Sometimes that sheet has a grid on it to make it easy to cut straight. The glossy side of the vinyl is the side with the clear plastic backing.