The AI drove the laser cutter's software too — how rooo's leather keychain got made
2026-06-11 ／ Vol 21 ／ draft at the time of publishing
In my workshop sits a laser cutter: an xTool M1 Ultra. A 20W diode laser that engraves, cuts, and even does camera-based positioning. Until now I'd used it occasionally — engraving product labels, that kind of thing.
This time I made a leather keychain with the logo of my shop, rooo. A small leather tag, 60mm × 21mm, with the logo engraved and the outline cut out by laser. A novelty item — a tiny avatar of the shop, more or less.
What was new wasn't the object itself but the process: I handed even the operation of the dedicated software (xTool Studio) to the AI.
Until now, it was all "browsers and files"
Looking back, every "I handed it to the AI" story on this site has stayed inside the PC. Monthly accounting input, audits of my 3 websites, the weekly patrols. Operating a browser, reading and writing files, calling an API. All of it lived in the world of text.
This one is different. The laser cutter's software is a Windows desktop app — no browser extension, no API. What the AI did is exactly what a human does: look at the screen, click, and type. So-called computer use, reaching for the first time all the way to "the software in front of the machine."
What the AI actually operated
The flow went like this:
| Step | What happened | My involvement |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Launch xTool Studio and bring it to the front | — |
| 2 | Switch the operating target to the sub-monitor (the app's window opens on the secondary display in my setup) | — |
| 3 | Import the design SVG (open the file dialog via a shortcut and point it at the file) | — |
| 4 | Assign a process to each part (outline = cut, logo = engrave) | Eyeballed the assignments |
| 5 | Pick the material, test on scrap → fire for real | The start button is mine |
Take a screenshot, find the button, click it, take another screenshot to confirm. The same routine a human newcomer would use to learn the software — clumsy but steadily moving forward. The fun part was that even the stumbles were human-shaped. If the window isn't frontmost, the click swings at thin air. It stares at the main monitor while the screen that matters is on the sub-monitor. "Oh — I do that too," over and over.
For vector layers the software offers 3 process types: score (a light burnt line) / engrave / cut. The AI told the cut line apart from the logo in the layer list and assigned the correct process to each, all by itself.
The design-data trick: everything in one SVG
After some trial and error, I settled on putting the cut line and the logo engraving into a single SVG. The outline is drawn as a red stroke, the logo as a fill, and in the software you assign processes by line type: "red stroke = cut, fill = engrave."
Split it into 2 files and you have to align them on every import. Keep it in 1 file and they arrive already overlapped. Write real dimensions (mm) into the SVG and the scale matches automatically. Unglamorous, but "finish the alignment at the design stage" turned out to be the single most effective trick of this project.
Lessons that only the physical world teaches
One thing along the way made my blood run cold. Real leather can be engraved and cut — but PVC (vinyl) faux leather must never be laser-cut. Burning it releases toxic gas. Two materials that both look like "faux leather," and one of them must never go under the laser.
The AI is the one that researched this and warned me — and at the same time, it's the one check I decided a human performs every single time. Is the material in my hand real leather, PU, or PVC? Checking the tag and the feel, and deciding whether it may go on the laser bed, is my job. Mistakes inside the screen can be redone. Toxic gas cannot.
The last button is mine to press
Once the processes are assigned, all that's left is pressing start and the laser fires. This is where I don't let the AI press anything. A laser pass is irreversible; one mistake and a piece of leather ends its life charred.
It's the same structure as the final "confirm" button I press myself when importing journals into my accounting software: irreversible operations stay with the human. That's the house rule, and it doesn't change in the physical world — if anything it gets stricter. Plenty of digital operations have an undo. Charred leather has no undo.
Which is also why the first pass never hits the real leather. I dial in power and speed on scrap offcuts first, then go for the real thing. Deciding to "start from scrap" is another piece of stage-setting that stayed a human job.
The lesson: the AI's territory now reaches the machine
The finished keychain is, I'm happy to report, genuinely cute. Out of the faint smell of burnt leather came a small tag with the familiar logo in scorched brown. A logo I'd seen on screen hundreds of times sat in my palm for the first time. That felt honestly good.
The AI's territory has stretched from "inside the PC" to "machines plugged into the PC."
But in the physical world, failures persist as objects. Material safety checks and irreversible buttons are human work.
Fixing the design, driving the software, assigning the processes — that much can be delegated. Verifying the material, test-cutting on scrap, pressing the final fire button — from there it's me. As long as that line is drawn, a laser cutter becomes "a machine tool you can share with an AI." I've already decided what to make next.