Overview & Demo of the Silhouette Portrait 

Thank you for this. I know it's a little late, but I found this video to be key in my purchase decision. I'm a custom bladesmith and do a lot of acid etching onto stainless steel. Often it's just a name, but sometimes it's a bit more complex of a design. I've been cutting my vinyl stencils out by hand up to this point, which has been painstaking, hand-cramping and very time consuming. Your video answered all the questions I would have about the flexibility and ease of use of the Portrait and I am most thankful for the time and effort you put into it.

You are a rock star. You have my thumbs up and I am subscribing! Anyone that has a name like "CraftTestDummies" is my kind of lady!

I just imported a jpg file, selected the "trace" function, and created a cutting file. It was amazingly easy considering I'd never done anything like that before. The Silhouette Studio Software is pretty impressive!

I just got the Portrait and I'm so darn confused with this thing but this video was very helpful! Thank you so much for sharing!!

Thanks so much for your instructional video! I got this as a gift and though I am a ultimately creative person, I continued to woe in error of my projects. I enjoy that you used your error(s) to instruct this video which made it all the more interesting to know that I may make mistakes, but not to be so upset about it. You learn as you go! You are a wonderful teacher INDEED!

Aaron Brennan- you'd need to buy the professional Silhoutte software to convert it to and SVG file and then be able to cut it out. That runs an additional $50. OR your could buy the Scan N Cut (I have additional YT videos reviewing this machine) which would enable you to print you image, scan it in, and cut it OR use their FREE software to convert it. However, the machine runs about $399. The Portrait is usually about $100 plus the software so you might be better off using the Portrait and paying for the software. Good luck!

The brief answer is YES. You can use a function called trace and cut that will turn any (simple) jpg into a stencil. : )

Hi Jenny, thank you for this video. It helped me decide to buy a Portrait. I appreciate your effort. It's well done. -Frank

Thanks for this awesome vid, Jen. I just got one for Christmas and am in love with it. So funny that I somehow missed the right button for loading the mat until you told us!!! No wonder my paper stuck all funny on the long edges!!! I noticed you posted this review several months ago, so now I'm going hunting to see if you've done any followups! Thanks for all you do. I've learned so, so much from your reviews!!!

Coolness! I just got one for Christmas. Is it just me or do the RU-vid videos from Silhouette suck??? Yours is so much better! I have GOT to find time to sit and play with this thing and really see what all I can make it do!

I love the video. I am grateful that you spoke of and showed the little [mistakes?] ie: cut the corner off the mat, and the spokes. I would rather see 'honest' tests than cut and paste vids. I just got one of these from HSN. It has not yet arrived. Your video is of GREAT value to me. Thank you for your work!

Many thanks, just got my new machine today and the first two cuts have gone very smoothly.

Haha I like the tophatter sounds in the background. I too have a cameo and it is the best thing ever.

You are able to clean your cutting mats easily using wet wipes. It re-stickys them

Thank you for this awesome review. Short yet very detailed and concise

Your video is the only one that helped me figure out what the heck I was doing wrong. Thank soooooo much!

I have been on the fence for a long time with Silhouette . I do love my Cricut so thought I would go with the Portrait if I did decide to get one. TFS :)

This video was very helpful. Hope you will do more videos on the Silhouette. I have been thinking about getting the Cameo. Thanks for sharing

Good video! I use the large commercial vinyl cutters like the 54inch Mutoh at work and the 24 inch Summa cutter from home, I've always disliked setting them up with tiny media sizes on these, for small things to cut it is great! I always wondered what to do with the vinyl film and heat transfer vinyl scraps, now they have purpose!

Basically, the cutting mat. The Cameo is a 12X12 format and the Portrait is a letter-sized format.

Great review. I have a Silhouette Cameo & am in love with it. I loe that I can download one image at a time if that's all I need. I have had mine for about a year & didn't find it that hard to create my own cut & print n cut files. i need to get those gold & silver pens. They're really cool. Thanks for showing that option. JIL

from what i have read is it uses .svg files which are a standard file type for illustration files

Just a guess but I imagine hairspray will add back the tackiness to your sheet. I use it all the time on my 3d printer bed. Getting this machine today so I am just speculating at this point.

I dont know about the Portrait although it looks the same yet smaller but I have the Sihouette Cameo and you are not limited to the images and designs they provide for registration mark cut outs at all. You can also drag and drop images or photos from things you find online or design yourself and then set the registration marks and cut those too. ;-)

Bunny- do you want to cut 12 inch widths or will 8.5 do? If you need bigger, spring for the Cameo.

Hello,, Does it support any font type? I'll be using it to create stencils in different languages.. If I load my design into it will it cut the inner white spaces or just around the edges? Many thanks to you..

Is it possible to cut your own images made with Ilustrator?

Well it sounds like a robot because it is a computerized numerical controlled machine or in other words something like a tethered robot (had to geek out here, sorry). Great video!! helped me on my decision to buy one of these.

I'd check the Silhouette America website for technical questions like that. Good luck!

Other than the cameo hsn has 2, the American portrait and the potriat die cutting..difference..

thanx for responding, i figured it out one was on sale(a bundle package) and one was at regular price after weeks of research i went with the portrait, although i do have a question when selecting my image it doesnt transfer with the color, do i fill in the lines myself?? it transfers the way u also show it white with red lines..how do i get it too already have the color ready for print? although im not printing im just cutting so no hurry to answer

Just one comment if I may: There are markings for letter and A4 size on the top left corner of your cutting mat. They are quite faint markings but very helpful to know how to align your papers on the mat without eye balling it. As for aligning the mat itself for loading, yeah, they should've had markings on the machine front. I aligned it such that the right margin of the mat aligns with the right most line in the front. Another option that worked was load the mat such that it's between the two white rollers you see in the front. Hope this helps. Lastly, I just tried a moroccan lattice background on printed scrapbook paper (not CS). Blade was set to 3 like it said but I had to re-cut with setting 4. Blade setting is not an exact science, it's trial and error in some cases. Silhouette's own videos are useless for beginners, thank goodness for you tube videos from users. Thanks!

Do we need to use only the designs they offer? Can we use designs from other sources

Hi. Thanks for the awesome video..I have been considering getting one for a while now.Just one question...if you want to cut an image out of a scrap piece of paper can you do that? Or does it have to be a full 8x11.5 sheet every time?

Excellent demo. My library doesn't show the 50 free designs. It didn't sound as though you had to download them?

I have one never used it what I want to do is cut out my own scanned art work will it do this?

Hey I wonder if this machine is capable of cutting thin plastic like credit cards?

Helpful, but what I really need to know is how well it will trace clip art. I bought a Pazzles Inspiration for $600 when it first came out, but I haven't used it for 3 years because the software that traces images wasn't very good. They have since come up with slightly better software for $75 more, but I decided to put it up for sale on Amazon so I can buy another brand. Can you try tracing some clip art and let us know how it goes? Thanks - your reviews are excellent.

Thanks, I will be purchasing one now for my mother after watching a couple videos/reviews of the machine, also has anyone tried cutting Vinyl on this machine yet?

I jjust got mine and IM SOOO LOST!!! THANK YOU SO MUCh for this

Hmm, comparing it to a cameo 4 from other RU-vid videos, it might have the same noise or just a little less

great video thanks you!

Loved the video just got mine and your sure a help! Thank You

FYI: This is old informatiom. The interior structure and the control buttons of the Silouhette Portrait I purchased in 2021 are very different from those depicted in the video.

I got a Silhouette Quickutz a few days ago (really old, alternative kinda to the new silhouette ones) and it's so loud haha. So after 8pm i can't really use it as boyfriend parents go to bed then :( I plan on getting the Silhouette Portrait as it's new and will actually work with Windows 8 and is not as outdated as Silhouette Quickutz/Xyron Wishblade

Great review.Im thinking of this product or the cameo!!? I will be using one of them for airbrushing. I paint goalie masks...so I need to be able to cut team logo's onto vinyl, then airbrush the desired colors....can either machine do this...? THX

Hey Jenny , "great presentation" on a happy vibe. Just wondering if you had a similar issue as mine. My issue was, I set everything up and set the paper setting to A4 , but sometimes the paper won't feed in & just spits out, but after so many atemps and reset like closing the programe it finally cut, but the paper I order has to be cut to size before I place on cutting Matt , does the paper have to match A4 markings on cutting Matt , or can it over lap or be under etc, reason I thought I would ask you is I wasted a whole roll and got one good cut, just trying to be sure on the next roll . But I'm really impressed with this cameo,first time using it and made a great design.

can u cut a 13x9 size on silhouette portrait whose mat size is 10x8?

Very very very helpful!!!

Since the Portrait rollers have to run on top of the 8.5 x 11 card stock (rather than just on the mat like the Cameo), do you find that the rollers leave dents in the paper? Or maybe you never use the edges. I am trying to cut windows in the 8.5 x 11 sheets for photos to show through, but the roller marks show. Silhouette America told me this is unavoidable - do you have any work arounds? I got my portrait for under $100, so spending another $100+ for a Cameo is not an attractive idea to me, but... I don't like those roller marks.

How would you compare the Portrait to the Cameo? I also see that they had an Silhouette SD. Any comments or reviews on that?

Can you cut your own designs as long as you enter them into the software? I'm thinking of getting this but I don't want to be limited by a library of designs, I would like to make my own. If not I'll probably get the scan n cut.

I have called the Help desk for most of my questions and they were a huge help. I do not understnd SVG files and how to download them. The help desk told me I can only download Jpeg files. I do not have the desighner series. So how do I get them in JPEG then onto my mat? HELP

I saw that the machine still worked even when you used the mat that you had accidentally cut. Do you think it would work if you bought a 12" x 24" Cameo mat and trimmed it to 9" x 24"?

After 3 years, would you still advise to buy this one, or are some other models/brand out there?

I need help with cutting my stickers,Can you help? 😩

Hi there! Thanks so much for this! I am debating which to buy, Portrait or Portrait2. I hope you can help me make the choice by giving me some info I need. I was wondering if you could move the black pinch wheels to the sides? I have a cricut and though it is not mentioned much online, you can move those small pinch wheels in the middle to the sides, just so they don’t mark thicker materials. It seems the rollers in the middle in portrait 2 are slightly different and from the looks of it cannot be moved to the sides. But it looks that those tiny black pinch rollers can be moved to the sides on portrait. Secondly does this have a place for a blue tooth dongle at the back? Looks like a battery compartment. Would really appreciate at your earliest convenience as I really need this info so I can make my final decision! Thank you in advance:)

I wonder if you might help me please. I just got this machine today, and have tried 4 times now to cut words on scrapbooking paper - #3 on the blade doesn't cut all the way through....#4 cuts all the way through but leaves marks on the mat and rips the letters....help?

Can it cut vinyl for t shirt?

Great video thanks

so there's no bigger than letter-size cutting mat for Portrait.?

I'm so sorry that I cannot be of more help- I don't know your location and who will ship there. Perhaps contact Silhouette America and ask them?

Can you use fabric?

I'm having trouble trying to cut faux leather any tips?

Will this machine work to cut vinyl stencils?

I downloaded the software and I dont have any preloaded images???

Thank you. I was gifted a machine

so you can only use their designs and not your own?

Thanks for such a nice review! Will this machine cut adhesive backed vinyl, used in car interior trimming and décor?

Can I use a Acer crome for the software

@crafttestdummies hey, i wanna buy one, so i dont really need the thank you cards or roses ethier i need it to cut stencils so can it trace and cut JPG stencils that i make in photoshop?

May I asked your opinion? I'm new in crafting.. Is it better for me to hv cameo or portrait? I'm on the budget btw.. TQ

I purchased a Cricut Air but had to take it back for refund! there was no OFF LINE software for the machine.. also there was no android app so basically its a very pretty brick or door stop at best I hate being forced to use a website in order to get equipment to work was complete waste of time - thank you for this though i will look into getting one of these instead

I have one small question about this: how much clearance does the cutter have? I know the Curio has about 1/2cm of clearance. I ask because I use 1/16" sheet wood for a lot of detail pieces for making props. I could go as far down as 1/32" (and I could just laminate cuts afterward and clean them up by hand if need be), but I can't find any real statistics about how thick your materials can be and still feed and cut properly.

Is the mat size 8 1/2 x 11 or can you fit a 12 x 12?

hiya.. can this cut HTV vinyl :) i know the cameo does.. but was wondering about the portrait? i need to google this too LOL

Can this be used to make custom stencils?

Will it cut vinyl stickers ..?

Would this be able to cut 3M vinyls?

Hello, i just bought that machine and i have huge problem. I am cutting PVC folio, but i need the cut to be like 50-60cm (25-27inch) and i cant adjust the machine to transfer the folio forward. I mean that, I have already cut the first part (A4 format), and then i am not removing the PVC folio, just forwarding it to a clean sheet.. but i cant forward it, cant move it.. im sorry for my bad english, hope you understand me and help me. Thanks.

I'm from Emirates And I need a machine like this you can help me to find out where to get them, and well priced Thank you

HEllo, I bought a lot of png files to make my own stickers as well but find it hard to just cut around the image because when i trace image, it cuts a box squarely around the image and not trace the outlined image of my photo even when i click cut outer edge. WHen i go to cut, i click on the red triangle, it shows the box. Its so frustrating. Can you do a step by step using your cameo ( i have a portrait) showing how to pick just one png image and cut out the white background and/or etc with how you click on things to make it cut specifically around just the edge? I tried to trace popcorn and it cut out the inside part to the outer and it was a mess... I hope you understand what i mean.

If you download a font from the computer, can the cutting machine cut around the letters of the word? Or cut the letters out individually?

Hi, I am looking into buying a Portrait just for cutting and printing stickers would you recommend this or suggest the cameo? I don't know If the price of the cameo is worth it just for cutting and printing. Thank you in advance.

Thanks for sharing. I have been interested in buying a vinyl cutter for sometime and you video answered most of my questions. I’m trying to get I to cut gasket medium a I have viewed video on it, but not a talking video. Do you or have you made custom shapes videos. Every info would be helpful thanks.

great video I wanted to know which one would be better for creating tshirt designs?

Hello, can you re-size images? i.e., if you wanted to shrink down a pretty small? like for dollhouse furniture?

your video was very useful but i have some quick question i'm new to the crafting i just bought a Cricut and i'm wondering if the portrait and cameo are the same as the cricut expect not buying the Cartridges also is the portrait the same as the cameo & difference is just the size ? and can i get pictures from google and print them ? Thank you in advance . (:

How does the Portrait compare to the Cameo? Is it the size paper it can cut? I'm having a hard time finding info on the differences and similarities of these two machines.

Hi which cutting machine do you think would be best for cutting fabric shapes?

@ 8:05 you say you can only cut out one of their images? Is this true? Please help. I have an image I want to cut out with this machine. Its an image on my laptop. If this is true than I don't want to buy this machine.

Does this come with a dvd or do you have to download something online

Merr!!!!

Is there a particular reason you switched from the portrait to the cameo?

What type of files can convert to the portrait program and can you use vectors?

Jenny please tell me how to get that card stock I want to use it with my portrait

Please, can you say if this cutter can also cut cardboard with a thickness between 180 - 250 g / m2?

there are lines on the left; disregard the first long one; the next one is w/mat; second one is for w/out mat and 3rd. is for stamping. i need help/ i have no icons on the top of my software; mine are on right side/verical; all videos show at top. am i doing something wrong; cant get to blade settings as in videos. can anyone help me. or direct me here to go

I must have a new Silhouette model. The feed button for the media on the plastic sheet looks different, as does the blade. When I click on the sheet feed button, nothing happens. Literally, 1 out of 60 tries succeed. I'm being driven to insanity.

my unit is not cutting - sounds like it is - could I be loading the blade wrong (portrait)