Here you can download the Illustrator file used in this tutorial.
LaserPreparationTutorial - example.ai
Type the desired text
Position the text in the final desired position
Vectorize your text by creating Outlines
Option 1 : Right click on the text and choose : Create Outlines
Option 2 : Go the menu, click Type and then choose : Create Outlines
Option 3 : keyboard shortcut : Shift+Cmd+O (MAC)
If you wish to cut out the text letters be careful as the small pieces inside the letters like a, e, o, p, q etc. will not be attached to the rest of the material and will fall out.
To remedy this we can use fonts that are designed for this specific purpose and are called stencil font. Feel free to search on the internet for free stencil fonts available. There are plenty!
In case you are a lazy bastard, you can follow some of the links bellow:
167 Free Stenciled Fonts · 1001 Fonts
30+ Best Stencil Fonts | Design Shack
Shapes made out of several shorter segments (see picture below) is not appropriate for use with a laser machine (If interested why, see explanation at the end of the file). What we need to do is to join all the small segments together
You can check if your shape has several segments by selecting the entire shape. If there are several segments selected in your layers window, that means that your shape is composed of several segments.
Another way to check is also by trying to select the shape itself. If clicking on the shape with the Direct Selection Tool (keyboard shortcut A) highlights only a part of the entire shape, that means that the shape is composed of several different segments.