Marc_Baril

I agree with everything will_matney says.

CNC has been around for decades now in factory settings, it is nothing new. What is new are the machines that are now available to the average hobbyist or small workshop. If CNC could have taken over, it would have done so 15 years ago.

You can tell when detailing has been done by a machine, hands down. Your average person may not notice or care when they see this on their Costco bought furniture, but anybody who knows anything about fine furniture and cabinetry will recognize the cheesiness of machine carvings from several yards away. CNC carvings lack the crispness and depth of hand-carved work. Undercutting is extremely limited with rotary cutting tools and this will never change. These machines will never replace humans in creating artful woodwork because wood is one of the least uniform and predictable (except to the trained hand and eye) materials humans work with.

Remember that the target market for the higher end, heavily hand-built furniture are people who understand the beauty of fine wood and a careful craftsmanship and have the money to seek it out.

One shouldn't however dismiss the artistic possibilities of these tools out of hand. CNC may not be appropriate for traditional decorative work or fine finishing, but they are very convenient for mundane tasks where one simply needs to hog out a lot of material before getting to start the "fun" work (...of course, some people find the hogging out part fun as well; hey, whatever turns your crank). Designs that would have been too costly to produce may come within the reach using CNC. Even before CNC came along, people put together router jigs (and still do of course) to perform steps such as hollowing out the seat of a chair - is that "cheating", or is that just being smart? Also, I can see how very interesting textured panels can be generated with these tools. Like everything else, It's just a question of matching the design to the tools at hand. Just don't buy one of these things expecting that it will churn out beautifully crisp and clean Rococo or Art Nouveau panels for you. Their use is very limited.

In a word; as far as I'm concerned the CNC vs. hand tool debate is a non-argument.