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Close to Mr. Beam
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Lol, nice. That’s Michael for sure 
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Laz3r (like Slic3r) 
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Vi Luminis
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What an embarrassment of riches! Thank you all so much! I was taken by surprise.
The next person choosing a name for a laser now has an amazing selection of wonderful possible names, regardless of my choice.
I think “Project Monocle” has a lot of merit:
- It’s whimsical, and has clearly invited a whimsical logo. The backronym reinforces the whimsy, but is sufficiently contrived that no one would feel like they have to spell it out. It’s just the “origin myth” for the name. Maybe a slight change: “Michael’s Open Numerically Operated Cutting Laser Engraver” because “operated” and “controlled” are redundant, and I want it to be a good cutter…
- No one would use this name for a commercial product, so no worries about trademark hassle. The only use of “monocle” I can find in the laser area is a solid-state laser focusing ring that you can 3d print, and there would be no confusion between the two.
- The “project” part makes it clear that my goal is something others can participate in if they want to, and that the goal isn’t to make a commercial product. I used this successfully at Red Hat when I set up the Fedora Project to make clear the distinction from the Red Hat Enterprise Linux product.
I really enjoy Dorothy Sayers’ finely-crafted detective stories, set between the first and second world wars, about Lord Peter Wimsey, who caries a monocle. My wife suggests that my (initial) instantiation of Project Monocle could be named “Lord Peter.” I think I’d drop the bowler and use a simpler mustache for the inter-war concept period as a result. That would make a nearly square, but slightly horizontally-dominant logo, which can be deconstructed for simpler representation first by dropping the mustache, and second by dropping the words, for different use cases and presentation sizes, kind of like how the MakerForums logo can lose the words for the site logo, and the wrenches for the favicon, but still be recognizable as the MakerForums logo.
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@NedMan I can always redraw, but if you have an SVG of that logo that I can start from I’d be happy to use it as my basis.
@mcdanlj Here you go. 
Somehow I had a feeling the whimsical nature of the name might resonate with you. Excellent choice (If I do say so myself )
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Looks like you will not be stepping on any trademark toes.
There is even an expired logo that is very similar to Ned’s that is available!
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I’ve been playing around with the SVG. Discovered that the original was subtly and charmingly asymmetric. Changed the handlebar to a petit handlebar while preserving a bit of asymmetry, and removed the top hat to make it more square in aspect ratio. Also added a bit of a dark ring around the red dot to tie the rays together. What do you think of this?
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Looks good!
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Looks good!
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You guys are amazing.
- Short brainstorming
- Fast decision
- Quck leagal check
Better than any startup consultant! 
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Spot on mate!
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I think that logo is the full-size one that graces the main project page.
Here’s a simplified version (only long rays, bold font) that survives more shrinking, like this:
Even more simplified, and the center ring thicker to emphasize it, to turn into a favicon:
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So I think the next question is: Who might want to build a variant of this? The BOM for my huge build is well under $4K including air, cooling, exhaust, tube, PS, the whole shebang.
If I’m alone for now I’ll just open a build log.
If you might be interested if a true 40W ~400x400 or smaller bed were sensible at a lower price, let me know that too, and what the target price would be. That’s in the range that linear rail is now pretty cheap, and it would be a lot less extrusion and lower cost components all around.
If others might want to join me in the project, even if you aren’t sure yet whether you actually want to build one, we could open a new category for Monocle. Documentation, design, improving my bare-bones web site, maybe one of you wants to vlog a build; there’s lots that could be done and I’d welcome participation. Basically, I’m going to put what information I reasonably can online, but if it’s just me it’s kind of a boondoggle.
I’ve created a GitLab group for the work, so we can work together easily.
Let me know if you might be interested, so I know whether to open a build log or a category. The hardware has been arriving over the past few days, so this is getting serious.
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Site is up. I haven’t figured out how to get this simple theme (all CSS, no javascript; that’s important to me) to point to the favicons but it shouldn’t be difficult.
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I’m getting a 404 error
Same here.
My fault, I forgot that I needed to change permissions to make the pages visible.
It should be visible now.
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