How do you digitize embroidery?
I have a Brothers embroidery machine, and im trying to figure out how to digitize images. I have no idea where to start, which program do i need? where do i get it from? Is there a easy to read manual for digitizing? im not experienced, any help will be great!
Comments
to answer your first question, in order to make a quality design that's worth your thread, stabilizer, fabric and time you will need to do what is called manual punch digitizing.
If you are an artist you are a step ahead as you can use your own pictures, but if not you will have to find clipart that the aritist allows to be used OR you can subcribe to many different clipart sites to get your images.
Think of digitizing as kind of like tracing a picture only a lot more steps and a lot harder! That's the best I can describe it.
It takes a lot of patience and trial and error and MANY test stitching sessions of a design to make sure there is nothing that needs to be adjusted.
Now for the best programs-well that's a loaded question.
Most of this decision depends on what you want the software for. None of them are "easy" at first, but again with a lot of patience and persisitance anyone can accomplish great designs.
Prices range from free to thousands of dollars, of course the cheaper the program the more frustrated you are probably going to get with using it.
I personally use Embird. This is a great program because you buy the "basic" package, and then add plug ins that you want. For digitizing you will need the Studio plug in, and if you are wanting to do quick and simple lettering from any TTF you will want their Font Engine plug in too.
I suggest if you are wanting to play around with digitizing, Sophie Sews is a free software. Of course not the best, but it's free and will give you a feel for what digitizing is all about.
I have to warn you that the last I heard they were still in the building/testing phase so there are are glitches and bugs but nothing that will cause your computer to go *poof*
I would also suggest a sewing/embroidery forum
I belong to a few, but my favorite is sewforum provided by allbrands
there are thousands of very helpful members there and a lot of free designs.
i post a lot of my work there as free samples from our website.
If you do a search for Sophie Sews and Sew Forum you should be able to find links to both.
Hope this isn't info overload and that it helps!
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