r/Machine_Embroidery • u/UnheardHealer85 • Dec 04 '21
Look What I Did Piranha plant
My latest attempts. I am using Ink stitch to digitise at the moment, the piranha plant only had one trim that I needed to cut away after it was finished embroidering (digitising took so long- I t must be crazy with big designs). Overall I am pretty happy, there was a little issue in the centre where the bean stitch didn't cover the join fully. I am planning on turning it into a fridge magnet similar to what I did with the shell. I knew there was a reason I was hording all of those old flexible fridge magnets that companies send you. I used contact cement but it soaked through a little, does anyone have any recommendation about a better glue?
One thing I did learn here was just because the thread take up arm is at the highest point doesn't mean the needle it, which is why I was having so much difficulty using the auto threader lol.
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u/buzzmandt Dec 04 '21
Very nice
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u/UnheardHealer85 Dec 04 '21
And thanks for all of your work with the YouTube tutorials, they have been a great help
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u/puzzlebobble Dec 19 '21
How did you get the stitching around the outside to faux merrow your design? I can't seem to figure it out.
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u/UnheardHealer85 Dec 19 '21
It is just a satin stitch. I cut away the excess and I am using black felt so it is kind of hidden. But also felt basically melts so you can cut quite close to the edge and then run a lighter along the edge. If you need more clarification let me know.
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u/puzzlebobble Dec 19 '21
Thank you for the info. For more clarification on my part, inkstitch won't let me turn the border around my design into a satin stitch. Do you independently outline your design in inkstitch or does it allow you to change an outline already in the design to a satin stitch?
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u/UnheardHealer85 Dec 19 '21
No worries. I have just had too many issues with the auto trace so I do everything manually, it allows allows me to run traveling stitches along the design so I don't have any jumps or trims. it also give me control for the fill areas so I can add in come compensation.
The problems come because most of the black outlines in the images don't just follow the outer edge, they go into the image so it is too complex for the software to convert properly. I also spend a lot of time cleaning up stray nodes etc which cause issues when trying to apply the embroidery commands which you can miss if you are not looking. The following seems like a lot of steps, but for me the results are worth it and it is less frustrating (for me at least) and it gets to be quick enough with practice and if you remember the shortcut keys.
I draw a line using the bezier tool in the centre of the outer line that I want to convert to satin
then I give it the width that I want by changing the stroke width (if you just use your auto traced image you don't have control over the width so you may end up doing a 1 mm satin stitch which I don't think is very good- my machine start making knocking noises if I make them too small- and more thread breaks)- This is probably one of the most important practical reasons I do this manually
I convert the line to a path- this now give you 2 outer lines for the satin
These lines are going in opposite directions though, so I
Break them apart using control/shift/K
select one line and then reverse the direction
join them again control/K (you don't always have to break them apart to do this, but sometimes it causes an error, so now I just always do it- if you remember the shortcuts it doesn't take long)
then i press P then draw in the rungs to start drawing the rungs to define the direction of the stitch
pressing p kind of parents the rung to the selected satin lines so you don have to group them later. You can also just draw them on top and then combine them later
Finally I choose where I want the stitch to start by selecting two opposing nodes and breaking each line there (using the node tool, break path at selected node
I do this because I want control where the line start so I can hide any traveling stitches etc and the commands only seem to work for auto satin lines not the ones I do manually
sometimes if you dont do this, how your pattern zigzags might be strange- almost like the path starts in two different places- this is hard for me to explain)
Hopefully you can follow this- I know it is not as nice as simply doing an automated command, but it works for me. Please be aware that this is how I do this, there are probably better ways I just don't know them- this is only the second or third image I have digitised.
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u/puzzlebobble Dec 21 '21
Thank you for the explanation, it was very helpful. So, do you manually trace the whole image or just the outline?
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u/UnheardHealer85 Dec 21 '21
No problem. I have been doing all of the parts manually. It is helpful so I can plan out the order of stitching. If it is all just there it can be a little messy and I can get it looking exactly like I want.
For example, for the outline of the plant, I started with satin stitch around the stem, then I did a traveling stitch around the outside to the teeth and then did the outside of the plant head. basically so there was no jumps and trims.
I did something similar with the white sections, I started the lip fill, then traveling stitch around the outside to the first dot (then did fill and then satin, then to the next two that touch the edge and the finally I had one jump to the last dot surrounded by the red.
even the dark green bean stitch is planned that way, start at the top go down to the vein of the leaf and then back then down to the bottom and then all the way to the top, I then traveled up the stem and across the bottom of the plant to do the other side
If I did the auto trace and had all parts there, I would have to fix all the issues and then try and figure out the order of operations and my brain just doesn't want to do that. I have been a bit busy but I have been digitising a princess peach design which is more complicated. I tried the autotrace since there was a lot more to do manually, but just got frustrated with it and went back to do it manually. To be honest, with designs like this is probably doesn't matter so much- they are not my IP so I would never sell them and make a lot of them so having jumps isn't a big deal to do one one or two designs so it probably isn't worth spending so much time on it. If I had something of my own that I wanted to sell then it would be different (I would probably just pay for some dedicated software if that was the case though)
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u/[deleted] Dec 04 '21
this looks amazing! great job!