Current Project

I've got both the Mac and PC running and have been faithfully practicing digitizing lessons. I found the lessons I've been doing from Australia are great but difficult to do because I have to read the chapter, try to remember what they said, then do it. Since I'm not familiar with what all the tools do, this is proving to be extremely difficult. I'm a watch then do kinda gal.

Artistic Thread Works sent me a newsletter a week ago and in it was a lesson by Holly. It's obvious she used to be a teacher because she's precise and explains exactly what she's doing, when she's doing it. She got me hooked immediately and I wanted to learn more. I joined ATW for $20 a quarter but was disappointed there weren't more lessons on her website. Her husband says she's working on some now.

Anyway, Holly got my juices flowing to learn more so I put in Volume 1 of my Design Creations lessons. These lessons are instructed by James Lyman who does/did digitizing and embroidery for Disney, Charmed, Lucas Films and others in the entertainment field.

Anyway, he does beautiful stuff but is very soft spoken so the volume is really high. He also has the habit of doing an edit and forgetting to tell you what tool he used, if he left clicked or right clicked, etc. That means going back and playing the step over and over until you see what he did.

So here's what I did. It's a blend of lessons from Holly and James. D wanted his signature embroidered on his HD apron. He'd already written it in dark black ink and HUGE. I scanned his apron. Which is the weird picture above.

Previously I let Generations auto digitize the signature then tried to edit it from there. Size, move stitches, etc. It was a nightmare. This time, I digitized from scratch and what a difference that made. This is the machine sewing out the sample.

Once I sewed out the first part, Dave looked it over and decided what he wanted to change. He wanted some major edits on the cross bars at the bottom of his signature. That means the signature won't be a nice neat sew out on top of the original written version.

I decided to make a background fill but didn't want it heavy so it would end up being a hard shield on the apron. I gave D a choice of three levels of fill. Of course he took the most dense affect.

Nope, this isn't the apron but it gives the general idea of what it will look like. This density for the background is actually a good choice. It should cover any of the black ink on the apron the design can't hide. Yet, it isn't filled so tightly to take a gazillion stitches or end up not the least bit flexible when he has to stoop down or bend over.

Holly took me from, "I should learn to digitize so I don't have to send designs out for someone else to do it." to "Holy cow, this is fun! What can I digitize next?"

Boy oh boy....what a difference the right instructor makes.