Impressions - March 2014 - 57

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Embroidery Design & Digitizing

Don't Forget the Details
Finish off your embroidery by digitizing details to enhance your designs.
By Lee Caroselli-Barnes, Contributing Writer

Where you see

nce you have built your embroidery design with the perfect ﬁll,
column or satin stitches, the ﬁnal
step is adding detail to enhance speciﬁc areas of the design. This step is last in the embroidery process because the detail needs
to be placed on top of your other stitches,
but also because that last layer is what your
customer's eye will see.
In the ﬂoral image that is pictured
above, you can see the running stitch is
used to add the all-important ﬁnishing
touch, or detail. Where you see the running
stitch on its own - where it does not have
to compete with other stitches for room or
to be visible - you should go over the detail twice. Your second pass should be with
a slightly longer stitch so that the light will
catch it and make it more visible. Remember to offset your needle penetrations for
better coverage.
Keep in mind that a stitch does not
turn a corner or bend - it is straight. So
when you digitize the running stitch, the
shortening of the stitches is what gives you
the illusion of the line curving.
If that running stitch is outlining an
area, be sure there is no distortion there.
This means your column or satin stitch

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the running stitch on its
own - where it does not
have to compete with
other stitches for room
or to be visible - you
should go over the detail
twice. Your second pass
should be with a slightly
longer stitch so that the
light will catch it and
make it more visible.

must have an edge run underlay so that
it can only pull in so much. That edge run
will dictate how far it will pull in, and your
running stitch outline should parallel the
edge run underlay.
The closer the edge run is to the edge of
the column stitches, the ﬂatter the column
will be. Bringing that edge run into the center of the column will give you the more
rounded column that you see in the image
shown. In this case, the running stitch border has to appear to be on top of the edge
of the column stitch on the screen to allow
for the fact that the column is intended to
pull in and become rounded.

Detail belongs in
areas where light
hits the image.
When placing the running stitch detail
on top of the ﬁll or tatami stitch, you must
be aware of new factors. However, the
rule is the same if you are outlining the
ﬁll: Make sure it won't pull in and become

distorted. This means you must avoid the
heavy ﬁll with heavy underlays and layer
your ﬁlls. You will ﬁnd information on this
process in the articles on blending and
shading, as well as pull compensation, in
previous issues of Impressions (see "Suggested Reading" at the end of this article).
By layering your ﬁlls, there will be no
pulling in or pushing out, and the ﬁll's
edge will remain true with just the edge
run as an underlay. Not only will your running stitch outline align beautifully, but
the ﬁll will accept the additional stitches
March 2014 | Impressions

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Impressions - March 2014

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