Lesson 8 - Creating Outlined Designs (Redwork)

Redwork designs are all the rage, and they are fun to digitize, too. They are formed of triple run stitches and single run stitches to get the look of hand outlining.

Like any design we manually digitize, we need to plan how to execute the design.

We are going to create two designs using the Microsoft_ Paint program so we can see how to approach different designs.

• Click Start on the Windows toolbar.
• Click Programs.
• Click Accessories.
• Click Paint.

Paint will open. The white area is the design area. If it is very small, slide your mouse cursor over the lower right corner until it becomes a double arrow, click on the corner point, and drag down and to the right to enlarge it.

You will be drawing a triangle with a line in it for the first design, then adding additional lines in it for the second design. You will be saving both designs as bitmaps to bring into Digitizer EasyDesign. Don't be concerned about the artistic look of the triangles. The idea is to create a graphic to practice digitizing.

• Click the Line tool, which is the 6th tool down in the left column.
• Click on the design screen in the lower left corner. Drag a straight line to the upper center to create the left side of the triangle. When you lift your finger up from the mouse button, the line will be formed.
• Create the right side of the triangle and the bottom of the triangle.

Finally, add a line perpendicular to the triangle base.


Click File, Save As. Save the design as Triangle1 in the folder of your choice.
Add two more lines to the design, perpendicular to their sides. Save the second design as Triangle2.

Click the X at the upper right corner to close the Paint program. Click Image, Insert Image on the Menu Toolbar.

Insert image Triangle1 from the folder in which it was saved. Magnify the screen so you can see the entire image.

The Plan: As we mentioned before, Redwork in machine embroidery is done using one of two tools, the triple run stitch and the single run stitch. We use the triple run stitch when there is a clear line to work with. We use the single run stitch when we must backtrack over an area.

We are going to mark the Triangle1 design to designate points:

We want to use triple run stitches as often as possible with an outline design because you get the best depth of outline, and you only have to go over an area of a design one time. Another consideration is that we want the design to sew as efficiently as possible. We don't want wide hoop swings or thread trails. We can look at this design and see where we only need to go over every part of the design one time: Start at point A,

1. continue to point B
2. continue to point C
3. continue to point D
4. continue to point E
5. continue to point B to complete the design.

Once we've decided how to proceed, we only need to designate our digitizing tool and choose a thread color.
Click the Run Line icon.

Click the Object Details icon.

1. Click the Line Stitch tab.
2. Click Run Line.
3. Click Triple.
   You may choose to shorten your stitch length. We've found stitch lengths around 2.00 mm give the nicest outlines because they go around curved areas well.
4. Click OK.
5. Click the Thread icon.
   
6. Click a color of your choice.
7.  
8. Following the plan, left click a reference point at point A.
9. Click a reference point at point B.
10. Click a reference point at point C.
11. Click a reference point at point D.
12. Click a reference point at point E.
13. Click a reference point at point B to complete the design.
14. Press the Enter key to generate the embroidery.
    

The point of this exercise is to learn to plan the most efficient way to digitize outlines. If we had begun digitizing at point E, for example, when we came to the perpendicular bar, we would have had to go up from point B to point A, then down again to point B. We would have sewn triple run stitch over triple run stitch, which we want to avoid.

Triangle2: Now, let's bring in the second triangle design. Click Image, Insert Image on the Menu Toolbar of Digitizer 10000.
Insert image Triangle2 from the folder from which it was saved.
We will mark Triangle2 to designate points:


The Plan: With this design, we can duplicate how we digitized Triangle1 until we get to point D, where we will change to single run stitch to go up the line to point E, then backtrack from E to D. At point D we will again use triple run stitch.

So the plan will be:

1. Click the Run Line icon.
2. Click the Object Details icon.
3. Click Triple.
4. Click OK.
5. Click a reference point at A.
6. Click a reference point at B.
7. Click a reference point at C.
8. Click a reference point at D.
9. Press the Enter key.
10. Click the Object Details icon.
11. Click Single.
12. Click OK.
    Click a reference point at D.
13. Click a reference point at E.
14. Click a reference point at D. Try and keep the reference points as close as possible, so you generate the second line of embroidery over the first line.
15. Press the Enter key.
16. Click the Object Details icon.
17. Click Triple.
18. Click OK.
19. Click a reference point at D.
20. Click a reference point at F.
21. Click a reference point at G.
22. Press the Enter key.
23. Click the Object Details icon.
24. Click Single.
25. Click OK.
26. Click a reference point at G.
27. Click a reference point at H.
28. Click a reference point at G.
29. Press the Enter key.
30. Click the Object Details icon.
31. Click Triple.
32. Click OK.
33. Click a reference point at G.
34. Click a reference point at I.
35. Click a reference point at B.
36. Press the Enter key.
    
    The key to manually digitizing Redwork is the planning.
37.