Many newbie embroiderers may be tired of some basic designs that came with the embroidery machine. They got some beautiful patterns in their life, or they are tired of buying different designs, but they are confused about to how to make their own designs. I hope this article can help you.
Selection of digitizer software
There are many digitizer software on the market, such as Wilcom, Embrilliance, Hatch, emCAD and other softwares, as well as some embroidery machine companies, such as Brother and Ricoma. The most popular one is Wilcom, which has the most complete functions and most users. There are many tutorials, which are easy to learn. It has high requirements for users' computers and price is expensive. I personally use emCAD. Considering that my computer configuration is kinda low, Wilcom will get stuck, so I gave it up. emCAD is a relatively small software with low requirements for computer configuration, cheap, but less teaching tutorials. But generally speaking, the functions of the softwares will not differ too much. Just choose one that meets your needs, capabilities and budget.
Search for materials
We often see some pretty pictures on the Internet. For example, I am a huge fan of Naruto. I love the character Pein and want to move it to my own clothes, which got a great sense of achievement. When looking for materials, we need to pay attention to several points. First, the pictures should be as clear as possible, with high resolution, as few colors as possible (for the convenience of beginners), the lines should be as thick as possible, and the JPG form should be selected as far as possible, because JPG meets the requirements of most software.
Selection and skills of needlework
There are six or seven common needling methods. For beginners, I recommend two of those, “Satin” and “Tatami”. They are simple and easy to use. 
Satin: it is suitable for embroidery and composite filling of banded patterns. As the stitches are dense, the actual embroidery effect is shiny. It is the most common stitch.
Tatami: it is named after the effect that its stitches are woven like straw mats. This is mainly caused by the fluctuation of stitches produced by its staggered needle dropping. Tatami is often used to fill stitches.
The bottom sewing (backing) method in combination with Satin, 1: center line flat stitch and side line flat stitch (applicable to most cases) 2 Tatami (applicable to large-scale filling needle sewing); Matching with the backing method of Tatami, 1: side line flat needle (applicable to the backing of small-size Tatami) 2: Tatami (applicable to the backing of large-scale Tatami)
Adjustment skills and methods
1: When a long word or a sentence is embroidered, it is necessary to add a ribbon stitch of Satin around the letter to cover the edge. Due to the shrinkage of the material, the embroidery sequence will affect the final effect (the Satin of the binding is misaligned). Some changes to the embroidery sequence are needed to improve the embroidery effect. Adjustment skills (words or sentences with a large number of words): after embroidering a letter or word, you can directly wrap the edge with a Satin, and then start embroidering the next letter or word, and so on. Instead of sealing all the letters or words, the embroidery is finished and then the Satin is used for uniform binding.
2: When embroidering on fabrics with high elasticity such as socks or knitted fabrics, in addition to increasing the shrinkage compensation coefficient, the embroidery effect can be improved by making two layers of bottoms.
3: When the embroidery is precise, the stitch density can be appropriately increased. When embroidering a small part, you can also increase the stitch density appropriately, and then change the needle with smaller diameter and thinner thread on the machine to increase the precision of embroidery.
4. The difference between the two edging sequences is the color sequence on the right. This is the one-time edging after all the letters are embroidered. If there are many letters, it is easy to cause the pattern to move. The second is to cover the edge of one letter after embroidering, which is more stable.
Cautions for the new designs on the machine
Before a perfect work comes out, it is inevitable to try again and again. Considering different machines, different materials, different needles and whether used the backings, we should pay attention to the adjustment of the density of your design. We use DST and DSB formats. The size should not exceed the size of the embroidery frame. The USB flash disk should be less than or equal to 16GB.
Be patient and you will get the perfect work!
About selling and sharing
As for the selling and sharing of your designs, some people are happy to let everyone use their own version, and some people want to use it to get extra income, which are all good. If you want to sell, please consider the following points: the quality of your design, the number of stitches, the time you spent designing it, and pricing according to the market.
Wish you all good!
(Star Chen/Shawn Wang)
