How To Turn Your Drawings Into Unique Embroidery Designs

Have you ever wanted to turn your unique and creative drawings into embroidery designs? In many cases, we've tried to create several unique embroidery designs, but just don't have the resources to do so. So why are you sitting around, and not attempting to turn your unique drawing skill, into a masterpiece of an embroidery design? The process is very simple, and once you get the hang of it, you can use the same drawing as a template for future embroidery designs. After you've done it successfully one time, you'll be able to do it on any drawing that you create. By learning this fantastic technique, you will increase your embroidery design collection by ten fold.
To begin, redraw your original drawing on a blank piece of paper. If it is already on a blank piece of paper, you can skip this step. However, if it's already on a blank piece of paper, and you don't have another copy of the drawing, then you should redraw it. Simply because you will no longer have the drawing after the entire process.
If you have a scanner or some scanning device, you can use this as well to duplicate the design so you won't have to worry about redrawing it and/or losing it. If you are redrawing the design, do not include any of the texture, shading, or miscellaneous lines that are not needed. Keep the design simple, so that when you are trying to create your embroidery designs, you will have a few set colors you can follow, and won't have to worry about whether or not it is going to get too complex. The more you include in your drawing, the harder it will be to embroider.
When you are finished, look at it, and the drawing should resemble something that you would find in a children's picture book. The more simple you make it, the easier it will be for you to transfer it over to some of your embroidery designs. From here, you need to get some fading or erasable dressmaker's marking pens. With these pens, you have to redraw the outline of the drawing that you have made, onto your embroidery fabric. Now that you've created the outline for you to follow, you now have to go back to your original drawing, and begin coloring in the different parts of your drawing. This will let you know a basis of what colors you are going to use, and where they are going to be on your embroidered fabric.
From here, the process is up to you to begin sorting out all of the colors and determining whether or not you have too many colors, or you do not have enough. It is good in some cases to have just a few colors for a simple drawing. If the design gets to complex, you'll only be stressed out in the long run. Take your time, and with patience you will build up your skill for turning your drawings into unique embroidery designs.

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Digitally Editing Photographs of Paintings

In my previous article, I explained how I photograph my paintings, recording high enough quality jpg's to reproduce well to at least 7 inches square in high-resolution print. In this article, I explain the digital editing process I use in Adobe Photoshop 7.0, once I have downloaded the images to my computer. The aim is to have a final high-resolution file ready for print, and also some lower resolution files suitable for use on a website. Whether or not freeware is as good as Photoshop, I wouldn't know, but if you don't have Photoshop already, I would research this before buying a copy.

This article is not a Photoshop or computer tutorial. It lists what I do, but doesn't give instructions. This article is for readers that already have a reasonable knowledge of Photoshop, and other computer skills. I only have basic skills myself, so nothing too advanced is needed. Before you do anything, you will need to ensure your computer screen is properly calibrated. If you type "PC monitor calibration" into your internet search, there are plenty of websites that will take you through this.

Let's assume I've just finished photographing my latest painting, and have just downloaded the images into my "Source Images" folder on my computer. I keep all my source files in this folder, and keep a regular backup of this, and all my other images folders, safely hidden in another location. I back-up to CD or DVD, as it's non-volatile memory. You might want to consider backing up to an external hard drive too. Any editing I do to the source file is saved as a different file, in a different folder.

Firstly, you may remember from my previous article, I take several versions of each shot. I preview them carefully, and delete all but the best one of each.

Opening the file in Photoshop 7.0, I crop, rotate and zoom out so that I have the largest view possible on my screen of the whole image. Then, with the painting next to me for visual reference, I adjust the Levels accordingly.

Then the Colour Balance. My source files are usually too blue, so I move the pointers slightly away from Blue and Cyan. Then, I adjust the Saturation. With my photos, the red is often very over saturated. I sometimes have to move the red saturation down to around minus 15. That's usually enough to get the colours and tones right. Tweak around if necessary. I occasionally use the Brightness/ Contrast too.

Stand back and look at both the painting and the PC screen together. Take a break, then look again with fresh eyes. If there's someone else around, ask them for a second opinion. Getting this right is important, especially if you are going to be uploading a version of this image on-line for a potential buyer to look at. Then, I zoom in to 100%, and use the Unsharp Mask to bring it crisp into focus. Don't overdo it. I always find the image needs a bit of sharpening, and always leave the sharpening till last. I Save As jpg to my "High Res Edited" folder, (image quality maximum).You may want to save to a lossless file type instead, but high-res jpgs have always been fine for my purposes.

Now for making images suitable for my website. I reduce the Image Size, so the longest dimension is 850 pixels. Zoom in to 100%, and use the Unsharp Mask to focus. I then Save For Web at a quality setting I'm happy with in the preview screen. I tend to save them at very, perhaps unnecessarily, high quality. The file size is usually around 200k. If you're worried about people downloading useful versions of your images, you may want to reduce the longest dimension and/or image quality.

I then create the thumbnail image, using the same Save For Web process as before, but making the longest dimension 157 pixels.

Note: I always sharpen in 100% view.

Vincent Van Gogh, the Tragic Story of a Brilliant Painter

Twelve years after his tragic suicide, Vincent's work was discovered by a Parisian art dealer. Until then, no one, except for those who knew him personally, had ever even heard the name. Today, large sums of money are exchanged for his work.
Vincent was born in the Dutch village of Zundert, in the south of the Netherlands. He studied theology and became a preacher in the Methodist Church. He also worked for several different art dealers in The Hague, London and Paris. Only in 1880 does he start painting, first traditional and very "Dutch", reflecting the Dutch rainy climate with many dark brown colors.

In 1886 Vincent moves to Paris, and two years later to Arles, on the Mediterranean, near Marseille. On the 20th of October of that year, Vincent's friend Gauguin joins him in Arles. Vincent's art becomes lighter in color, showing the Mediterranean sunlight in it.
Two months after Gauguin comes to Arles, Vincent has a schizophrenic episode and cuts a piece of his own ear off. The years following, Vincent starts to get very sick, and he eventually kills himself in 1890. His brother, Theo van Gogh, who had supported Vincent all of his life, dies seven months after Vincent, possibly from grief.
Van Gogh never sold a painting in his life. Today, his paintings are the most expensively sold in the world, and are admired around the globe in many museums and private collections. He also is celebrated as the forerunner of the expressionist movement.