Bridging the gap from creativity to cross-stitch chart.
A reader asked me the following question:
You mentioned that you use different design techniques depending on the piece, including software. I would be interested to know what software you’ve used and what you’ve found to be the drawbacks to designing using software versus graph paper.
This is a very interesting question with a somewhat complicated answer, so I’m giving it a blog post for discussion.
Ok, first, I was perhaps unclear in my original post about creating charts. For creating a cross-stitch chart, I use PatternMaker Pro, which is available from a company called HobbyWare. The primary reason I use PatternMaker is because when I first started charting for publication, another company published my designs and that company needed the charts in a PatterMaker format. There are other programs on the market: Easy Grapher Stitch Wiz and PC Stitch for example. I haven’t really investigated the pros and cons of these because I’ve been happy overall with PatternMaker. If I did more complicated stitches, I might invest in something that allowed me to make better stitch diagrams. That’s a bridge I’ll cross when I get to it.
So how do I get from doodle/sketch/design to a chart to stitch from. The short answer is it depends. The long answer is that it depends on the type of the design, and also how long I have been designing and working with the software.
For a design like the mini-impressionist series, I can literally paint it in chart on the computer. These designs are built up in layers: first the blue of the sky and the green of the land, then more and more details. I usually make multiple computer files as the design progresses. Here’s what the progression can look like:
I also find geometric designs fairly easy to design directly in the cross-stitch software. Examples of these would be “Post Modern Dogs”, “Maze” and much of the Celtic knotwork.
Additionally, I find most alphabets fairly easy to design directly in the software itself. The major constraint with lettering is how big do I want to make it and is it backstitched or cross-stitched.
I tend to sketch designs such as the dragons and other “natural” objects. Here are a few examples:
This is a far more painstaking process. I usually sketch in a sketchbook, trying to perfect the design (for “Angle of Love”, I actually used a straight-edge and a compass!) I then tape graph paper on top of the sketch and redraw the outlines onto the sketch paper as it would be in a cross-stitch graph; angles are contrained to 45, 60 and 30 degrees, everything else goes along the edge of a graph line. Occasionally, I draw directly on graph paper, especially if I want to limit the drawing to a particular size. I don’t always work on graph paper because it sometimes impedes the design process. I then transfer the drawing line by line into the cross-stitch software. That process can be timeconsuming. Once I have the line drawing into the software, I can work on coloring it in using the software. I have learned the hard way to check the colors I pick in the chart program with real floss colors. Even that can sometimes be misleading!
Here’s a look at how “Mother’s Treasure” evolved. The original sketches were done separately, and then combined. I added the border next, then colored everything. Finally, I softened color-change lines and tweaked individual stitches:
Overall, I simply find some designs easier to make directly on the computer and some are more easily drawn on paper first. I am doing more and more directly on the computer as I get more comfortable designing that way. I will probably continue to use both techniques and probably others!