Create Your Own Design
0. NEW PROJECT
At first you have to create a new empty project. This is done by tapping at the plus button in the bottom right corner.
After entering a name and creating an empty project, you must choose the portrait format.
1. OBJECTS
Basically, every continues line of a design is an object.
For each object you can select a new color of thread, however this is done during the embroidery process.
Here you can see an apple. You always should divide your design into geometric patterns. Each half of the apple is just a part of a geometric form, a circle. The stalk is just a triangle.
In this example there would be 2 objects. One for the apple and one for the stalk.
When starting to program a new part of your design you create a new object.
2. LINE
In the script of your object you are now able to add bricks.
You can find those bricks by tapping onto the plus sign in the bottom left corner.
Search for the given bricks below to create your first line. Stick to the color of the bricks, all bricks are sorted by colour. Tap onto the brick you need to add it to your skript.
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In the embroidery designer the length is given in steps, therefor it is good to know that 5 steps are 1mm in original size.
Choose different stitch types to see how they look like.
By tapping onto the play button in the bottom right corner, you can see what you have programmed so far.
3. TURN RIGHT/LEFT
To tell the embroidery machine in which direction it should stitch, there are additionally bricks to turn right respectively left.
Now try to program a square. Think about how a square is built of lines and rotations by 90 degrees. Choose a line of 100 steps for the beginning
When you are ready, try to change the size of the square.
4. COUNTING LOOPS
As you now already know how to program a square, you can see how many bricks it would take to program your chosen design. Luckily there is a possibility to simplify your code.
Those simplifiers are called counting loops.
Every brick you set between those two orange bricks is now repeated ___ times.
Now try to simplify the code for your square by adding these bricks and deleting those you don’t need anymore.
5. POINT IN DIRECTION
As you may have noticed so far, the object always stitches to the right at first. As you have already learned, you can turn right and left with these two bricks.
These turns are relative changes, which means the direction after the brick depends on the direction before you set the brick.
Additionally, there is a brick to set the direction absolutely.
Here you can see where which degree values point at:
Now try to set the before your brick and change the degrees of the brick to 45°.
You have guessed right? Well, yes, now the object starts to stitch the first line in direction 45 degrees.
Now the square should look like this.
6. PLACE AT
To set the position you want to start stitching at there is the brick.
The embroidery designer has a coordinate system with origin in the middle of your screen.
To place the object, you can use the coordinate system but there is another possibility too.
By shortly tapping onto the brick (everywhere but not directly onto the figures) you can place the object visually.
Make sure to stop the stitch using this brick before placing the object at a new position.
Otherwise the machine will stitch to this position automatically, which is what we DO NOT want most of the time.
CHALLENGE A - BUILD A HOUSE
With your knowledge from the chapters 0 to 6 you should try now to program this design.
If you already know how to solve this, that's fine. Try it on your own.
If you aren't sure how to start here is a little cheat sheet:
You did it? Well, congratulations! If you are up to go further with programming embroidery designs we are very happy you like it!
Otherwise, if this challenge is enough for you, follow this link to get your certificate https://code.org/api/hour/finish.
7. CIRCLES
One of the most often needed geometrical figures is a circle.
As the stitching machine is only able to make lines, we have to approach a circle by coding a regular polygon. This sounds more complicated than it is.
To code a circle, we repeat the pattern
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so that we code a polygon out of little lines.
For a full circle we have to repeat for example 20 times: move 10 steps and turn 360/20 degrees.
Here is how this would look like:
Now try to code a bigger circle. Make sure NOT to change the value of the brick.
8. ARCS
To code arcs, you have to understand that every arc is just a part of a circle.
So, the code for an arc looks nearly the same as the code for a circle, you just vary the repetitions.
If you want a semicircle you just repeat the move/turn pattern half as many times.
Here is how this would look like:
Now try to code a quarter circle.
Have you guessed right? Yeah, surely you must repeat the code 5 times, as 5 is a quarter of 20.
In truth during programming you play with these two values, and , all the time.
If you want narrow arches you choose a smaller value here
and the other way around if you want a wide arch you choose a bigger value. Those numbers vary between 8 and 360.
To lengthen your arch, you vary the repetitions.
9. BROADCASTS
With the help of broadcasts, you can write code once and use it several times.
For example, to program this paw you code one of the little circles once and then just set it 4 times to a different position.
Use this brick for the code you want to use several times. Write the code right below this brick.
To call the code use this brick . Make sure to really choose the "Broadcast AND WAIT" brick!
By tapping onto the arrow at the rigth side you can name your broadcast.
To understand better how this works here is the example for the paw:
Code for the small circles | Code for the big circle |
10. SEWING UP
To make your embroidery design durable you have to sew up every time you change position without stitching there.
Mark, that before and after every object the embroidery machine sews up automatically. So you just have to code the sewing up if you change position within an object.
If you want to change the position within an object, call the broadcast “sew up” before and after changing position.
Therefor you have to code the broadcast first.
The broadcast should look like this:
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This is how the code of the paw changes, if you make it durable:
You see that before and after every time the position within the object is changed, we sew up.
CHALLENGE B - ICE CREAM
With your knowledge from the chapters 0 to 10 you should try now to program this design.
If you already know how to solve this, that's fine. Try it on your own.
If you aren't sure how to start here is a little cheat sheet:
You did it? Well, congratulations! If you are up to go further with programming embroidery designs we are very happy you like it!
Otherwise, if this challenges were enough for you, follow this link to get your certificate https://code.org/api/hour/finish.
11. HOW TO - MY OWN DESIGN
To create your own design, you have to draw a draft first. Draw your final draft onto one of the design templates (download). Make sure to choose the template you need, dependent on the size of your embroidery hoop.
After drawing your template, think of the geometrical parts, your design is built of. Those could be lines, circles, arcs, polygons, …
Mark the different parts on your final draft so that you can look them up while programming.
Time to start programming!
At first, you have to program a frame so that your design won’t be too big for your embroidery machine.
Create a new object. The object you choose should be something round like a circle. You can find some objects in the media library.
Now program this code in the script of this object.
Look up the size of your embroidery hoop and choose the correct template.
Code for 10 x 10 cm embroidery hoop | Code for 20 x 20 cm embroidery hoop | |
Now to start your design, create a new project and start with creating the first object for one part of your design.
A pattern, which helps when programming your design:
Place the needle at some point you want to start | |||
Point in the direction you want to stitch first | |||
Choose a stitch and start it. | |||
Then move some steps or make a circle or arc, that depends on your pattern. | |||
You reached the end of the part? Stop the stitch.
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Follow the pattern until you finished your design. |
SOLUTIONS
Solution Square without loop
Solution Square with loop
Solution Square with loop and direction 45°
Solution Challenge A - Build a house
There are three objects:
The code in the script of each object could look like this:
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Solution Challenge B - Ice Cream
There are two objects:
The code in the script of each object could look like this: