Gunold USA | Embroidery News and Information Blog

Embroiderers who want to make a design softer, with fill stitched areas containing fewer stitches, often focus on the density settings. Making the density lighter may be a suitable solution in some instances, but it often leads to a sparsely covered area.

I find that using the stitch length setting is frequently a better solution. Just think about it – making each stitch in a fill area a bit longer results in fewer stitches and a fill stitch area that looks more lofty and lush.

When adjusting fill stitches to be longer, consider whether there will be lettering or details applied on top of the fill-stitched area. Test to be sure that the stitches aren’t too long for the details to appear crisp, and that they don’t pull the fill apart.

As an example, a typical stitch length value is 3 points, sometimes displayed as 0.3 or .30. Increase to 4 points (0.4 or .40) or more, depending on your design details, for a soft, beautiful fill with great coverage.

by Daniel Fucci of Sierra Technology Group

Part V: Dealing with lowercase

Ok, so 8-mm serifs or 5-mm blocks seem to be challenging enough, even when they're all uppercase, right?

How about lowercase?  At 4 mm?  Yes, it sounds crazy.  What would be even more crazy would be to not use the geometry of the letter in your favor and get a hold of whatever space may be available. 

Follow the diagram below, step by step, to understand how each new solution may present a new challenge, and how to change stitch direction to take advantage of the natural push & pull process of embroidery.

Keep in mind that we’re using a 4 mm lowercase "e", which the chart from a previous article in this same Small Lettering series recommended not to do.  Are you up for the challenge?

This article concludes the initial 5-part series for Mastering Small Lettering.  Future installments may concentrate on digitizing instead of editing existing Font characters.

Stay tuned and how Gunold can help with your commercial embroidery digitizing.

Gunold is proud to announce our Facebook drawing for $350 in Durkee Embroidery Hoops.  The drawing will be on August 3.  Durkee hoops are designed to provide superior quality in a high impact plastic design.  Durkee hoops are great for various commercial embroidery sewouts including thicker, hard-to-hold garments.  The giveaway is your chance to get a number of different sized Durkee hoops to meet your unique embroidery needs.  More information about the Deluxe Set of Durkee Hoops giveaway can be found on the official Gunold USA facebook page.