Buzz-2-Stitches 4 Tutorial

Perfecting Graphics for Text Generation

Getting an auto-digitizing program such as Buzz-2-Stitches to automatically create satin stitch text from graphics can be challenging. While thin, cursive type letters may produce beautiful satin stitch lettering, wider letters are sometimes a disappointment because some of the letters may be generated as fill stitch. If only you could help Buzz-2-Stitches to understand what your want in your letters!

Fortunately you can! In less then 5 minutes, you can perfect your graphic so that Buzz-2-Stitches will generate the beautiful lettering you desire. All you need is the original graphic and Windows Paint...

PROBLEM:

In the example below, some of the letters are being generated as fill stitch. Buzz-2-Stitches default style of Text was used. Circled areas were generated in fill stitch and they should be in satin stitch. Changing the Buzz-2-Stitches settings alone do not fix the problem.

SOLUTION:

Total Time to perfect this graphic was less then 5 minutes.
We will be fixing the problems caused by the letters touching each other and we will add definition to the lettering strokes so that Buzz-2-Stitches knows how to process them. Please read on.

Issue 1 - Letters in graphic are touching.

We have zoomed in on an area of the graphic.

Notice how the bottom edges of the letters are touching (circled in red). While the letters look separate to us, a computer digitizing program can only see the total shapes. In the example above, the "HE" form one shape.

1. Open the graphic into Paint or other graphics program you are familiar with. Paint is included in Windows and is located under the Start > Accessories menu).
2. Separate the Letters
   First zoom into the one of the areas you need to work on using the magnifying glass tool. On the HOME tab, choose the line tool, select the color 1 to match your background and drag a line between the two letters to separate them. The width of the line you use will depend on the resolution of your graphic.
   
   
   
3. Repeat this for all areas where the letters are touching.
4. Save your graphic and run it through Buzz-2-Stitches again. Notice how much better the text generates but we still have problems.
   
   
5. As you can see from the above graphic, some letters were fixed. However the letters "H", "B" "X" and "N" are still generating into fill stitch instead of satin.
   

   Like all auto-digitizing programs, Buzz-2-Stitches cannot predict the strokes used to create a letter. We (as humans) are familiar to writing them so we intuitively know that an "H" is actually made of three separate lines -- the two verticals and the horizontal bar. In the next step we are going to define these strokes so that Buzz-2-Stitches will give you the lettering results you desire.

Issue 2- Separate the Lettering Stokes

1. Separate the Strokes of the Letters
   Use Paint to separate the strokes of the problem letters just like you used it to separate the jumbled letters above. You want a thin line to separate out the strokes of the letters. See the example below:
   
   
   
2. Create Your Embroidery Design
   Now that you have a perfected graphic, run it through Buzz-2-Stitches and enjoy your results. As always, we recommend that you test sew your embroidery designs before stitching onto your final item.