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Original text by: Marina Belova 
Today I uncovered yet another embroidery myth — about the possibility of replacing 3D Puff with a similar material. As they say, why waste money if there is no difference? Especially keeping in mind that I finally managed to find a 3D Puff replacement by trial and error. 
On weekend, while being in my country cottage, I had my eye on a couple of thermal insulants, used in home building, which turned out to be quite voluminous, rather soft and flexible by touch, and besides, one of them looked exactly like 3D Puff: 

The material on the left is rather spongy, soft and flexible. It's about 5 mm thick. The one on the right is similar to embroidery foam: it is soft and flexible. It's about 6-7 mm thick: 

Seeing them I immediately got an idea to try and make the 3D embroidery with them. Though everybody on the internet advises against it. 
I created a pattern according to all of the rules of creating the 3D embroidery patterns and started the embroidery. I used the spongy insulant first. The embroidery process went smooth, I had no problems with the material: 

It tore off very neatly along the perimeter, leaving practically no traces: 

As for the expected volume, the things were much worse: there was no volume at all. For this insulant crinkles badly, and does not retain volume afterwords. Therefore, it should be discarded once and for all. 
I used the Puff-like insulant second. I had high hopes for it. The embroidery process went extremely good: 

After having took the hoop off the machine, I immediately noticed that this material crumbs terribly, leaving a trace of small bits, which is a huge disadvantage. 

And when I began to remove the insulant, I was extremely disappointed: the volume of the embroidery was insufficient, despite the material being relatively thick. It pales in comparison even with 3 mm thick, but solid 3D Puff. 
It takes quite an effort to tear if off along the perimeter, and leaves bits that cannot be pluck out or even fused with the help of a lighter.
 
The second material that looks so much like 3D Puff, turned out to be entirely unsuitable for embroidery. 
Summary: all is not gold that glitters. 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
With ever increasing frequency I now become aware of the fact that there are no insignificant things in machine embroidery. Just overlook this or miss that, and hello, an inexplicable trouble, which you don't quite know how to handle. In support of this conjecture is a very interesting blog post by Embroidery Professor about the ways in which the thread should come off the spool/cone, which I found recently. 
One would think, what's the fuss about how one should position a spool, horizontally or vertically? But it is not so simple. It turns out that one should not change the way the thread comes off the spool/cone based on wind. It will lead to the twisting of the thread, which may cause several problems, especially on high speeds: 
Frequent thread breakage.  'Bird nesting' on the wrong side of the embroidery.  There are 2 ways of thread winding. As I don't know the right terms for them, I'll call them in my own way and show how they look like on the photos: 
Straight winding. 
Cross winding. 
One of the easiest ways of avoiding the aforementioned problems is to position the spools so that the thread will not twist when unwinding. As for the ways of achieving that, everybody should find their own, according to their situation and possibilities. But you should do the following: 
In case of a straight wound spool, the thread should come off across its central axis, like on the photo below: 

As for the cross wound spool, it should come off along the central axis: 

That's all there is to it. 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
About a year ago I tested all kinds of cutwork stabilizers available — water soluble and heat away one — on small pieces of lace. In those days I arrived at the conclusion that any kind of stabilizer is good for lace, because the lace patterns are relatively small, and in most cases do not require alignment. But now, after numerous trials and errors I arrived at the conclusion that for cutwork it is better to use not a water soluble film or thermogaze, but a water soluble stabilizer instead. Even despite the fact that it is easier for me to cut away pieces of film — the possibility of making a wrong cut is lesser, because the scissors glide along the film surface. Water soluble stabilizer is better for cutwork embroidery than thermogaze even despite the fact that with latter you don't have to wash the item for a prolonged time — thermogaze is too fragile and therefore not easy to hoop. 
One day I've been surfing Youtube and saw a video by Deborah Jones, in which she showed how easily the fabric would attach to a water soluble film if the latter was dubbed with a wet cloth and therefore became sticky. And of course, I became excited with the idea, because in that way you don't have to hoop the fabric, just smooth it while attaching to stabilizer. Adding supporting stitches like the ones described here will be enough, but this time it's more simple, because there will be no pins: 

I don't know whether we don't have the right kind of film here or did I get something wrong, but it didn't quite work out. I dubbed the film with water, and it became sticky, of course, but not enough to hold the fabric in place. The film instantly warped, became thin and loosened in the hoop — what accuracy can you expect, if the fabric can shift during the embroidery process. Then, having remembered an advice I read somewhere, I additionally sprayed the film with a temporary spray adhesive. The spray held the fabric better, but likewise was not very reliable as the fabric shifted in the hoop. So, my first attempt was unsuccessful. 
That was the end of one more embroidery myth for me — the one on the possibility of embroidery without hooping. 
This is the napkin I embroidered using a water soluble stabilizer: 

I liked the water soluble stabilizer because it was soft and flexible, and was easy to hoop and align. It did not pucker or change its shape during the embroidery, did not warp like the film or get perforated along the edges, even when the stitch density was high. Besides, the look of the bridges surprised and embraved me. Everything that caused me trouble the last time, when I tried to find the right kind of thread and the right stitch parameters for embroidery on a film, here came out neat and good-looking on the first attempt (I used the same cotton threads and the same stitch parameters): 


Truly, you understand nothing until you try, and besides, nobody will tell you anything. That's how important it is to know the types of threads and stabilizers when creating a machine embroidery design! Otherwise you won't be able to set the parameters right and it'll cause you suffering. 
I never doubted that it was possible to align cutwork designs. It is not hard, even if you do it helter-skelter, like I did. 
There seems to be so many information on embroidery design distortions — parts of the design overlapping or, on the contrary, having gaps between them. Even I have expatiated upon the subject often enough, either covering my own unsuccessful attempts or just musing about how the things should be and how they are in reality.
One should think that if I wrote about it myself, I would take it into consideration, but no, the same trouble continues to arrive at my doorstep from time to time.
Now then, I have digitized a design for a client so that she would embroider it on her own machine. I created a design with the knitwear peculiarities in mind, like I always do. I have already become a skilled hand at that, and even if there are imperfections, they are not critical.
Then she sent me photos, and I saw that it was a disaster:

It was embroidered on the dense knitwear. Something akin to the french terry, I guess. To say the outlines were displaced is to say nothing.
This notwithstanding the fact that I arranged for the thread to be changed often, in order to the object fill to be embroidered first, and its outline right after that.
I immediately began to doubt of my capability of digitizing anything and think that I'd probably better be done with design creation and machine embroidery in general.
So I rushed to embroider it on my own equipment, to see what was wrong with the pattern that I had created. As I didn't have any french terry to do the test, the only thing I managed to find was a piece of thin knitwear used for beanie caps. I hooped it, embroidered the design in question and got this:

No so awful; there are some imperfections here, but considering that this was a big design embroidered on knitwear — a material with more than 50% stretch, it is not so bad at all. Well, I probably should have lowered the density of the red fills, but in general, everything is OK.
The only possible answer to the question of why my client got a result depicted on the first photo is that during the embroidery there were technical mistakes, such as:
Knitwear being slack in the hoop. Wrong stabilizer. Now I'm curious: are these the only possible causes? Is it possible that the equipment is to blame?
So I went searching for the literature on the subject and asking well-informed people what exactly should I search for and where. In the end, I got to understand this. If such a trouble occurs, you should not only check the pattern, the hoop and the stabilizer, but the machine as well:
Whether the frame holder is correctly attached.
The hoop is badly attached to the holder and bounces out of it (I have a similar trouble with my Velles 15). The embroidery shifts, but not in the way I described. The hoop bounces.
Something obstructs its movement; you should check for the presence of foreign objects around the X and Y axis drivers. I've had this problem before, and the hoop bounced, but it looked different.
You need to check the tensions on the X and Y axis drivers. How to do it? I haven't figured this out yet, though I have the material.
The fabric may get caught in the parts of the machine. I've encountered a similar problem before. But this is not the case.
Voltage drops in the power system can also be the reason.
I have a strong suspicion that the machine is not to blame in this case; the embroidery technique is the problem.
I cannot say that having embroidered the design on my own machine took a load off my mind. I've mentioned in the past that the end result equally depends on the design creator and the embroiderer.
And now I'm all uncertain if one should do such a thing as digitizing for someone else? There is a possibility of them getting bad result, and you will be the one taking all the blame. How should one digitize an image remotely so as to be sure the outcome will be good? I haven't received the money for my pattern, by the way.
 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
Everybody knows that the needle coming through the fabric must not leave a trace of small pin holes along the perimeter. But such a things happens, especially on knitwear in case the needle has not been chosen properly and because of other reasons, too. Often this defect is not evident right away, because the stitches lie close to each other. But several washes later it becomes apparent to anyone wearing the embroidered item in question. 

The best way of avoiding such a problem is to look through the fabric at a light bulb when testing the design. The main point here is not to confuse the genuine holes with the stretched loops. Those who are not sure of what exactly they are looking at, may take a magnifying glass to see more clearly. 
I, too, was sometimes lost in the thoughts, trying to figure out what was wrong with those holes and why. Now, having looked over the materials on the subject, I came to understand some of the criteria needed for choosing a proper needle. What I am especially interested in are the reasons behind all this. I'll share my knowledge with you. 
As you undoubtedly know, knitwear is constructed by the loops of yarn, of which some are bigger and some are smaller. Therefore the most important thing when embroidering is to choose the needle so that its diameter would not in any case outsize the smallest loop. This, among other things, will guarantee that the yarns won't be ruined by the stretch and distortion caused by the needle. Such a small trifle, which, nevertheless, has remained unknown to me. 
The second thing that will guarantee that the loops will remain intact during the embroidery is the properly chosen needlepoint. I've already mentioned in my blog post that you need a ballpoint for embroidery on knitwear. It is necessary for the needle not to pierce the yarns, but to move them apart, so the loop would glide along the side of the ballpoint. Preparing to work on thin knitwear you should change your needle for the one with a light ball point (SES) at least. Moreover, you should change the needle more often when embroidering on knitwear than on woven textiles. You should not wait until the needles are damaged so much that they will ruin the fabric. 
A curious detail is that the needle is not always the reason for pin holes The reason for their appearance may be the knitwear being too dry. When the knitwear is dry, it loses its ability to stretch and be flexible, and becomes coarse. This means that it does not matter what needle you use — the yarns will not glide around its ball point, but rather be pierced with it. 
One of the oldest existing ways of avoiding that is to store your item in a dark humid place. It is true for the items made of cotton. Or you can sprinkle them with water prior to the embroidery. But here is a possibility of applying too much water — you should not forget that the embroidery machine parts are made of metal, which tends to get rusty. Therefore, you should not sprinkle water close to the equipment or get the fabric thoroughly wet. I've also encountered a clever recommendation to spray the knitwear with silicone used as a lubricant for some parts of the machine. It is also used for oiling the metallic threads so they could slip through the fabric more easily. But before using the spray you should first make sure that it is a 100% silicone — this way it will not leave stains. Silicone, too, shouldn't be used in close proximity to the equipment. 
Such are the nuances of working with knitwear. Embroidery design creation as well as embroidery technique is important. An these two go together, not separately. 
This text was written by me on the basis of Roy Burton's article in the Wearables magazine.
 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
Judging by the craze on the web, everyone suddenly wants to embroider on tulle netting (of the starch kind). At a certain point in the past, long ago, I, too, made a couple of shots at it, but did not succeed and ditched the whole thing. But the fact the etched in my memory was that this netting is very fragile and breaks very easily. 
Today I laid my hands on this material at last. I have 2 kinds of tulle netting with different mesh size: bigger and smaller. I don't like this material by touch, it reminds me of plastic and doesn't stretch much. Seeing it, I can hardly imagine where it can possibly be used. But if there are so many varieties on the market, there are people who want to buy. And the fact that people keep trying to find a way of embroidering on it means that tulle netting is indeed used. 
Of course, the first thing I did, was to check if my tulle was fragile. It turned out that it tears effortlessly. And it is not important, whether the mesh size is big or not: 


And because it tears easily, one should hoop this material with extreme care — tighten the screw just a bit too much, and the mesh will split up. Nobody wants that, for sure. 
Remembering my own experience of embroidery on the ordinary netting, I decided to spare myself a headache and hoop the tulle together with a water soluble film. Because my experiment then showed that it would be right. I took a thin film, despite the relatively big mesh size. 

What I didn't like in hooping was that the tulle turned out to be very slippery: it kept being loose and escaped out of a tightly screwed hoop. I created a simple low density embroidery design and reduced the density of satin columns by 20%, so as not to pull the fragile mesh. I used 2 edge runs for underlay to all stitches, just to maintain the outline. Ordinary rayon threads were used, and the result was the following: 

It turned out that the main mistakes you can make while creating a design on tulle as well as on an ordinary netting are: 
Thin outline that may reveal the understitching.  Small elements (the size of a mesh cell) — they don't have enough support. Unless you embroider on the most dense water soluble film possible.  Small distances between the objects (less than the size of a mesh cell) — the stitches hit the mesh cell from different sides, stretch it and this results in a hole.  A simple design hardly pulls the tulle at all, the mesh is not damaged by a needle, despite the fact that I use a standard one (SES), which is not suitable for the embroidery on tulle netting. The resulting embroidery is soft and does not resemble a bullet-proof vest. All I have left is to make corrections. 
In the course of altering the design according to the rules listed above, I decided to add density to the fills, because it seemed not enough, and increase pull compensation up to 0.5-0.6 mm. My second attempt resulted in this: 

I increased the density so that the fills looked less transparent, but not so dark as satin columns. I wanted to play with light and shadows, but did not quite succeed: 

Summary: It is quite possible to embroider on tulle netting, but you should choose simple low density designs, without small and thin elements (less that 2 mm thick). I would recommend a dense water soluble film as a stabilizer or a cutaway stabilizer in order not go get rugged edges like I did (see the photo above). You should hoop the tulle netting together with the stabilizer. The hoop should be wrapped (read about it here). You should choose a thin #70 needle, with a light ball point. 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
A few days ago I was thumbing through a blog of Eileen Roche, a founder of the Design in Machine Embroidery magazine, and came across an interesting blog post about the difference between the placement marks in embroidery. Those who are curious may read the original blog: 
I've already mentioned several times that I use such alignment/placements marks for linking he parts of big-size designs that don't fit into the hoop. But prior to reading this article it never occurred to me to distinguish between the notions, to understand what exactly I draw and why — indeed, this trifle is but a small part of my general knowledge of machine embroidery. If you ask me, when you give any notion an adequate definition, it will be much easier to understand what it's all about, and to explain it to the others. 
So, using the timely assistance from this well-known lady, I want to define the placement marks in embroidery once and for all. All these marks I draw in editor and then embroider are needed for placing the fabric in the hoop in such a way that the embroidery would fit into the place you intended for it, and not at random. Of course, the positioning is rather rough. But essentially, there 2 kinds of placement marks (at least, that how many I can think of right now):
The one that marks the future embroidery on a item or a fabric (called placement guide) — an ordinary running stitch that is used for positioning of the design on an item or positioning of the fabric/item onto the hooped stabilizer. This line may take various shapes, depending on the item that is being embroidered. I always use it in my In-the-Hoop projects.  Here is an example: 

This kind of stitch will be invaluable if you need to accurately position details like cuffs, collars, napkin corners, neckbands or pockets etc. that are extremely tricky to hoop. 
The arrows or lines used for linking parts of the embroidery (called alignment or placement marks). I call them checklines. A mark of this kind is also an ordinary running stitch or even hand stitch. They often recommend to do it in the shape of a cross, a star or a letter Z, and to position it outside the embroidered area, with which I myself don't quite agree, because, in my opinion, marks like that do not help to align the parts of the design accurately.  In short, the process of linking of the parts of the design too large to fit into the hoop, looks like this: 
I draw the marks of a great variety of shapes, depending on the object being embroidered, and always place them under the embroidery — it is easier to hide them this way, and I you almost never need to remove them afterward. For more information on how to align big-size machine embroidery designs in practice, read in our future articles. 
There, one more concept in machine embroidery in now clear to me. 
Original text by: Marina Belova 

When it comes to machine embroidery, every trifle has its significance, even such thing as embroidery speed. It is clear that we want to embroider faster, therefore we want to increase the speed. But before we do that we should remember what might happen on a very high speed:
The pull is greater than planned. The push is greater than planned. There are missing stitches in the beginning. There are gaps between the contours. Thread breakage is present. The delicate fabrics are warped and ruined. I'll say a few words about every one of these.
Everything is clear with the first two — the higher the speed is, the more visibly the machine pulls the thread, which effects the look of the embroidery.
The missing stitches occur when the machine begins embroidering and the thread 'escapes' from the needle's eye because the point of a hook cannot reach it. A situation like this is equal to the thread breakage, which, as our experience has shown, costs us a lot. Besides, it changes the look of the embroidery to the worse.
The gaps between the stitches occur mostly due to the increased pull.
One can easily understand why there are more thread breaks — the threads cannot withstand the strain on the high speeds. Besides, on higher speeds the needle deviates from its axis more, which, too, can lead to the thread breakage.
As for the warping and ruining of the fabric, my experience has shown me that the main reason for them is the same old pull.
In general, embroidery on high speeds causes great stress and nerve strain.
I've seen the recommendations to embroider on 550-650 rpm, which I consider questionable, considering what the modern equipment is capable of. But I will agree that the embroidery made on lower speeds looks a lot neater, and that the embroidery process itself is much less painful. Personally I like to embroider on 700 rpm. There is little thread breakage and the productivity is rather good. Though I've seen the results of the embroidery on 950 rpm. Not to speak of Amaya embroidery machines with their fantastic speeds.
Original text by: Marina Belova 
Some of these days it occurred that I overlooked the topic of a basting stitch, which is a special guiding stitch in embroidery. The reason why I overlooked the topic is that I myself never used this stitch: there was no need. Nowadays when learning to use a home embroidery machine, I understand why people invented this stitch and why it is used. Not every type of fabric can be ideally hooped on my home Brother, not to mention thick and bulky ones. 
This stitch attaches the fabric to a stabilizer more firmly, and can also be used as a guideline. The fabric may be either hooped or just stuck onto the adhesive stabilizer (like filmoplast, for instance) or just the temporary spray adhesive. 
Basting stitch is an ordinary running stitch with a 5-6 mm stitch length so it could be easily removed if necessary. You can create a basting stitch: 
In the embroidery design editor, which is the best and the most accurate way that allows to create a shape you need.  With the help of the embroidery machine (home machine memory usually contains such a stitch) — it often looks like a plain rectangle similar to the one marked with the green dotted line on the image below: 
Of course, basting stitch may be of any shape in case you digitize it yourself for every specific design. I've seen the recommendations to make a basting stitch along the perimeter of the embroidery — right under it, which I find rational in case all of design's elements are interconnected.
Like the one on the photo below — marked with the yellow dotted line:

On the Embroidery Professor's blog I saw an interesting idea of using this stitch when embroidering on a terry towel. It will look like this, and you'll need to remove it from the item after having completed the embroidery: 

That seems to be all that can be said about a simple stitch like that. 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
Several days ago I was embroidering my first full-blown design on a T-shirt as a present. Previously, after several unsuccessful attempts, I wouldn't have touched the T-shirts with a ten-foot pole. I needed to embroider a text on the back which said: "Лёша я или не Лёша?". For this I chose not just a plain thread, but the one that glows in the dark. I bought the blue Glowy by Gunold. Although these cost quite a lot (slightly more than 1000 RUR for 1000 m), I was eager to work with them and see the result. 
This is what the embroidered T-shirt looks like in the daylight: 

I didn't manage to capture the glow of the inscription with my low-powered camera. Perhaps, I did not expose the thread to light long enough. I really cannot say: 

But it looks good — everybody who had seen it, liked it. It makes a nice present. 
The thread that glows in the dark is 100% polyester. Let the professional tell that embroidering on knitwear with a polyester thread is harder than with a rayon one — I decided to do it nevertheless, despite my recent result of the embroidery with polyester thread on knitwear being a huge disappointment for me 
So, I'll tell you a bit about this thread, because there is very little information available. But there is nothing so hard about embroidering with it. 
According to the brochure, this thread begins to lose its qualities approximately after 50 washes. In order for it to glow in the dark you should expose it to the strong (lamp) light for 15-20 minutes. 
Any design created for the ordinary #40 thread will be good. But I saw the Gunold promo embroidery samples and noticed that their fill density was very low — you could see the fabric through the stitches. Therefore, I immediately decided to lower stitch density, too. So as to save the stitches and the threads. 
The ordinary 75/11 SES needles can be used for the embroidery. 
As well as the standard bobbin thread. 
Now that I had an idea of what I wanted to embroider, and I had created a design and a pattern, when I'd got the T-shirt and threads, the only thing that left was to choose the right kind of stabilizer. I wouldn't want to ruin all that. 
Everybody knows that the best embroidery stabilizer is a dense cutaway, that will tolerate everything. But I am wary of embroidering quite a big design on the back of a T-shirt using a cutaway stabilizer. It would impossible to wear. So I decided to be in trend and try to embroider on spunbond. 
The funniest thing is that to find this much-lauded spunbond was not an easy thing to do. There was simply no such thing on the market — and nobody knew if and when there was going to be one. Therefore, I was sitting at the stabilizers manufacturer, searching for a replacement, and thumbing through a wonderful Gunold stabilizer layout. 
The layout is a sort of a book that contains stabilizer samples. The most remarkable part of this book are the recommendations written in English and German languages on its margins, which tell how and where each type of the stabilizer should be used. That's when it dawned upon me: every manufacturer always gives very clear instructions for customers, which can be used for choosing the right product. And you need no courses to master the technology — everything is there: what to use, with what to use it, how, when and where. 
So, I've studied the Gunold layout, and visited their website after that, and then the Madeira website, in search for the type of a stabilizer that would the best for embroidering on a T-shirt. I came to the following conclusion (which, actually, came to my mind before, when I was embroidering on knitwear pique): you should use an adhesive stabilizer on knitwear, which will secure the fabric right away and won't allow to pull it while hooping. All you have left is to choose the right density of the stabilizer. 
I had the thinnest adhesive — circa 25 g/m2. It was the one recommended for T-shirts. During the test run the first word of the inscription showed that the fabric was not stabilized enough — the embroidery was pulled and the shapes became distorted, because the stabilizer was perforated and began to tear off along the perimeter while the embroidery was still running. Therefore, I put a piece an ordinary tearaway stabilizer right under the hoop. Now everything has fallen into place. I had an idea to use 2 layers of the stabilizer: a thin adhesive layer + a tearaway one (40 g), which were to be hooped together with the T-shirt. 
It turned out that for me the hardest part of embroidering on a T-shirt was hooping it. Various appliances for making positioning and hooping easier instantly popped into my mind. Hooping a T-shirt in a standard way on a flat surface is not an easy task if you lack the habit. To create a pattern, to get it right, to choose the right kind of stabilizer — those are the mere trifles. 
I did a test run with the standard polyester #40 threads — for costs reasons, naturally: 

I set only the standard embroidery parameters: and lowered the density of satin columns by 20-25%. also lowered the fill density by 25-30%. I split the stitches that were longer that 5 mm so as not to pull the fabric. Pull compensation was 0.4 mm in each case. I used the edge run + zigzag stitch for the underlay, and only edge run under the narrow satin columns. And the grid with stitch length no more than 3.5 mm and density no more that 2 mm under the fills. All of this works rather fine on knitwear. The embroidery doesn't warp or become too dense, the pliability of the fabric does not change. 
What was my surprise when I unpacked the spool of luminous thread and set it to embroider the T-shirt. Despite the manufacturer's claims these threads are visibly thicker that the ordinary rayon and polyester threads, the twist is not so tight. This means that the fill density could be lowered even more, allowing to save even greater amount thread. You could easily spot the difference between the design embroidered with an ordinary polyester thread and the one that glows in the dark. 
There was also another trouble with the glowing thread during the embroidery process — it turned out that to find a proper tension for them was not at all an easy task. And this despite the fact that I had used this very needle with polyester before. I had to make the tension substantially higher, or there were distinctive loops. It is possible that I, trying to do the best, chose the needle thinner (#70) than the one recommended by the manufacturer. And I got to face the music, according to the logic of choosing the right needle. 

Original text by: Marina Belova 
Perhaps, everyone who had used a cheap metallic thread (made in China, Taiwan etc.) knows that they have one huge disadvantage — they are much more coarse, just like wire, that any thread made by the big brands. And because of their coarseness they often cause a 'small' problem leading to the thread breakage. 
This is how the problem looks like in my case: the thread,coming off the spool — even before it comes into first hole in its path — forms a big loop that twists, becoming even more coarse. This loop is very flexible, because the thread constantly goes around the spool. And while making one of these rounds the loop begins to catch the threads from the neighboring spools that go upwards. This loop not only touches these neighboring threads, but intertwines with them and drags them along. Hence the thread breakage. I still don't have the thread nets that can straighten the loops up, therefore, I have to find my own key to this situation. 
This is how the newly formed loop looks like: 

I have lots of such cheap metallic threads; I bought them to see if they were quality enough and whether it was at all possible to use them in embroidery. An average price of a three-five thousand meters is not high — about 90-150 RUR. What is good in these threads beside their price that there is a vast array of colors. And despite such a nuisance as thread twisting, I embroider with them quite successfully, because they don't break often on my embroidery machine, therefore, it is possible for me to use them. The only thing that I don't like is the quality of the outer layer of the embroidery. But it is quite sufficient for experiments and test runs. 
The most interesting thing is that all of the guiding holes, plates and discs in my machine, through which the thread goes on its way to the needle's eye, are not enough for straightening up all of the loops formed on the way. Even in the commercial embroidery machines they are not enough! And I was under the illusion that such problems only existed in home embroidery machines. Last summer I encountered a twisting problem there, and successfully solved it. 
As for my commercial embroidery machine, I had to wreck my brains a few days ago, to find a way of preventing the appearance of the annoying loops. I've tried a whole bunch of options, but the most successful one on my machine was the use of supplementary materials described below. 
I took an ordinary plastic straw that go with the cartons of juice for kids (I have plenty of them anyway): 

Inserted it into the first hole in a thread path, shortening its way from the spool to this hole. It is only 17 or 18 cm long, but this is enough for a loop to appear: 

This is how my guideway for metallic threads looks like now: 

Further in the thread path I inserted a piece of a soft foam material, which I once tried to adapt for 3D embroidery. I placed it right after the first tension knob and ran the thread through in order for it to straighten out even the smallest loops: 

As usual, it turned out that one should not cast off the tricky threads right away, because you can work with them, too. It just requires some additional effort sometimes. 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
Today I decided to practice design alignment on my home embroidery machine. With that in mind I created a very simple border, which I'll now try to embroider along the specified line. And try to understand the difference in the alignment processes on commercial and home embroidery machines. And also to figure out how to create a design for future alignment. 
Here is my design, consisting of 2 rapport orders, which I will attempt to repeat along the straight line: 

My border is not wide — just 3.4 cm. Theoretically, a design like this one wouldn't be hard to align, for it has only one alignment point. The thickness of the elements doesn't matter for this type of border, because it is embroidered from top to bottom, and each of the already embroidered parts (marked green) will overlap with the next ones (marked red). 

To help joining the parts I draw the alignment stitches — the special placement marks specially designed for alignment. One of them is located near end of the pattern and on the photo looks like a funny protruding stick – it is used for matching of the embroidery pieces together: 

The second alignment stitch is located at the very beginning of the pattern hidden under the upper stitch layer. Here it is marked blue under the red satin columns: 

The main goal for the red and blue lines is to coincide when rehooping. Usually this is enough to embroider a big design part-by-part on a single-head commercial embroidery machine. 
Well, all that is now left is to try and align the design on my home embroidery machine using my usual technique. 
My embroidery base is plain calico + a tearaway stabilizer. I did the marking — one long line with several perpendicular cross-lines (just in case). You can see the horizontal line on the photo below — this is the main guideline, along which the border will lie, — and also the vertical ones: 

The I started the embroidery. The first hooping and the embroidery process are simple, the main thing here is to do the hooping properly: 

You don't even need to align — there is no use in it yet: 

But it was only after having embroidered the first part of my future border that I realized that design alignment on a home embroidery machine is anything but the habitual process of doing the same thing on a single-head commercial one. The whole thing is a bit more complicated and resembles the design alignment on a multi-head embroidery machine, where the design is confided within the boundaries indicated by the marks which work as the embroidery starting points. Because of this it was impossible to start the embroidery wherever I wanted in order to regulate the quality of the hooping. Now I understand where all this marking lines (plus signs, check marks, bars) outside of the embroidery area come from. 
To solve this problem I had to add one more stitch into the pattern, which would be embroidered last, after the embroidery was completed, and which would be ripped off afterward. Here it is (marked blue): 

This stitch has the following functions: 
It helps hooping. I will continue to hoop the fabric in accordance with the long line, along which the border will lie. But this new cross-line will be the starting point of the embroidery. And I will make it the embroidery starting point after rehooping. I'm doing it because the fabric will be invariably pulled during the embroidery or, what is even more sad, may turned out having been improperly hooped. And then all these cross-lines, however well-placed they can be, will move so that the next part of the design will be misaligned. The design will either will not reach the lines or there will be overlapping. Therefore, I will position my design in accordance with the long straight line and the new cross-line. Only they are relevant.  It helps to check the quality of hooping — I'll stitch this line in the beginning, to make sure that the fabric has been hooped correctly. Only after that I'll embroider a little alignment mark in order to make sure that my border will indeed be seamless after alignment.  Thus, my modified embroidery pattern will look like this: 

I copy the blue stitch and place it at the beginning of the design. This green guideline should coincide with the blue one from the previous hooping. Of course, one should bear in mind that the idea with an additional stitch will not be work on any kind of fabric. There will be perforations left on delicate fabrics even after ripping off the threads. But judging from my experience, it is good for many types of fabrics. 
Now I'll show you what have I got out of all that. 
As I have already embroidered the beginning of the design, I drew a line approximately where the green alignment line should be, as showed on the photo above, so I will use it — there is nothing else to align to. 

Then I rehoop the fabric and continue the embroidery: 

It seemed to me that it was not easy to hoop this thing properly on my Brother. But I mastered the skill in the end. I should definitely make some arrangement for easier hooping. Particularly because one can find a lot of these home-made things on the web. 
Then I load the modified machine design into the machine and start the embroidery. I do not iron the fabric with the partly embroidered design, in order to avoid shrinkage. If the fabric shrinks, it will be unclear what parts to align and where — the overall size of the embroidery will change. 
The most important thing is that starting point for the embroidery of the next part would be located on the crossing of the main line and the supporting one (in my case — the one I drew), which is now located on top of the hoop. I place the needle into the fabric to check if will get where intended: 

Then I start the embroidery. First I embroider the horizontal alignment line, and in this case it is hard for me to predict the outcome. Another alignment line follows, the one to which I will align my embroidery. It will be splendid if in coincides with the one that already exists. 
In order to do so, you need to move the hoop, and rehoop in case the two lines do no coincide at all. This time the new stitch was slightly lower than the one in the previous part, about 1-1.5 mm. On my commercial machine I would shift the hoop in the required direction right away, in order for the two stitches to match, and I wouldn't get a gap between the parts of the border. 
But to my profound disappointment it turned out that on the home embroidery machine it was impossible to move the hoop while embroidery was running. Well, I will embroider as it is and see where it will get me. Though, you can do one thing to fix that — to go back and shift the starting point in a pattern, which is what I did. 
So this is what I got aligning the first and the second parts — the gap between them is a bit wide, but it does not stand out: 

It turns out that I mispositioned the line — it is located too far from the previous part of the embroidery, but there is no gap in between. 
I rehoop once again. This time the cross-line is already there: 

I place the needle into the point where the main line and the supporting line cross: 

The first check was perfect: 

The second check almost matched the embroidered line, running just beside it, which was acceptable: 

The result: 

Well, you can go further from here; the more meters you have to embroider, the more times you will have to rehoop. Of course, not everything will go smooth right from the start, but it is possible to work with it. 
Here is the photo of what I got, before cleaning of the embroidery: 

The photo of a border: 

This is the conclusion I've come to: you can embroider a design part-by-part and align it on a home embroidery machine, like the one I own.
There always is a way out. But on the whole the method is neither very reliable nor accurate, there are many cons. 
So I arrived at the conclusion that my cross-line should have looked like this, and not the way it does on the photo above: 

As you can see, the horizontal lines here assumed T-shape, in order to make it easier to set the embroidery starting point. They would have formed a cross in case the alignment went well. 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
Today I'll continue with the topic of keeping the wrong side of the embroidery neat. This time I'm interested whether it is possible to use a metallic thread both on the right and wrong sides of lace instead of inserting a polyester thread of a matching color into a bobbin. With polyester thread on the wrong side various snowflakes, medallions and other 3D Christmas decorations do not come out beautiful enough. 
To maintain the experimental integrity and put the things right, I decided to embroider a design with a monofilament thread in the bobbin, to see what the result will be. 
I have a standard monofilament thread made in China, only it is black. It is 0.12 mm in diameter: 

I used a standard black polyester thread on the right side. It's a pity that there was no transparent fishing line, so I had to use the one that was available. 
For the right side of the second sample I wound up a golden thread onto a spool: 

So I hooped a water soluble film and tried to embroider with a monofilament thread in the bobbin. I was disappointed right away — the first loop was very badly formed, only on the very lower speed and in manual mode (about 120 rpm). But this a trifling matter compared to the fact that on the speeds above 400-450 rpm the upper thread keeps being cut by the fishing line in the bobbin every 5 or 10 stitches, so you cannot embroider at all. In the end, after several thread breaks and restarts, after several attempts of finding the right speed, I was bound to embroider on 400 rpm: 

The worst thing was that my machine did not like the trimming part — the knife just could not cut the fishing line, and the machine began to utter strange noises, which I didn't like at all. In the end, I had to trim the fishing line by scissors. But the wrong side looks impeccable: 

Golden thread + golden thread was a much better option: the loop formed effortlessly, there were no speed problems, neither upper nor underthread didn't break, and the trimming went as usual. The only thing that was different from the embroidery with the ordinary bobbin thread was that I had quite a job adjusting the underthread tension. This is what the front looks like: 

This is the neat wrong side of the second embroidery sample: 

Summary: I vote against monofilament thread in a bobbin, because I feel sorry for the machine. As for the golden thread, even a cheap one made in China, like the one I had, can be used on the wrong side without hesitation, and I will definitely do that in future. 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
I have once already mentioned in passing that the stitch length greatly influences the overall visual effect the embroidery creates. I thought of it because I recently embroidered an eyelet for a towel. So, after much digitizing and trying various textures and fill stitch lengths to get a softer embroidery, I got two different results from the same embroidery pattern, but with different settings: 

On the left you see the embroidery with the fill stitches 5.5 mm long, and on the right — the fill stitches 3-3.5 mm long. The embroidery on the left is softer than the one on the right, and it is only natural because of the greater stitch length. 
Of course, the fill texture is also of great importance. Only now I've come to understand why a lot of professionals recommend to make a sample of every texture available in the embroidery software, at a different stitch length. Making these samples requires some labor inputs, but they will vividly illustrate the information a design creator needs and which he or she will knowingly use in their work in future: 
The understanding of what the particular texture will look like in reality and not on screen. 
How changing the stitch length will affect its look, and how and where one can use it. 
The difference in stitch count for the same texture in case the stitch length is increased or reduced. 
I'll give you a simple guide of how to create such a sample sheet. I embroidered just 9 squares and got a ton of information as a result: 
The upper row consists of the satin columns with the stitch length increasing from 2 to 12 mm. The two lower rows consist of fills, also with the stitch length starting at 2 mm and gradually increasing in value. All the squares are of equal size, the only thing that differs the look of the outer layer of the embroidery. Here is the stitch count (each cell corresponds to one embroidered square): 
814
 
560
 
321
 
1094
 
757
 
594
 
1101
 
765
 
598
 
The advice to make such samples turned out to be rather a sound one. Sure, it is next to impossible to embroider all the textures that can be found in embroidery software, but if you do at least half of them, you'll get a perfect sample sheet which will make life for both you and your client much easier. 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
Several days ago I happened to read an article by H.H. Momsen in the Printwear magazine on different ways of removing stains from the embroidered items. My own experience of staining the embroidery instantly jumped to my mind. I shudder every time I remember it. After all, stains are a part of an embroider's life, too. 

I have probably seen all kinds of stains, from machine oil mixed with dust and grease to blood. Mistakes in marking of the item before embroidery fall into this category, too. Sometimes the marking was hard to remove — there were traces of pencil, soap, chalk, and also air and water erasable markers. Every time I had to struggle to remove them from the fabric, and not always the result was successful. 
Here are the tips by this knowing lady on the subject of removing the stains and preventing their appearance. I will add a bit from my own experience: 
After having lubricated your machine, you'd better start with the dark-colored items.  After having lubricated your machine, you should use water soluble topping (film) when embroidering the first item, to protect the item from the drops of oil.  Too bad if the shuttle was oiled too much, because the bobbin thread might get soaked in oil and might splatter item from there. That's why it is better to remove the excessive oil with an ordinary cotton swab. 
In case the stain has appeared anyway, you can try to remove it using gasoline or a mixture of turpentine and sal ammoniac in the ratio of 1 to 1. Sometimes I've managed to get rid of a fresh oil stain by simply washing the item in a warm water with soap.  Air and water erasable markers leave traces on cotton fabrics. Traces made by a Madeira disappearing marking pen cannot be removed by air or water or even with the special erasing pen, which should simply wipe it off. As for the less expensive Aurora markers, they do not give cause for criticism. You can test all these markers on a piece of fabric first.  Ball pen traces can be treated with glycerin and then with oil solvent.  Blood stain should be washed in warm water and rinsed with cold water after that. Repeat until all the stains will be gone. Now you can try removing the stain with hydrogen peroxide.  Coffee and tea stains can be treated with glycerin, an then oil solvent to get rid of the traces. Or you can dub the stain with a mixture of 1 teaspoon of sal ammoniac and 4 teaspoons of glycerin.  Vaseline removes machine oil stains.  Vegetable oil and animal fat stains might come off any type of fabric if you use gasoline, acetone or turpentine.  You may succeed in getting rid of fresh greasy stains powdering them with chalk, talc or starch and leaving them for a while.  But I've never managed to get rid of the pencil traces as yet. Therefore, I recommend using it only where it couldn't be seen — on the wrong side, for example. 
These tips aren't, of course, ultimate and you should test every time, not forgetting to remember the type of the fabric that was stained. 
There are times even in machine embroidery when one should use their gumption and knowledge of housekeeping. And also to keep various stain removers and cleaning substances, solvents, tissues etc. After all, our experience has proven that neither of them is ready to hand when they are needed. 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
I have long been practicing in searching for a 3D Puff replacement — read here and here. Now I'm in the middle of testing my new embroidery machine, and I decided to find a new kind stabilizer. Moreover, I have a lot of materials at my country house, which at the first glance seem to make a suitable embroidery stabilizer. 
I chose 4 materials for comparison: 

I'll name them from left to right: 
a very dense perforated cutaway stabilizer from Gunold. I don't remember how many g/m2 are in it. It stretches good in one direction, and practically not at all in the other.  some non-woven insulation material used in building; it, too, is perforated, but has lower density compared to the real stabilizer. It is similar to the stabilizer by its characteristics.  covering spunbond (for garden) — a non-woven material, soft, agreeable to the touch, perforated, resembles spunbond used in embroidery. But this material is flexible — it stretches in all directions.  ordinary printing paper. I've read a lot about using it as a stabilizer on the internet. Only now I've decided to give it a try. The paper is very stable and does not stretch at all.  I chose a plain calico fabric. I turned the hoop screw once, and hooped all the stabilizing materials in a similar way — together with the fabric. I had only one design for all materials. The result surprise me a little. 
The design I'd created contained a large number of stitches (about 21 thousand), and the first material I chose to embroider it on was a real stabilizer: 

This is what I got: 

Not bad altogether. The lines on the bushes shifted downward — they didn't hit the grooves intended for them and went beyond the fill area. The rest is quite acceptable. In one place between the dark bear's head and the bush there is a gap. Indeed, not so bad a result for such a big design. 
Then I proceeded to embroider on the building spunbond: 

This is what I got this time: 

The lines on the bushes shifted slightly more down, and there are gaps in the strips on the bear's shirt here and there. The fabric was visibly more pulled, but nothing too critical. 
I made the third embroidery on the covering spunbond: 

Here the result was most pulled of all, the lines on the bushes shifted the most, and the gaps on the shirt were the widest: 

As for the bears' eyes, I haven't even manage to finish them because of the sad occurrence of the 'birds nest'. I used to think that only on commercial embroidery machines it was such of problem to remove a knot like that without consequences. There you can at least get to it from the throat plate side. It turned out that on a home embroidery machine it was practically impossible. Here it is:
 
To remove it I had to unhoop the fabric and take off the throat plate — there was no other way I could reach it: 

Then I decided to embroider on 2 layers of printing paper: 

The embroidery on it was the best of all four, which was not at all what I have expected: 

What do you know, you win some, lose some. The result was good even despite the fact that the paper was perforated and almost detached from along the perimeter. 
And the paper is the most accessible stabilizer of all. This means that even in the hardest times we'll have something to work with. 
It turns out that you have to try everything once, in order to understand what is what. 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
Every one of us has encountered a dense tearaway or a cutaway stabilizer, which does not tear easily. But nevertheless we need to remove it from the wrong side, in order for the item to look neat. And no matter how you slice it, it is the part of the machine embroidery routine, so you have to do it anyway. 
Methods of removing the stabilizer include either simply tearing the it away or trimming it along the perimeter of the embroidery; which way to choose, depends on the type of the stabilizer used. Here are the most common mistakes: 
Distortion of the ready embroidery, which is the result of pulling the stabilizer too much in order to tear it away as quickly as possible.  Cutting the stabilizer in such a way that it leads to a «small» inconvenience of cutting the fabric with it. I've been there, and I know how disastrous it is. 
To cut a long story short, even simple actions like that will tolerate no haste or shoddy work. 
To avoid distortion of the design when tearing away the stabilizer, one should hold the embroidery close to the tearaway line. If you have used several layers of stabilizer, tear them away layer after layer. 
As for trimming the stabilizer you should just follow these steps: 
Use scissors with short sharp blades and round edges order not to catch the fabric.  When cutting hold not to the fabric, but to the stabilizer instead, so that the fabric (item) is hanging down from it. 
Always have the fabric in sight so that you could be sure the scissors are not cutting it.  Remove the stabilizer by gliding the scissors through it, moving them along the perimeter of the embroidery, about 3-5 mm from the edges.  In order for the item not to fall on the floor and get dirty, trim you stabilizer above the table.  That's it all.
Original text by: Marina Belova 
Perhaps, everybody knows how tiresome it is to change thread color on multi-head embroidery machines. As for single needle embroidery machines, inserting the thread into the needle's eye every time when you need to change color is quite a wearisome task, too. Therefore, every embroiderer could use the skill of joining the ends of two threads into a flat self-tightening knot that passes through the needle's eye. It is especially true if you insert a very thick thread (like acrylic) into the needle's eye. 
I will not go into details of how one can do it, but instead show you the picture, which served as a guide for myself when I was learning to knit amigurumi toys. Even now the ability to tie two threads together makes the job much easier: 

P.S. Polyester threads, in my opinion, should be tied in a tighter knot than rayon ones, for they have a tendency to slip out of it. In order to avoid it you may also leave the longer thread ends. 
P.P.S. Imagine my disappointment when the trick didn't work out on my home embroidery machine. 
 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
A lot of people on the Web say that you may use plastic food bags instead of water soluble film, which is quite expensive. What's interesting is that not only my fellow compatriots write about it, but our western colleagues as well. Those who do not know how to use the water soluble film, are very welcome to read this article. 
The question is quite an interesting one, especially if we look at it from the standpoint of an embroiderer who tries to save the consumables.
Therefore, I decided to test all the potential replacement materials in order to make sure that this method works. 
So, I'll try to replace thin (10 microns) water soluble film with the following materials: 

Plastic food wrap (comes in rolls).  Plastic bags used for food freezing. I want to point out that the bad I have here is quite thick.  I created a small monogram for embroidery on terry cloth. And made 3 copies of it right in the editor, without changing the parameters. This was necessary, because I wanted to see the difference between the test pieces. 

I embroidered the first monogram on the leftovers of the water soluble film: 

The second monogram was embroidered on a food bag: 

And the third one — on the food wrap: 

After having embroidered all 3 test pieces, I decided to embroider just one letter. I changed the design so it looked like this: first came the understitching, then the machine made a stop, and after that all the finishing stitches were embroidered. 
Why would I need to do it this way? The answer is simple: so that to remove the film after having embroidered the underlay and before the finishing stitches. I've seen this several times. In my opinion, the necessity of creating the design in a highly unusual way it a great disadvantage of this method, for you have to draw the underlay by hand. But I wanted to see if there were differences between the standard way of digitizing and this one. 
This time instead of water soluble film I used the food bag. I used it only to embroider the underlay: 

Having stopped the machine, I tore the bag off: 

After that I embroidered all the finishing satins without any topping: 


Now all three tests were completed. All that's left was taking them off the machine, and thoroughly remove the film and the bag. I haven't managed to get rid of all the leftovers: 

The process of removing the film or stabilizer from an item is the dullest and extremely wearisome part of the embroidery on terry cloth for me.
Especially on terry cloth, where there is always a possibility of catching the loop and pulling it out. And what's the most remarkable, it is always hard to remove all the ones that stick out, though it seems so easy. Besides, the cleaning process is rather long if you do not use some additional means, but just pluck the film from under the embroidery. Those of you who have done that, will understand. 
Then I did the pressing. I decided not to take a risk of pressing the item it as it was, but used the stabilizer leftovers for protection. Just in case: 

Now can you can see the results: 

Water soluble film (the first monogram counting from the top) is good as always. Though the film does not come off after steaming, you can remove it using the wet cloth.  Embroidery on a food bag is just as good. And besides, all the leftover pieces disappeared after the steaming, leaving no trace.  The embroidery on the food wrap is the worst of three — I mean the smoothness of the stitches. The leftovers did not disappear after the steaming. It seems impossible to remove them by hand, because the wrap is extremely stretchy.  Stopping the machine in the middle of the embroidery I now consider an over caution, for it only complicates both digitizing and embroidery processes. 
Summary: an ordinary plastic food bag can be a perfect water soluble film replacement. At least, with terry cloth, where is works very well. I think that even washing won't change the look of the embroidery. As for embroidery on velvet, the matter is still in question. 
P.S. I would not recommend using the polythene bag for complex designs with small details, for it would be hard to remove, and steaming will cause it to roll up and to create rather hard 'ribs' along the perimeter. 
 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
I think that every machine embroidery digitizer has experienced a necessity of changing the design not only because of different size or a different type of fabric, but also to embroider the same design in a different color scheme. 
Here is an illustrative example. I embroidered the same design on the same type of fabric, but with different colors. The colors of both the fabric and the threads varied. And every time the color of the thread contrasted the color of the embroidery base. 
This is a branch embroidered with dark threads on the blue knitwear pique: 

Here all fills and densities are in perfect order. And this is the same branch, but embroidered with light-colored threads on the dark brown pique: 

As you can judge from the photo, the dark background shows from under the light-colored threads, and to my eye the branch looks thinner and less neat, like it sinks into the fabric. You also get the impression that the lighter threads are thinner than the dark ones. 
On the photo below is the branch embroidered with the thread that does not contrast the dark fabric. Nothing is offending to the eye here: 

I also show you the photo of the embroidery made with threads of several different colors, but with the same outline parameters. When you look at it, you instantly see that something is wrong with the white thread — the dark background shows through and tempts you to make corrections. 

It seems that the light-colored thread requires more attention from the digitizer. That is, higher compensation value and higher stitch density.
But if you asked me, I would not increase the density of the finishing stitches so that to avoid extra problems. I would increase the density of the understitching instead. 
And don't forget about the greater attention to the light-colored thread in the design. I've encountered situations when I had to digitize the same image twice, in two color schemes, i.e. I got two different files as the result. One for the light-colored threads and another, a simpler one, for dark colors. 
As you see, you cannot just take machine embroidery files and simply change everything in them, from the type of thread to the type of fabric, and achieve the result of the same quality. There is no such option. You'll always need to make small corrections. 
There are no trifling matters in machine embroidery. Though our understanding of the quality may vary. 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
A couple of days ago I was thinking on where it would be better to cut the jump stitches (travel runs between the objects): on the right or the wrong side of the embroidery. As it always happens, the mystery was easily solved — with the very simple yet sound advice from Deborah Jones: 

If you use topping (water soluble film), don't remove it after embroidery.  Trim the jump stitches on the right side.  Now turn the item the wrong side up and, gently pulling, secure the upper thread end in the fabric so that it is not visible anymore.  Trim the jump stitches that are over 12 mm, created by the bobbin thread on the wrong side. It is necessary in order to prevent the long threads catching the parts that stick out.  Remove the stabilizer both from the right and the wrong side.  To make the embroidery look neat, you'll need to do all the work that any commercial embroidery machines with an automatic trimmer (a knife under the needle plate) does — pull the upper thread tails to the wrong side. There is no way to avoid wearisome manual labor in machine embroidery. 
Even such a small problem is handled not like I'm used to, as usual. From now on I won't make the jump cuts between the objects. I'll let the machine do the trimming. 
When I was just beginning my embroidery career, I was most strictly advised to minimize the number of trims in the design not because it was good for the purpose of making the right embroidery sequence leading to embroidery efficiency, but only because it would cause 'damage' to the machine. But later a technician said to me that trimming was not in any way damaging for the machine, and that I should not try to avoid it where it was really needed, because removing the jump cuts would require a lot of manual labor afterward. 
 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
Multicolored threads and to what purposes can they be used, always have been a mystery to me. They seem extremely beautiful on spools, but the result of the embroidery is often discouraging. Where can they be used so that the result would not look odd? 
Multicolored threads can be called in different ways: some manufacturers say "multicolored" or "multiple colored", the others — "color blend"; you could even see the name "variegated". Usually they are #40 threads that weigh just about the same as the standard ones. The price is slightly higher than for the standard threads of the same composition. The color combinations may be most unusual to the eye. There may be 2 colors that either blend smoothly or contrast each other. There can be a distinctive pattern, or a rather chaotic one.
Here is an illustrative example of multicolored threads: 

Or even more illustrative one: 

There is so little information on these threads that you don't know where to start. Because every time you embroider with them, you inevitably get stripes, both on satins and fills. 
The only techniques known to me where these threads contribute to an interesting and good-looking result are trapunto (free-motion) and quilting. That is, embroidery with simple stitches. Or decorative motif stitches in extreme cases. All the other types of stitches are offending to the eye. 
Not long ago I was embroidering a butterfly in the Thread Velvet technique, and got an idea not to change colors, but to use the multicolored thread instead — it was easier with that particular design. The characteristic striped look of the embroidery before trimming is shown on the photo below: 

It becomes better after you've trimmed and slightly frayed the threads: 

While observing the embroidery process, I notice an interesting effect. As I mentioned in my blog about the Thread Velvet, this technique stems from employing several layers of satin stitches, superimposed. So, when I was embroidering the layers of satin stitches of low density, the threads in them got intermixed, and that seemed to destroy the striped effect. 
This gave me the idea of using these threads in the Balboa Stitch technique, which involves embroidering the same objects with layers of satin stitches of low density, superimposed. I decided to experiment a little. I chose the design. There was a gradient fill it in, how very suitable for my purpose: 
And I created a butterfly test design out of it, which employed a number of various techniques: standard satins, standard fills, layers of satins of a high and low density, and also layers of fills of low density. This is the result that I got: 

Let's look at the image, moving from left to right: 

Two columns in the leftmost vertical row — both satin stitches and the fills are made of low density layers. The layers and, subsequently, the colors superimpose chaotically, which results in a curious effect.  Two columns in the next row were made using traditional methods. The shapes here are simple, the embroidery is covered with the stripes of even width.  Then the third vertical row: the butterfly on top is made of ordinary satin stitches, the on the bottom — of standard fills. The shapes here are more complex and the thread is spread in a more random way, but the stripes are visible.  The forth row was made of low density stitch layers. The butterfly, embroidered with satins, in located on top, and the fills are on the bottom. It creates an ambiguous effect.  This is my summary for now: 
A definite "yes" to the simple stitches done with these threads.  The same can be said about Thread Velvet technique.  A definite "no" to standard fills.  As for using the ordinary satin stitches, the question remains open for the debate, for the result was not so bad. At least, with these threads.  As for the layered technique, it is only good for very simple objects.  There are more questions that there are answers, as usual. 
Does anyone have an idea, where one may use these enigmatic threads? 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
Oh Your Excellency Lord Hooping Device! How much depends on You! 
But let's be more serious: how can we make hooping of the garments more easy, but yet use an ordinary hoop? I don't suggest using special devices that help positioning an item in the hoop, which every embroiderer dreams of. What I mean is what one can do with an ordinary hoop to make life easier. 
Not very long ago I was embroidering with the use of the ordinary square hoop, which is a part of any commercial embroidery machine, and no stabilizer. And in case no stabilizer is present, it is very important for the fabric to be very taut in the hoop. What's no less important is preventing the fabric from slipping out of the hoop during the embroidery, as it will inevitably cause the pull. 
My hoop is made of plastic. And the fabric has a tendency to slipping out of it along the sides because of the gap between the bigger and smaller squares, and also to become slack in the hoop. However, the fabric is firmly secured at the corners. 
All this happens because the gap between the inner and outer squares varies — it is the smallest at the corners and the biggest at the centers of the sides. Of course, the fact that the tension is spread unevenly may lead to all kinds of embarrassing situations. 
I didn't have time for intricacies, and therefore, I did this: took a roll of the ordinary adhesive bandage (the one that can be found at the chemist's) and stuck it onto the inner side of the outer square, where it touched the outer side of inner square, like this: 

This helped to even the tension during the embroidery, and additionally made hooping easier. 
But having embroidered a couple of items with these 'patches' I've noticed that the ones at the sides were not thick enough, because the fabric loosened there. Therefore, they should be made thicker. So I took an ordinary paper adhesive and wrapped it around each side of the hoop 2 times: 

The attempts to hoop the fabric with and without a stabilizer were successful — the tension was right, and the fabric almost was not pulled at the corners. 

I've read somewhere recently that there are special materials that can be stuck to the rings (ovals, squares) of the hoop to prevent the fabric from slipping out, similar to the ones I made of an adhesive bandage. The name slipped from my memory. Soft duct tape for hoop wrapping can also be found on the western markets. 
Given that I have two sets of hoops of every size, I decided to wrap the straight sides of my second square hoop in a thin fabric. I took a strip of calico about 2 cm wide: 

Wrapped the outer square in it, not forgetting to make a small bulge at the center of each side. I secured the ends with a few stitches so that the wrap did not unwind. This is what I got: 

Hooping test showed that wrapping works good as well. 
Then I decided to see how the wrapping would effect the performance of the round hoop. In my opinion, using the round hoop is easier, because the gap between the rings is the same along the perimeter. Anyway, I wanted to check if there was the difference: 

I hooped a piece of knitwear together with a stabilizer. The result was splendid. The quality of the hooping was increased because of wrapping of the ring in a fabric. 
Summary: wrapping of the hoop and evening of the gap with the 'patches' improves the quality of the hooping. 
But the hoop marks (also known as hoop burn) on knitwear are still present: 

And why shouldn't they be if the outer ring has not been wrapped. My next step was to test the widely publicized method of removing the hoop burn — putting paper under the outer ring. 
It is usually advised to use the thin cigarette paper for this purpose. But I don't have any, and the only substitute I could fined was thin tearaway stabilizer. Now I'll try to make a 'sandwich' — stabilizer/knitwear/stabilizer: 

Because the paper that lies on top is nontransparent, it is very difficult to control the fabric during the hooping. This I didn't like right away. But I've already hooped the fabric and tore the stabilizer off. I will not embroider on stabilizer, will I? 

The quality of such blind hooping leaves much to be desired. A not at all convenient method, and what's more, everything was in vain, for the burn on knitwear remained visible, though to a lesser degree. 

But was determined to bring this matter to a conclusion. Therefore I proceeded, and an idea popped into my mind: how about cutting a window in the piece of cloth the size of the future embroidery and trying to hoop it with the fabric and the stabilizer, in order to see if the marks would be visible after that. 
This time I used the following layers: stabilizer/knitwear/additional fabric with a window in it. 

The hooping was of a comparatively higher quality than I achieved with paper. Not to mention the fact that hooping is much easier if you can see what you're doing: 

But I was really interested in hoop marks: would they appear or not? It turned out that the fabric didn't prevent appearance of the hoop burn. 

I really don't know what say about a trace like this one. What should one do to avoid it? 
P.S. The idea for this article was suggested to me by Lydia. 
P.P.S. Various tips on removing the hoop burn can be found here. 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
I've already raised the question of hoop marks (hoop burn) on fabric and the ways of avoiding them. Today I will write about removing the ones that are already there. 

First let's try to figure out what is the reasons for their appearance. It is believed that the reason for hoop marks is screwing a hoop too tightly so that the rings are fitted too closely. The traces may vary: 
Simple creases  Shiny rings  Fibers shift  Fibers damage  Some fabrics are more prone to get hoop marks and some are less. For example, pure fabrics will more likely get hoop marks, unlike the blended ones. Fabrics like velvet are often difficult to hoop and require alternative methods of securing, because the hoop tramples down the pile, which is then uneasy to restore to its original condition. 
Of course, some of these marks are easier to remove than the others; everything depends upon the degree of damage and fabric composition. 
There are numerous ways of removing the hoop burn. I've seen the following recommendations, which require inexpensive means that are always under our hand: 
Always keep a bottle with a sprinkle, filled with plain water. After unhooping, spray the hoop marks with water right away and leave it for 5 or 10 minutes to dry. When fabric is dry, press it with steam.  A sticky roller brush that removes fluff and pile from clothing will help with the hoop burn on dark textiles.  Starch mixed with water will be equally effective. You need to sprinkle it over the hoop marks and dub them with a soft cloth or just by hand. But this is only true for light-colored fabrics.  For the dark-colored fabrics better use an ordinary fabric softener.  Hoop marks will easily come off the knitted fabric if you use steam. I've tried this one myself.  It is recommended to remove shiny hoop burn with vinegar and water cleaning solution, which is sprayed over the damaged place and then dubbed with the piece of the same fabric.  Flattened pile could be brushed.  Creases will most probably disappear after first washing.  Fiber shift is much harder to correct. I remember how I had to restore the fabric simply by moving the fibers back to their original position one by one with the help of a needle. Fiber damage (tear) is, in my opinion, irreparable. Therefore you should very attentive to how tightly you hoop the fabric. 
Original text by: Marina Belova 
I think that the subject of hooping deserves to be expanded once again. Today we'll look into such an important aspect as testing of the quality of the hooping. This is necessary for avoiding such widespread troubles as pulling of the fabric, gaps between outlines, object shifting etc. 
In order to succeed you only need to check a few things after the hooping. They are quite self-evident, but sometimes some of these just go wrong: 
Turn the hoop the wrong side up and make sure that the stabilizer is evenly hooped and not lopsided, thus leaving the fabric without support. You may avoid this by sticking the stabilizer onto the fabric. 
Also make sure that some part of an item was not accidentally hooped as well. 

Now turn the hoop the right side up and check if the fabric is taut. There are two ways of doing it:  Checking if the surface of the fabric is even.  If there are creases present, unhoop the whole thing, adjust the screw and do the hooping all over again. 
Try to lift the fabric with your fingers so that to separate it from the stabilizer. In other words, check if you can 'pinch' it.
 And if you can, tighten the hoop screw.  Trace the fabric surface with your finger. There should be no air bubbles. If one appears, you should unhoop the fabric, tighten the hoop screw and hoop again. 
Now check whether the fabric has not slipped out of the hoop on either side. In order to do this try tugging it slightly. This often happens in case you use a square hoop instead of the round one, which tightly secures the fabric at the corners, yet has the gaps on the sides. If the fabric slips out, you should wrap the hoop in the soft cloth. Apply wrapping only to the sides and not the corners. Then rehoop once again after that.  That seems to be all. I would also try to make sure that the fabric wasn't lopsided or that there was no deformation both vertically and across. But this is not always apparent to the eye, for textiles differ from each other. At the same time I would check if the fabric was hooped evenly, whether it had not shifted in relation to the grid, in order to embroider in the planned direction. 

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