Digitizing a funnel cloud outline

[cbireley]

Our new school has a funnel cloud as their logo. I was asked to do some spirit wear for the fall teams. The design was sent to me in a vector file, which was great. I'm very new to attempting digitizing and I was able to do some of it w/a "column" stitch, but there are so many starts and stops, I'm finding, that it isn't going to stitch out well. I saw a sample of someone else's work and it looks like the outline is pretty continuous, even though there are several swirls and the corners are pointed. But it was not a complex fill stitch that they used. Any suggestions, off the top of your head, that would work?

I know this is hard to think about w/o the design in front of you, but any suggestions would be appreciated. I think I have tendonitis in my shoulder from digitizing...

[Juli in Kona]

Sometimes a design just doesn't translate well into embroidery and needs to me changed slightly. You could try doing the outline/shadow first, running the connections under the main part. You could send me the graphic and I could take a look. julid at hawaii.rr.com

Juli in Kona

[signman]

It is easy to build a design from 'parts', using column fills of different widths, for example...and when you make sure the 'in' and 'out' points fall on the next piece to sew (in of one section starts on the 'out' of the last one) then it will sew continously as though it were one piece.
This way you can build up a 'texture' with the stitching to make a swirl, for example, without the lines of a fill pattern. I look at similar designs in the Treasure Chest collection and 'dis-assemble' them to see how Dakota did it. Sometimes the 'pointed corners' are really just s small column piece themselves, not part of the main design-but when sewn in sequence it finishes off with a sharp corner and there is no 'stop and start' as it goes.

[Juli in Kona]

To fix those places where the column goes around a sharp corner and it ends up with very long stitches, just add a point to make the "Point" squared off. You'll have to try different placements, but you can get it to look good doing that.

Juli in Kona

[cbireley]

thanks, juli...I'll send it on b/c this is over my head! ha...I understand what is being said, I just don't know how to do it.

Is your email address [email protected]

[Juli in Kona]

That's correct