Monday, May 11, 2009

Design Thread Colors



Embroidery designs are created in many different brands of embroidery programs like Brother, Husqvarna, Artista, Pfaff etc. When designs are converted from one format to another, the thread colors used in one format, are often not compatible with the thread colors another format uses. When this happens, the colors shown in your embroidery design, may look rather unusual, and not like the original image of the design displayed on the website. Don't worry, this is normal and there are many different ways you can make it look correct.

Color Charts are often included with your designs.
When you order designs from the Internet, you will generally receive a color chart to use with your designs and give you a guide of the thread colors you should use.  You should follow this color chart, rather then the color sequence of your embroidery design file.

Thread Conversions
Sometimes the color charts are brand specific and refer to a particular brand of embroidery thread the designer used. You may use a different embroidery thread. If so, you will need a thread conversion chart. There is a list of different thread conversion charts available further down this page.

Many of the latest color charts include a list of the color names, or picture of colored squares as the guideline, instead of the brand of threads, as it is easier for the embroiderer to choose the correct color from their thread stash.  

Finding the Color Chart included with your designs.
The Color Chart should be included inside the zipped file downloaded with your embroidery designs. If you can not find the color chart inside the zipped file, you may need to unzip them, and save them to a folder in your hard drive.  Some embroidery programs can not read the color charts, so you have to ensure you are viewing the folder, and contents of the zipped file, outside of your embroidery program.

Color Charts come as different file types.
The last 3 letters of the file name like .txt indicate the file extension and determine what type of file it is, and what program you need to view the color chart with

.TXT This can be read on any computer and even some embroidery programs. It is a very basic text file with only text information.
.PDF This can be read on any computer, but you must have downloaded the free Adobe Acrobat Reader program to view it with. This file can include different pictures etc. 
.DOC This is to be read with Microsoft Word, if you don't have Microsoft Word, you will need to ask the designer to provide the information in a different format for you.
.JPG This is an image file, that you need to view in an image program, or windows picture viewer available on any computer.  It gives you a list of colored squares that show you what color thread you should look for.

Use your Embroidery Software to work out the colors for your design.
If you cant find the color chart with your embroidery designs, dont worry, you can easily work out what colors you want to use with your designs.  Every embroidery program should give you the options and tools to enable you to change the colors of your design to the ones you want to use.

We have a great mini tutorial available by Carolyn Keber, that shows you how to change colors using Embird. This great conversion program enables you to make many changes to your designs, before you even sew them out.  If you don't have Embird, we highly recommend you download thefree trial and give it a go.

 

Thread Conversion Charts.

Click on the links below to find conversion charts for different thread charts.
You will be taken to many different sites on the internet.
Use the back button on your browser to return to Secrets of Embroidery.

From this Thread Brand

To This Thread Brand

ARC to

Anchor to

DMC

 

J&P Coates

 

Madeira

Brother to

ARC

 

Madeira & Sulky

 

WonderFil

Coates to

Madeira

 

Anchor

 

DMC

DMC to

Sulky, Mettler, Robinson Anton, Madeira, Aurifil and Isacord

 

Madeira

 

Sulky

 

Anchor

 

J&P Coates

Isacord to

 

Robinson Anton

 

Rapos

 

Madeira

 

Sulky, Madeira, Mettler

 

RGB

Isafil

WonderFil

Janome to
 
Madeira to

 

Anchor

 

DMC

 

J&P Coates

 

 

Robinson Anton

 

Isacord

 

Sulky

Marathon to

WonderFil

 

Pantone

Mettler to

Isacord

Rapos to

Isacord

Robinson-Anton to

WonderFil

 

Sulky

Pantone to

Robinson Anton

 

Robinson Anton, Madeira, Ackerman & Sulky

 

Isacord

Sulky to

 

Robinson Anton

 

 

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