Unlike printing, custom embroidery has many limitations that must be considered to transfer graphic artwork to into an embroidered design. These limitations must be especially considered when embroidering on garments with limited space, like baseball hats. To ensure the best results, an experienced embroidery digitizer must account for these limitations when digitizing your logo. Â
Embroidery Digitizing is the process of converting any artwork, logo or a picture into digital stitch format using computer software that an embroidery machine can embroider on apparel.
Some logos can are not ideal for custom embroidery, however our artists and embroidery specialists will be able to guide you through the changes needed make your artwork optimal for embroidery. It is helpful to go into the digitizing process knowing the limitation of the digitizing process as this will help ensure successful results for your custom project.
When choosing artwork to be used for embroidery, please be aware of the following trouble areas:
This artwork is not appropriate for embroidery. Look for “trouble areas” in this logo which will not be suitable to be reproduced in embroidery.
This artwork has been optimized for embroidery. The finer details have been removed and the design has been simplified so that it can be reproduced in embroidery.
Let’s look at the example artwork above. The quality of the original artwork is excellent and the digitizer will not have any trouble picking out the finer details. However, there are other areas which will make this design difficult to render in embroidery.Â
The size of the company name is too long, which means that when the text is enlarged to its proper size the logo will be too wide for a left chest application. The address on the second line is quite small and unsuitable for embroidery. Remember that the minimum size required for text to be legible is 1/4″ tall. The gradients in the circle are not reproducible in embroidery.Â
The fine details of the outline and on the bottom are not suitable for digitizing. The design is going to be embroidered onto a darker garment, so the dark text will not show up. There are also too many colors in the artwork to work in an embroidery design. The final design has been modified in many areas so it can be reliably reproduced in custom embroidery.