New Textiles 2011

8 bit Angle Fish made in Processing

I struggled  on what to do for this project as I kept considered doing a 3D print fabric. However, I’m somewhat satisfied with my experience on the embroidery machine as it did give me some ideas on how to tackle my final project.

Through Processing, I made a (8 bit) Angel fish by using overlapping triangles. It’s a small tribute to early computer graphics.

In the embroidery software, I learned that there were 26 shades of blue. Obviously, I didn’t have 26 shades of blue embroidery thread, so I choose to combine similar colors into 5 groups…

…On the embroidery machine, however, I learned that my 5 groups weren’t 5 groups as I ended up having the option to change the color some ~15+  times.

Embroidery machine showing sections to be embroidered with thread installed on machine (for lack of better words).

In addition to not having as man groupings as I thought, I also had difficulty with tension and as a result, the bobbin thread made a random appearances and the sewing thread kept accumulating into messy tangles

Initial embroidery completed until I changed the bobbin

Tension on the new bobbin is too tight...

...bobbin tension still too tight...

Snag

Final Result

Following another student’s example, I decided to switch to a thicker fabric. The final embroidery still has the bobbin thread showing, but I suppose that this project was an experiment as I did switch threads several times and as a result, found by trial and error different tension settings for the threads as the automatic tension setting didn’t diminish the appearance of the bobbin thread.

Some things I learned and that I should keep in mind for my final project:

• I should use a bobbin thread whose color is close to the fabric, which is something that’s similarly done in quilting.
• I also learned that for embroidery that has adjacent different colored sections, it’s NOT a good idea to cut the thread when the machine gives the option because as I learned at the very end, previous embroidery can become undone.
• Pre-test the tension settings for the thread and fabric I plan to use.

Angle Fish

Code:

int x=0;
int y=0;
int a=50;
int b=0;
int e=0;
int f=50;

void setup()
{
size (500,500);
translate(200,200);
background(255);

for (int i=0;i< 10;i++)
{
for (int j=0;j< 10;j++)
{

int colort = round(random(100+i*15));
fill (colort, colort, colort*5);
noStroke();

int sizet = 300/(40-i+1);

triangle (x+i*sizet,y+j*sizet,a+i*sizet,b+j*sizet,e+i*sizet,f+j*sizet);

}

}
x=50;
y=50;
}