Points Editing Mode

Embird Embroidery Software Tutorial

This tutorial explains the Points Editing Mode of Embird Editor. It shows how to:

- Move a single or several stitch points,

- Add a new stitch point,

- Change the stitch type,

- Split the design at a chosen stitch point.

Similar steps can be used for deleting a single or several stitch points.

1 - Run Embird and click the "Editor" menu to switch to the Editor window.

2 - Select the "File > Open" menu to open the design that you want to edit.

3 - Click the "Points Editing Mode" button or choose this mode using the "Mode > Points Editing Mode" menu.

4 - Select the area of editing (Picture No. 1). Depress the left mouse button and drag the mouse to select the area of editing with a rectangle. Release the left mouse button once you have chosen the suitable area. In this example, we are going to edit some stitches in the top-left corner of the "a" character.

1. Select area of editing

5 - Only those stitch points that lie inside the selection rectangle are accessible for editing. All the other points are drawn in a ghost color (Picture No. 2).

2. Area of editing

6 - Move the mouse pointer to the handle square of a point, depress the left mouse button, and drag the mouse (while holding the left mouse button down) to move this point (Picture No. 3). The point being moved is selected - notice that it has a thick handle square.

3. Move single point

7 - If you want to move several points at once, you will have to select them first. Click the left mouse button on the first point to select it. Then move the mouse cursor to the second point, depress the SHIFT key on the keyboard, and click the point while holding the SHIFT key down. It will be added to the selection. Now you should have two points with thick handle squares. Repeat this procedure for every point that you want to add to the selection. You can see the number of selected points at the bottom of the "Objects Order Bar" at the right side of the screen (Picture No. 4).

4. Select multiple points

8 - Once you have selected several points, you can move them to a new position. Move the mouse pointer to any of the selected points, depress the left mouse button, and drag the mouse. Release the left mouse button once you have moved the points to the new position (Picture No. 5).

5. Move multiple points

9 - You can add a new stitch point easily. The new point is always added AFTER the selected point. Therefore, it is very useful to switch on the setting in the "View > Stitch Direction" menu, so that you can see the stitch direction and select the right point (Picture No. 6).

6. Switch on "View > Stitch Direction" menu

10 - Once you have selected the right point, move the mouse pointer to this point and depress the right mouse button. A popup menu will appear on the screen (Picture No. 7). Choose the "Insert" command from this menu. Another way of inserting a new point is to depress the "Shift" and "Ins" keys simultaneously after selecting the right point.

7. Insert new point

11 - A new point is created in the middle between the selected and following point (see arrow in Picture no. 8). The new point becomes selected immediately, so that you can move it to another position if necessary.

Note: You can add several new points at once this way: Select several points first after which you would like to add the new points. Then use the same steps as shown above.

8. New point inserted

12 - There exists another way of adding new points: You can add them "freehand", directly to the right position. Select the point after which you would like to add the new point. Then move the mouse pointer to the position where you would like to place the new point. Depress the CTRL key on the keyboard and click the left mouse button while holding the CTRL key down (Picture No. 9).

9. Add new point "freehand"

13 - A new point is created and placed in the chosen position (Picture No. 10). The new point becomes selected immediately, so that you can move it to another position if necessary.

10. New point added

14 - Points Editing Mode allows you to change the stitch type easily. The stitch type always relates to the stitch BEFORE the selected point. In the example below, we want to change the connection stitch between characters to a floating stitch (jump), because currently it is a running stitch. Select the end point of the connection stitch and then click the right mouse button for the popup menu (Picture No. 11). Choose the "Change to Floating Stitch" command from this menu.

11. Change stitch type

15 - Now you can see that the stitch type has changed to floating (jump) (Picture No. 12). Floating stitches are drawn with a dashed line in Embird.

12. Selected stitch changed to jump

16 - Another feature of Points Editing Mode is that you can split the design at a chosen point. In the example below, we want to separate the characters - split the design at the connection stitch. Select the end point of the connection stitch first. Then click the right mouse button for the popup menu. Finally, choose the "Split" command from this menu (Picture No. 13).

13. Split design on chosen point

17 - The design was split at the selected point (Picture No. 14). Now we have two objects in the Editor; you can see their icons in the "Objects Order Bar" at the right side of the screen.

14. Design split to two parts

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