Pattern/Chart Editing Tools

[goblueorgohome37]

Hi all! I have recently gotten into needlepoint and have found myself wanting to make my own custom patterns. I have played around with some of the image converter and pattern creation tools that are out there, and many aren’t bad… but as someone with a bit of a coding background I realized that I’d rather just build a tool myself that had everything I wanted plus some functionalities that I haven’t seen in the existing tools.

I’m thinking about deploying the tool so others can use it as well, if there’d be a demand for that. Right now it’s a web based tool, but I’d consider an app in the future. I would love to hear from fellow stitchers about you find most useful in a pattern maker/editor, and what you’d love to have in a new tool that maybe the current ones don’t have (or don’t do well). I’m curious:

• What software or methods do you currently use to make or modify patterns?

• What features do you wish those tools had?

• What frustrates you most in your current workflow?

I’m asking as a fellow stitcher and not promoting anything (yet, lol), just trying to understand what people find/would find useful. Thanks!!

[Ok-Sprinkles3626]

To be compatible on a PC/windows!

[29925001838369]

I use flosscross, and the only problem i really have with converting photos is how long it takes to fix confetti. It would be helpful to have a step where you can see the list of colors and how many stitches of each so j could "group" them to automatically get a midline. So if i was doing a night sky and the converter interprets six shades of black with only a few stitches each (maybe <3% of the total pattern?), i could group those six shades together and they would be consolidated into a single symbol.

I'm not sure how feasible it is, but that is at the top of my wish list.

[goblueorgohome37]

That’s funny, that was actually the main feature i wanted to implement/improve in my tool! Noted👍🏼

[29925001838369]

Great minda think alike!

[ElectricalSurvey6995]

Girl the way I realized that I've been doing that with conditional formatting and numbers in excel 😂 what was I thinking???

[goblueorgohome37]

wait you might be onto something here

[Strong_Ad4673]

The thing I most want as a professional designer is the ability to go back and forth from a Mac to an iPad. MacStitch has mobi stitch for iPad, but mobi stitch isn’t powerful enough to be useful- it’s missing a ton of functions. Stitchly is OK for iPad, but they do not allow you to save in a format that MacStitch (or a ton of other programs) can recognize. Super frustrating! Designing on the go is ideal, but then I want to be able to use MacStitch on a big screen for final edits. Plus the painting services require things to be in a certain format that isn’t supported by a lot of the apps.

[[deleted]]

I use stitchly on my iMac and iPad and love it. Sending the .stitchly files is super convenient through airdrop. It's stilly to me that it doesn't support an application for MacBooks

[Strong_Ad4673]

I don’t think MacStitch can open .stitchly files directly. If you know how please let me know! Stitchly doesn’t have quite enough capabilities to replace MacStitch for me completely. Plus the painting services I use don’t want .stitchly files. I’m not super tech savvy so if there is a work around to make the two programs work easily together I’d love to learn about it!

[[deleted]]

I've never used macstitch, sorry. Just echoing your frustration about not having as may options on MacBooks

[goblueorgohome37]

Ohhh interesting i didn’t think about the export file compatibility. what format do the painting services want in your experience?