CREATIVE DRAWINGS users

[kifcat]

Hello all,

Do any of you use CreativeDrawings? Comments?

Anyone in Oz?
Waiting patiently.....
KIfcat

[wienerin]

I'm on Corel Drawings. Probably very similar.

[kifcat]

... Corel Drawings. Probably very similar.

Yes, I believe so.

I'm hopeless at understanding written instructions, and I found that the accompanying 'help' file for CREATive Drawings seemed to be translated from ?Spanish. It may as well have been Greek to me.

The separate tutorial file is much better, and I attack it in small bits, but poor comprehension still plagues me.

The retailer, however, is a marvelous source, and always has time over the phone, for my queries. We have a regular pattern in that I have my computer on and CD open and a previous design ready to open.

Only this week (I've had it since last November), I learnt about manipulating the fonts, and only last night, I digitised my very first design from scratch - a needle and thread and bobbin, and I'll email that off the retailer and then ring him and have another phone tutorial.

I saw the Creative Drawings programme being demonstarted at a craft show in November 2008, mulled over it for a year, by which time I'd decided to buy a multi needle embroidery machine, and knew I wanted to digitise a map of the island I live on, so went back to the same show last November and bought it, with virtually no instruction - not the fault of the retailer, just time constraints to drive 2 hours to the ferry port for the last ferry home!

I'm a bit of a Nervous Nelly,and was taught to 'do it once, do it well', so I've been lurking and learning ever since.

Do you like your programme? How long did it take you to master?

Kifcat

[teddy_rn]

Hello all,

Do any of you use CreativeDrawings? Comments?

Anyone in Oz?
Waiting patiently.....
KIfcat

Is it like a digitizing program or something? I am clueless

[kifcat]

Hi, Teddy-M,
indeed, Creative Drawings is a user-friendly digitising programme that is usable by any modern domestic or commercial embroidery machine that connects to a computer or the internet.

After 3 years of wondering what I should buy, I knew I wanted to get a commercial embroidery machine rather than a domestic, single needle embroidery machine. I also knew that I wanted to embroider maps of my part of the world, as well as its particular native flora and fauna.

When I first saw Creative Drawings in November 2008, I knew it was exactly what I wanted and needed, but, wary of the 'you pay peanuts, you get monkeys', hesitated to buy it (so much cheaper than anything else) for a year, and even after I bought it, I couldn't touch it for months, so fearful was I.

Digitising programmes to go with domestic or commercial embroiders were/are thousands of dollars. I bought CD4 last November that came with a separate electronic tablet and pen (as yet untouched) for about $1300au. CD5 has just been released, and alone, without the tablet is about $800US.

You can search for its web site, and there are some videos on that site that might help you. Sorry, I can't even upload a link yet, and I wasn't all that impressed with their web pages, either, but I DO like the actual programme.

Essentially, the Creative Drawings programme allows me to scan a drawing, diagram or photo, and use that drawing as a literal background, over which I can either hand-draw, or use the 'trace' command which automatically reads the image and creates something very similar on the working page of CD. From there, it's a matter of using the editing tools, plus or minus the shift and control keys.

Of course, you can also import a zillion other pre-made designs, but I wanted to do my own stuff.

I live in the middle of a patch of endangered floral speciments, with few photos, and only a few digrams of these plants.

I have no drawing talent, but I can copy, and I can trace.

Whilst there are some good examples of digitised kangaroos and koalas, there are an awful lot of international digitisers who turn these animals into comic characters, but I need the dinki-di version. For example, Kangaroos do not stand with a bent tail, but a bend in the tail makes the design narrower.

I can't play the piano (or water ski), and that might explain why I have problems connecting my right and left hand, but, by gee, I've been giving it a good shot, and with the help of the local agent, and his endless, patient phone tutorials, I'm at last seeing the light, and only last night, actually created my very first design from scratch.

I chose a needle and thread and bobbin, and saved the design and have already emailed it to my CD agent with questions, which he has already sent answers to.

I don't have the internet connected at my farm, and only use the internet when at the office, and that's only 3-4 days per week for 2-3 hours, so I print out the replies, take that home, and sit with a cuppa and make myself devote an hour to a lesson.

Oz is a big place and the one and only dealer is over 1000 miles away, so having a workshop is not an easy thing to do, and I have been flying solo with phone back-up, and I can't praise my dealer enough.

This coming November, the dealer will be at a craft show about 100 miles away, and I think I have persuaded himm that he really should have a couple of dedicated teaching sessions, away from his stand, for owners of CD. He has a couple of craft retailers in the capital city who have also pressed him for dedicated classes. Fingers crossed!

Bottom line: if you like machine embroidery and have a modern machine but little artistic talent then Creative Drawingsis the way to go.

Hope I haven't bored you to the back teeth with my long-winded reply!

Kifcat

[wienerin]

... How long did it take you to master? ...

about two hours...

but I'm working with computers, programming myself and making my living from IT since I've been 17...

[tracsimon]

http://www.creative-drawings.com/cre...ings/index.htm
I hope this helps understand it better teddy_rn

[wienerin]

Thank you for the link!
After looking at this website and reading their PDF brochure, I see that in fact it has "only" the DRAWStitch technology in common with my Corel DRAWings. And it's much cheaper...!

[kifcat]

making my living from IT since I've been 17...

Ah, yes....!

CD actually say that all they need is 2 hours to teach you, but my old brain learns in a particular way, and my Dad used to say if I could make my life more difficult, I would. I deliberately learned to play the ukele left handed (I was in love with Paul McCartney in 1965), but never worried about restringing it!

I'm not much wiser, though decades older, but I had an innate belief in the bloke who was demonstrating the CD programme, and had done enough research to know that digitising programmes were thousands of dollars, and as soon as I saw him create a design from a photo, I was hooked.

I'm a tertiary-trained art historian, but a 4yr old with a crayon in the art production stakes, and have a very literal approach to things. I'm also very aware that we oldies can be left behind unless we plunge right in, and that's what I've done, with both the purchase of a space-age looking multi needle embroidery machine, and a digitising programme not associated with the machine company.

Even overnight, I've made astounding progress in producing, from scratch, from my own hand-traced image, an embroiderable design which, with a little more editing, will be just what the client wants!

There's no stopping me now!

kifcat