I recently got a Cricut Joy cutting machine. I do not have an embroidery machine. I love to sew Choly Knight's patterns, and it occurred to me that I might save a few minutes and make professional-looking eyes and other features by using the Cricut to cut out the appliques in iron-on vinyl.
As it turns out this is quite achievable, but unless you are assembly-lining a bunch of plushes of the same sort, or making something that has dozens of tiny elements, it is not likely to actually save time. :) *
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| These platypus plushes both have iron-on (HTV) eyes and noses |
Here is the process I evolved for taking Choly's applique shapes and turning them into cuttable images.
What you'll need
(1) PDF with the element you are converting to a cutting file
(2) An image editing program. I will be using GIMP which has quite the learning curve, but has the advantage of being free. Photoshop or any of its derivatives would also work just fine. The photo viewers / editors that ship with Windows will not be adequate though.
(3) Cricut machine (any style), Design Space software, and all its assorted tools.
(4) Iron-on vinyl (HTV) in the color(s) of your plush's features.
I am assuming that readers are moderately familiar with Gimp, Design Space and their Cricut machine. If you're not, there are tons of great tutorials out there.
In a nutshell:
The applique templates are hollow line-art. You need them to be solid for Cricut. **
Using your image editor (NOT Cricut Design Space!), select all of the applique elements you need of a single color. Flood-fill them with black and then copy them to a new canvas. Duplicate any that ought to be duplicated, being sure to mirror one copy if necessary. Then copy the 2x2 test square (usually on the first page of the pattern) into your new canvas. This will help you establish scale in Design Space. Save your canvas as a PNG named something like "patternname_black.png" Repeat for other color(s).
Now import each of your new PNGs to Design Space using the standard procedure and add them to a Design Space canvas. Use the 2 inch test square as reference, scale your elements down so the square fits exactly into 2 inches on the grid. Next, still in Design Space, add a square to the canvas and scale it to just cover your scaling square. Group the new square and your elements and use the "subtract" operation to get rid of it. Finally, you should be ready to cut your shapes!
** Update 8/23 : When I wrote this I was pretty new to Cricut Design Space. Today I am pretty sure that the flood-fill step to make your shapes "solid for Cricut." I think you can choose not to make them hollow when you import them with a little attention to detail. However, I haven't tried it. Please do so at your own risk. I Know my method works! (And the 2inch test square remains necessary as far as I can brainstorm it.)
In greater detail
In GIMP, open your PDF pattern. I am using Choly Knight's Platypus.
Gimp offers the option to open only selected pages of a PDF. You need the ones with the 2 inch test square and the one with your face applique patterns.
We need our cut files to be solid black, but the patterns are merely outlines.
** See Above note about solid-fill shapes. Making your shape solid black may not be entirely necessary.
Working with the page that contains your applique, use the magic wand selector to select the inside of all of the shapes of one color.
Use the select->modify menu option and add 3 pixels to your selection.
Next, fill the shapes with black. (Make sure "Fill Entire Selection" is chosen on your bucket tool.)
Finally, copy all of your newly filled shapes and paste them into a new image.
(Cntrl-C, Cntrl-Shift-V copies and pastes to a new image.)
Once you get them there, remember to duplicate things like eyes and nostrils. Be sure to mirror your second copy when it's not symmetrical.
Next... You may have noticed that there is little rhyme or reason in what size elements are once imported into Design Space. Usually that's not a huge problem, but we need ours to be exact. We could also use a ruler on a printed copy of the page, but... yuck!
So we will be adding the 2 inch test square to this image. Open the page from the PDF file containing the test square, fill it with black using the same procedure as above (I usually use the rectangle selection tool), and copy it. Paste it into your new canvas containing the applique shapes on a new layer. Be sure to resize the destination canvas to be big enough to accommodate the test square, and also be sure there's a good margin between it and your applique elements.
Finally, save your new canvas as something like "patternname_black.png"
Repeat for each color of element you intend to cut.
Now we are ready to close Gimp and open Design Space.
Using the standard procedure, import all of your elements into Design Space and add them to your canvas.
Notice that your 2 inch square is Not 2 inches according to the grid in Design Space.
Adjust the size of your images so that your two inch test square occupies exactly 2x2 squares in Design Space.
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| Resize so that this square occupies exactly 2x2 squares in the grid |
Finally, group your new square and your cut image, and chose "subtract" from the Combine menu.
Now you have a just the elements you want to cut, and you're ready to go!
A couple extra tips: There's no law against putting multiple colors of vinyl on your cutting mat so that you can do everything in one cut session. Just be even more careful than you think you have to be about measuring and ensuring that the elements you want to be, say, pink, will be cut on the pink vinyl. Frankly it's error-prone, but it feels efficient and it uses up scraps of vinyl so I am sure I will keep doing it!
* I mentioned above that this will not save you time, and it Won't! It's not only the conversion process that I am detailing here that takes time, it's the extra steps of dragging out the machine, finding the vinyl, preparing the mats, arranging everything in Design Space such that you're not wasting unreasonably amounts of material, weeding, ironing exactly one layer at a time... felt and EZ-Steam is much faster. But your end product will look great.
* Here's an older post of more sewing tips for plushes .
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