CROSS STITCH PHOTOS©

You are here either because you are interested in doing a cross stitch of a photo
or art work you may have or was sent here by our mother site PHOTO PATTERNS.

Here you will find helpful information on doing a Photo Pattern!

Doing a cross stitch of your photo or art work is a new way of expanding the hobby of cross stitching.
Many of you who have done cross stitching for years may find that making a photo cross stitch is easy.
Yes, it is easy but some new rules will apply to photo cross stitching that the seasoned stitcher may
find not necessary.
In doing a photo cross stitch we don't usually use a back stitch for one, and its best to start at the top left
side of the pattern and work across the top of your aida cloth in ten block squares. Our patterns are made
up in book forms, usually 20 to 30 pages with the first 15 to 20 pages being the chart of symbols
converted to DMC Floss and are in ten block squares. By starting at the top left and going across
the cloth you will not have your hand laying over the part you just stitched and it becoming soiled.
We don't recommend jumping around when doing our patterns to see how a part will look when finished.
Many times you will challenge the fact that a color may not need to be used in a group of stitches and
want to change the color to what you may think it should be. The software we use is made just for Photo
Patterns and has been tested and is updated yearly or sooner if needed and places the correct color floss
DMC number at each stitch on your pattern. Doing a photo cross stitch is not like buying a kit in the store
and stitching it. We take your photo and process it and place it in our software program so that each
and every color is determined by the computer. A red wall will not have just a bunch of red stitches but in
our photo cross stitch may have 18 or 20 colors to realize the red color. Our software looks at your photo or art
work in pixels to make your pattern.
Also in our photo cross stitch, its very important that all stitches lay in the same direction, if you start with
top left to lower right and right top to lower left, they all have to be the same for the whole pattern
or it will not look good. Photo cross stitch after completed looks great standing back a few feet
and looking at it. If you follow a few simple and new rules you will end up with a finished pattern
that you can hang on your wall and be proud of that you made, Thus you became
"a cross stitch artist!"

Picking a photo or a piece of art work to do as a photo pattern.

A few rules here will make your finished pattern a success!
Photo Patterns turns down a lot of photos sent us, If you're not sure, either e-mail us the photo or
art work or send it to us via regular mail and we will make sure its a good candidate for a pattern before
you pay for your pattern order. The most important things to look for when sending a photo is the
contrast between the people in the photo and what is behind them. Example is a photo of a couple wearing
a dark blue suit or black suit standing against a real dark wall or a dark background. If you can not
see where the black suit leaves off and the background starts or if the parties in the photo have black hair
and the background is black and you can not see the outline of the black hair against the background, then it's
not a good photo. 100% of pictures taken by a photo studios will work good as they make sure the
background is in contrast to the subjects. The same thing must be watched with white and a white
background. You must have some contrast.

What we can do for your photo
We can remove marks or spots on most pictures, lighten or darken or enlarge the picture. We can
remove an object, sign, wires or other small objects. BUT first we have to see the photo before deciding
that we can do so. We can crop people out of a photo, we can remove background or change the
background color BUT AGAIN only if we can see the total outline between the object and the
background. We can take a wallet size photo and make it larger. But here again we can't change the
ratio of your photo and make a square picture into a 8 X 10. All sides have to be enlarged the same
amount to keep the ratio of the original picture.

MORE INFORMATION ON CHOOSING A PHOTO

Now what do I do?

 You have decided you want to do try a cross stitch photo and have picked a picture or a piece of art
work that you think would look good to fill up the vacant space on your wall. You need to decide the
finished size and the stitch count of your pattern. OK, you want a 8 X 10 finished pattern to hang on
the wall. That was easy, NOW you need to decide the stitch count of your project.
Here we can help you out. You may have an idea of the stitch count you want to use, You may have
poor eye sight and want to use 14 count or you may never tried a different count as you don't realize
that the more stitches per inch the better your photo cross stitch will look. OK, here are a couple things
that will help you decide. A pattern of a portrait will be more realistic with more stitches per inch in the
faces and a landscape will do good with 14 count and still look fantastic. This is where it can get
confusing to the stitcher. We have done many portraits at 14 count and they look great. It's really
up to you as to what you feel good doing.
If you want, you can let us decide what is the best count for your photo or artwork. PHOTO
PATTERNS will place your project in our software and make the pattern at the count best for your
project.

Getting your photo or art work to us.

 Here we have a few choices for you to pick from. The slowest choice is using the US Postal Service.
This method you would send your photo in the regular mail along with your check for payment. You
must make sure the photo or art work is protected as some times the Postal Service does not take
very good care of your package. The best way is to go to Walmart, for one, and buy a bubble
envelope and place the photo in that between a couple pieces of cardboard. You will have your photo
returned with your order.

With the Scanners and the programs being used in todays computers the next best method is scanning
your photo and sending it via e-mail. If you use this method, its best to use the default settings and
send it to us and let us work on the color and contrast of the scanned object. At Photo Patterns we set our
screen up with a color chart so we know that its going to be correct with each picture.

If you have a digital camera you can send the file direct to your e-mail program to send to us. Also, any
Walmart has a scanner that will scan your photo and place it on a CD that you can take home and
send the file to us via e-mail.

WOW, That was a lot of Information!

BUT, very important information to make a good pattern. Photo Patterns would like you to print
this information and refer to it when picking a photo for your pattern. Photo Patterns has been in
business since 1997 and over the years has tried to improve the making of Photo Patterns and
believe we have a simple system and a system that makes it easier for our customers to order.
The biggest concern of our customers is having the pattern fast and have the pattern look good
when done. We will continue to improve our system and hope to have our customer come back
and bring new customers with them. We will continue to bring you an inexpensive pattern but also a
quality pattern. Our patterns started out back in 1997 at $19.95 for a Basic Pattern and today we now
only charge $21.00 a pattern. The extra charge of $5.95 added to the pattern is for shipping via
Priority mail and shipping supplies. Thus we will continue to give you most the inexpensive Photo Pattern
on the Internet with the fifth Basic Pattern still being free except S/H.

Getting your finished pattern back to you.

Photo Patterns now has a fast way for you to get your finished pattern by e-mail. After we finish your
pattern we will send you an e-mail with instructions on doing your pattern. You get everything except
the folder that it would come in if you received it via Regular Priority Mail. In most cases you can have
your pattern in 72 hours. If we have to do any touch up or work on your photo such as removing the
background that will add another 12 hours to your receiving your order.
If you sent us a picture to work from we suggest using Priority Mail as we have to send your picture
back along with your order.

Below are a couple of samples of what can be done if you follow the above rules.

This is the original photo. Then the picture was cropped to make the cross stitch pattern at the right side.

This is Corre a retired racing Greyhound!

This is Corre after being mounted on a mat and framed

Each oattern was done with 70 DMC colors.

This is another photo that was cropped fora pattern.

This is O'Conneor another retired greyhound racer.

This is O'Connor after being mounted on a mat and framed

Each pattern was done with 70 DMC colors.

This was a 14 count pattern done in a 8 X 10 Size,
Customer comments

Hi just thought you like to see the cross stitch, My wife finish,it took her about one month and she like how big the pattern
is and though it was easy to follow,She like the idea that there was no half stitch.and backstitch We both like the way
it came out and very happy with the way it came out.

A Happy Customer

Jim & Claire
We will add some new samples soon!

Do you have a question?

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