How do you store your designs? I will make Meganne laugh cause I always put the jef together with the colorchart (as jpg) and a picture of the design (=jpg). I'm the only one with that tick? :o)

Ansalu thanks a lot for your great job answering all the questions concerning the organization of files!

@mysticrainbow: Here you can see my alphabet-folder. I think I never uploaded so many pictures and that are the last one for the next time (hope nobody is bored).
greetings, Bettina
(yes, Meganne there is your star-alpha and djacks pets and briannas wonderful alpha and many more... ;o)
yellow=Sick blue=Cute (embroidery + alphabets), green= emblibrary (just one alpha but so many other designs ;-), purple= GGDesign and red are my 3 vampir-fonts cause I'm a big twilight-fan :o)

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@ichbines:the first one is like you see the design ready for the dl; then you click on (next to Colors:3) and you get to the second picture. This size it is too big (it's the same screen as the first one) so I just take an outcut as jpg or I resize the monitorwindow so it fits in it without so much white room on the side.
I hope you understand my lausy english; so sorry for that :-P

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by ichbines 22 Jul 2010

Hi ansalu you got a PM!

Great organisation, but what do you do to get the colorchart as in the second picture?
I only can copy the picture of the letter as jpg, the right side never shows up!

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by ansalu 16 Jul 2010

Hello,
are you from Germany? Thought that becaue of your name :o)
I post a picture where you have to click to get to the colorchart. This I cut out just the size I need (have a 24" screen ;-) and store it together with the designfile and the jpg showing just the picture of the design.
If there are more question be free to send me a PM :o)

Your folders look similar to mine. I was curious as to how you sort your alphas. I have divided mine into folders according to size, under two inches over two inches and over 5 inches but have pulled out and put in a different folder the alphas that have extras included, like borders, etc. Have also separated the applique alphas into their own folder, cross stitch, redwork, etc. So many alphas, easier to find what I want. How do others sort their alphas?

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by ansalu 16 Jul 2010

I'm ashamed I have no special system for my alphas. I just put that together from the same websites (like Sick, emblibrary, Cute, Amazing, CA, brittdesign, GGDesign, 8claws&paw, LynniePinnie and so on), the rest is in my brain. A friend always calls me her embroidery-guru because I never forget a design I put in my treasure chest (okay almost never forget ;o); I'm like Gollum in Lord of the Rings: My treasure...
I will post a picture of my folders for the alphas so you can see my non-system; just my favorite sellers have different colors.

OH no, I'm not laughing, that's the only way to do it.

I have 18 main embroidery design folders and heaven only knows how many sub-folders, all my embroidery designs are stored in these folders.

Then I have folders for Artwork; Digitising; Completed projects; zipped downloads; projects; patterns; instructions; software; tutorials; e-books; fonts; machines; supplies... and these are only for my machine embroidery.

I have more folders for doll making; photography; mixed crafts; cooking; knitting & crochet; stationery; movies; family; health & medical; property & investment; accounting; etc., etc. 72 other main folders in all.

If I wasn't organised I'd never find anything.

If you click on the photo below to enlarge it, it will show my Embroidery folders, though I can't show all the sub folders, my monitor screen is only a 19"

Until recently I had double this amount of folders because I kept my Elna designs (reformatted into .EMD) in a duplicate set of folders.

I always store the design file, plus a jpeg picture file, a colour chart if one is available, any licence text file and any instruction if the design is part of a project.

If the design came in a zipped file I keep the zipped file in a separate folder as a precaution against loss.

So I'm laughing with you Ansalu, because anyone who isn't this organised wastes many hours searching through their designs and quite often can't find what they are looking for and it is such a HUGE job trying to sort and organise design files if you don't start doing it early enough in your collecting.
Hugs n roses, Meganne

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I use Pulse Ambassador which helps with the pix and color chart. I have mine filed in categories and then within that category, I have them broken down into another ie: file kids, then inside that file would be girl, boy, sport, toys, etc... If it come with pix and color chart, I don't delete, but normally I don't bother looking at that with the Pulse. It is free to d/l and use just for that purpose. If I wanted to use it for other things, then I would have to pay for it, but I'm not that advanced yet. hehehe.... Maybe down the road I will be interested in digitizing, but I'm happy just sewing/embr. This was a good question. Thanks

I make the color chart and the picture as .pdf and store it in the folder with the .pes. I have Catalog XPress that I use to organize the designs but I like a picture because the colors are not always right in the .pes and the visual helps in picking colors for the sewing.

I would dearly love to be that organized! My computer is full to the brim with jumble and junk!

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by ansalu 16 Jul 2010

That was also my problem when I start with machine embroidery: I was collecting every freebie I could get. But afterwards I often didn't know how the designs look or I had only tiny little pictures of the design without sizes. So I start to put just put them into my folders when I had a picture and a colorchart so I know what I get when I need something fo a special work. It's something I do in the night when all the rest of the family is sleeping ;o)

Used to, but I bought sewwhatpro and it shows the design as a picture so I now do not need the jpg anymore. Less space on my drive.

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by ansalu 16 Jul 2010

I had the problem that there were no iconizer or embroideryprogram available for my old iMac when I started 3 years ago. So I had to convert all the pes-freebies in jef with the free online conversiontool on embroiderydesigns.com :o(
Now I have "parallels" on my new iMac and use embird but I still do it my "old way". I didn't use windows very often and it need to much time to start it just for a quick look on a design ;-)

WOW, what do you do to get the colorchart as in the second picture?

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by ansalu 16 Jul 2010

click on "colorchart" then I cpoy it as a jpg to have all the main informations. I hate it to buy design when I did not know what's the size and how many stitches/ Colorchanges you have to do. If a design has more than 20.000 stitches or 10 colorchanges I start thinking if it is worth the time you need for stitching. I love RW-designs :o)

To see it better here a picture of my purple alpha; Meganne I can hear you laugh ;o)

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by shazells 16 Jul 2010

OH Dear this is a little too organized if you have some spare time mine needs sorting LOL Hugs Shazells

by ansalu 16 Jul 2010

Yes sometimes I feel I will get in one of the "Stepford-wives" or like my neighbour cleaning their gateway with the hoover!!!
In "normal life" I'm absolut chaotic but here it saves me time. And don't need more than 3 hours sleep in the night helps a lot :o)