vintage clip art to turn to needlepoint
I am always tempted by finding an easy way to convert artwork or photos to needlepoint, and I bet you are too. Often I feel like stitching something new but can’t find anything in my stash. At other times there is an image I love and think would make good needlepoint but I’m in a hurry to stitch it.
While there are companies that will convert art and photos to needlepoint printed on canvas, such as my friend, Sandy Grossman-Morris, sometimes you want it fast.
Mostly I’ve been disappointed with my attempts to do this. The transfer methods don’t give good results, or the converters give too many colors to make good needlepoint. So I was very intrigued by Althea’s post earlier this week about a new free converter, Pic2Point. She gives an overview of the process in the post, so I decided to try it for myself.
I started with this Japanese style Mount Fuji with pines from a Dover Pictorial Archive collection. The source is a high quality JPG and I want it to be 6″round. I picked this because as a line drawing, I’m hoping it will be good for customizing with stitches.
Once you have uploaded the picture, you can adjust the results, picking the number of colors (2 to 32), the mesh (8 to 24), and the size (4 to 36 inches). I picked 2 colors (for sharpest resolution) and 14 mesh). Once you have decided these things, you can preview the results and make adjustments.
The result is a PDF that you can download and save. To be quite honest I was not impressed. The chart prints on letter-size paper and for all but the smallest pieces you will have to cut and paste. The symbols are found on typewriters’ keyboards and are printed in every square. There is a color key. but the assumption with the chart is that you will stitch every square in Tent Stitch.
While it is nice as far as it goes, and the price is right, it is of limited usefulness. You are better off enlarging the source material and tracing. It will be easier to stitch and better looking.
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