Patent ID: 6510360
Filing Date: 2003-01-21
Classification: D05B

Abstract:
A method of operating a computer to produce an object-based design description file for an embroidery pattern, from a vector-based stitch file describing the pattern as a sequence of stitches, the method comprising the steps ofanalyzing the vector-based stitch file to identify stitch points qualifying as embroidery edge points at which the stitch direction substantially reverses; producing a list of said identified edge points in the order of corresponding stitch points in the vector-based stitch file, further analyzing the vector-based stitch file to identify groups of successive edge points in the list of said identified edge points wherein the edge points of each group define a respective embroidery region containing only contiguous area filling type stitches, and generating from co-ordinate positions of edge points in each identified group an object describing the respective embroidery region for the object-based design description file.