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Electric Quilt 5 Frequently Asked Questions

 

I scanned my own fabrics. Why does the print look so large on my screen? I am only getting half the fabric pattern.
Directions for scanning fabrics can be found in your lime-green Design Cookbook on pages 158-159. Many people skip "Option Step 4". If you do this step it will change the scale of your fabrics.

• (In MS Paint) If you think the fabric pattern looks too large on the screen, go to the IMAGE menu, and choose Stretch/Skew. Type 50% for both the horizontal and vertical stretch. This will make the fabric scan appear smaller.

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How do I scan in fabrics?
Here are some generic directions for scanning. All scanners are different, have different menus, different steps, different buttons and use different terms, so it is up to you to figure out the equivalent buttons in your software if you do not want to use Microsoft Paint in the directions below. These directions should work for ALL WINDOWS USERS, no matter their operating system or scanner.

PREPARATION

• Iron your fabrics. (Wrinkles show up in your scans and look like shadows in the fabric when you color.)
• Read the software directions or lesson for your scanning software. Pay attention to the directions for cropping and saving.
• Make a folder somewhere on your computer where you can keep the original scans. This way you will remember where they are when you go to open them in step 5.

SPECIAL TIPS

• FILE MANAGEMENT - If you plan on scanning fabrics often, putting them all in one folder might get kind of messy once you have over 50 scans.
  
  • Suggestion: Inside your My EQ5 - bmp folder, create a new folders called "scans", "pictures", and "tracing". Use "scans" for scanned fabrics and use sub-folders inside of there. Use "pictures" for housing your pictures to be used in memory quilts. Use "tracing" for any bitmaps you plan on tracing to make into blocks.
  • Inside the scans folder, create a new folder which will remind you of the group you are currently scanning. Examples: "blues", "Jinny Beyer borders", "moda 2005", etc.

• AUTOMATIC TOOLTIPS - When you import a fabric, the file name is automatically inserted into the name slot of the fabric notecard. So if I name my scans "Nature's Elements by Hoffman - blue 1", "Nature's Elements by Hoffman - blue 2", etc. Then these will be the tooltips you see in EQ5.

SCANNING

1. Scan the fabric into your scanning software.
2. If the white space around your swatch is not automatically removed, you will need to crop it out. Refer to your scanner's instructions.
3. Save the image, preferrably as a windows bitmap, but any format will do for now. Save it in the folder you created earlier.
4. Open Microsoft Paint. (START - All Programs - Accesories - Paint.)
5. Click File - Open and browse to find the first scan you made. It should be saved in the folder you created earlier.
6. If the pattern looks too big on the screen, choose Image - Stretch/Skew. Type 50% for both the horizontal and vertical stretch, leave the skews at 0 degrees.
7. If step 6 helps, continue on. Otherwise, click Edit - Undo, and try a different percentage. Use less than 50% for a smaller pattern, more than 50% for a larger pattern.
8. Your swatch does not need to be a square or incredibly large. In fact, anything 200-400 pixels on each side will suffice. The larger the swatch - the larger the file size.
9. Click Image - Attributes.
10. Change the dot in units to "pixels."
11. Change the width and height numbers to something smaller if needed. This will crop the image for you.
12. If you do not like the results, choose Edit - Undo. Then, repeat step 11 with new numbers.
13. Click File - Save As.
14. Save it in the bmp folder for My EQ5. If you followed our installation instructions, the folder will be in one of two places:
    My Computer - C drive - My Documents - My EQ5 - bmp
    **OR**
    START - My Documents - My EQ5 - bmp
    (Otherwise known as: My Computer - C drive - Documents and Settings - Your User name now - My Documents - My EQ5 - bmp)
15. Drop down the "Save as Type" box to either "256 color bitmap" or "24 bit bitmap". If you are concerned about file sizes, do the 256 color bitmap, that is 1/4 the size of the 24 bit choice.
16. Click the Save button.
17. Open EQ5.
18. Click Cancel at the opening screen.
19. View the Sketchbook and click the Fabrics tab.
20. Click the Clear button. Click OK at the prompt to clear all the unused fabrics.
21. Close the Sketchbook.
22. Libraries - Fabric Library - Import button.
23. Change the Look in box to your bmp folder from step 14.
24. Select one or more files from this window. Click Open.
25. Click on the fabrics and click Copy.
26. Click Close when you're done.
27. Optional Step: You know how EQ fabrics have tooltips when you hover over them? If you did not follow the suggestion above for "automatic tooltips", view your sketchbook fabrics tab. Click a fabric and click the notecard button. Change the name at the top to what you want the tooltip to be. Repeat for all the fabrics. Close the Sketchbook.
28. Libraries - Palette Library.
29. Show Sketchbook - Save.
30. Name the group of fabrics. Click Save.
31. This will make the group of fabrics accessible from every project.

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How do I get fabrics from the web into my EQ5?
Guess what? It's your lucky day.

We actually have a lesson of the month on this very topic. Try the lesson and you will get complete directions, plus some extra fabrics.

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I scanned the fabric in, but it looks like a tile floor whenever I go to color. Help me.
If your fabric looks like a tile floor, it means your imported image was not cropped. There is white space in the image around the colored part.

You need to open the scan, crop out the white space, save the image under a new name, re-import the scan into EQ and use the swap tool to change the tiled fabric to the new fabric.