JP3499610B2 - How to create applique data - Google Patents

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a method for preparing cutting data for cutting appliqué cloth pieces from cloth and embroidery data for embroidering appliqué cloth pieces on fabric. .

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, a plurality of types of character fonts such as alphabet, hiragana, katakana, kanji, numbers, etc. have been built-in. BACKGROUND ART A so-called monogram embroidery sewing machine is known in the art in which the above are arranged and combined in an arbitrary order and satin stitches according to the arranged character font are formed on the cloth.

A cutting device has also been announced in which a character font to be used is arbitrarily selected from the character font group and an applique cloth piece according to the contour of the selected character font is cut from the cloth.

[0004]

However, the above-mentioned monogram embroidery sewing machine is intended to fill the area within the outline of the character font with satin stitching, not to sew the edges of the appliqué cloth piece. Moreover, there was no linkage between the monogram embroidery sewing machine and the appliqué cloth cutting device. For this reason, it is not possible to use the former monogram embroidery sewing machine as it is for attaching the appliqué cloth piece cut by the latter cutting device to the cloth such as the uniform outerwear, and it is attached to the embroidery sewing machine. Alternatively, it is necessary to newly create the embroidery data for embroidering the appliqué cloth piece on the cloth by the connectable embroidery data creating device.

This embroidery data is generally composed of positioning temporary stitching data, stop stitching data, and satin stitch data, which are created as follows. First, paste the pattern of appliqué cloth on the digitizer of the embroidery data generator, pick up many points on the contour of this pattern with a pointing device such as a button cursor, and input the contour data. To create positioning temporary stitching data required for arranging appliqué cloth pieces from to. Then, a large number of points on the contour of the template are repeatedly picked up and contour data is input again, and the tacking data necessary for tacking the appliqué cloth piece to the cloth are created from the contour data. Next, the inner circumference data and the outer circumference data are input by alternately picking up a large number of points on the inner circumference line along the inner side of the contour of the pattern and a large number of points on the outer circumference line along the outer side, and this inner circumference data Also, the satin stitch data necessary for embroidery sewing of the appliqué cloth piece to the cloth is created from the outer circumference data.

As described above, in order to create the embroidery data, since the contour data and the like are input many times by repeatedly picking up a large number of points and the like on the contour of the pattern paper, it takes time and labor. In particular, since there are an extremely large number of types and patterns of character fonts, it has been a difficult task to create new embroidery data for each character font.

Moreover, if there is a deviation between the character font and the newly created embroidery data, there is a possibility that the appliqué may appear as a defect.

An object of the present invention is to solve the above-mentioned problems and to utilize, for example, an existing character font group already created for a monogram embroidery sewing machine, a word processor, a computer, etc. And the like, and can easily and efficiently create cutting data for appliqué cloth pieces and embroidery data for appliqués, and eliminate gaps between cutting data and embroidery data to prevent appliqué defects. To provide.

Another object of the present invention is to combine the character fonts selected from the existing character font group in an arbitrary order, arrange them arbitrarily, expand or contract them arbitrarily, and increase the character height for each character. The object of the present invention is to provide a data creation method capable of freely changing the content of an applique by arbitrarily changing the character width or aspect ratio, or gradually decreasing or gradually increasing the character height or character width in the order of arrangement. .

[0010]

In order to achieve the above object, an applique data creating method according to the present invention selects a character font to be used from an existing character font group and extracts contour data of the selected character font. Then, based on the extracted contour data, the cutting data for cutting the applique cloth piece from the cloth and the embroidery data for embroidering the applique cloth piece on the cloth are created. The cloth, cloth or piece of cloth in the present invention has a broad meaning including equivalents such as leather, resin sheets and composite sheets. A microcomputer can be exemplified as the data creating means.

The existing character font group is at least one kind of character font group selected from hiragana, katakana, kanji, foreign characters, numbers, symbols and small figures. It is also possible to prepare a large pattern data group together with this character font group and combine the selected character font and the selected large pattern.

Further, as the embroidery data of the appliqué,
Positioning tack data required for arranging appliqué cloth pieces on fabric, tack data required for tacking appliqué cloth pieces on fabric, satin stitch necessary for embroidering appliqué cloth pieces on fabric Data etc. can be illustrated.

In the present invention, the character fonts selected from the existing character font group are combined in an arbitrary order, arranged arbitrarily, enlarged or reduced arbitrarily, and the character height, character width or The aspect ratio can be changed arbitrarily, and the character height or character width can be gradually decreased or increased in the order of arrangement.

[0014]

According to the applique data creation method of the present invention, for example, a monogram embroidery sewing machine, a word processor,
Since the cutting data of the appliqué cloth piece and the embroidery data of the appliqué are created based on the existing character font that has already been created for the computer etc., it is possible to eliminate the need for pickup operation on the digitizer, for example. Data and embroidery data can be created easily and efficiently, and there is no deviation between the cutting data and the embroidery data.

Character fonts selected from the existing character font group can be combined in any order and arranged arbitrarily, enlarged or reduced arbitrarily, and the character height, character width or aspect ratio of each character can be increased. If you change arbitrarily, or gradually increase or decrease the character height or character width in the order of arrangement,
You can freely change the content of the appliqué.

[0016]

EXAMPLES Examples of the present invention will be described below.
A description will be given with reference to the drawings. First, the applique data creation device used in this embodiment will be described with reference to FIG. 1. The center of this creation device is the control device 1, and C
A microcomputer including a PU, a ROM, a RAM, a connection bus, an input / output interface, etc. is used. The control device 1 includes a font memory 2 which stores an existing character font group as an input device, a font reading device 9 (a floppy disk device, a magnetic tape reader, etc.) for reading a new character font,
A keyboard 3 and a mouse 8 are connected. A display 4 is connected as a display device, an XY plotter 5 is connected as a printing device, and a floppy disk device 6 and a tape puncher 7 are connected as external storage devices.

The configuration of the data creating device is merely an example, and, for example, as an external storage device, a hard disk device (including a removable type), a magnetic tape device, a magnetic card device, a magneto-optical disk device, an optical disk device, I.
A C card device or the like can also be used.

A cutting machine 10 cuts appliqué cloth pieces, and is driven in the XY direction with the board surface 11 on which the cloth 15 is set and, if necessary, reciprocally driven in the Z axis direction to perform thermal fusing. Heat cutter 12 and operation key 13
And a floppy disk device 14 as an input device. A floppy disk FD1 in which cutting data is recorded by the floppy disk device 6 is inserted into the floppy disk device 14.

In addition to the heat cutter, for example, a cutting blade, a laser cutting device, a liquid jet cutting device or the like can be used. When the external storage device other than the floppy disk device is used as the data creating device, the corresponding external storage device is also used for the cutting machine. Further, it is also possible to connect the data creating device and the cutting machine 10 with a transmission cable or a wireless transmission device and directly transmit the cutting data to the cutting machine 10.

Reference numeral 20 is an embroidery sewing machine for embroidering appliqué cloth pieces onto a cloth, and a plurality of embroidery heads 21 for vertically moving needles through which an upper thread is passed, and a bed 22 having a hook and a bobbin bobbin built therein. And an embroidery frame 24 for spreading the fabric 17a
And a drive device (not shown) for the embroidery frame 24, etc., and a table 28 is provided on a movable carriage 27 with casters 26.
A sewing machine controller 30 which can be arranged above is supported.
This sewing machine control device 30 includes a control panel 31, a keyboard 3
2, a display 33, a floppy disk device 34 as an input device built in the control panel 31, and the like. A floppy disk FD2 on which embroidery data is recorded by the floppy disk device 6 is inserted into the floppy disk device 34.

When the external storage device other than the floppy disk device is used as the data creating device, the corresponding external storage device is used as the sewing machine control device 30.
Also used for. Further, the data creation device and the sewing machine control device 30 are connected by a transmission cable or a wireless transmission device,
The embroidery data created by the data creation device can be directly transmitted to the sewing machine control device 30.

Although an example in which the data creating device and the sewing machine control device 30 are separate bodies is given here, the sewing machine control device 30 is provided with the function of the data creating device. It is also possible to create the following data.

Now, in this embodiment, as an example of data creation,
As shown in FIG. 2, the embroidery data for sewing the three appliqué cloth pieces 16 composed of three letters “ABC” to the chest of the T-shirt 17 is created. This data creation method proceeds in the order of steps as shown in FIG. Figure 3
The dotted line with an arrow in indicates the flow of data. Hereinafter, these steps will be described in detail.

(1) Selection of character font In the font memory 2, hiragana, katakana, kanji, foreign characters (Roman characters, Greek characters, Russian characters, Hangul characters, etc.), numbers, symbols and small graphic character font groups are selected. A plurality of character font groups selected in advance are stored. There are various types of typefaces, such as regular writing, cursive writing, Mincho, Gothic, and floral writing, but you can select a character font group of any typeface. As these character font groups, various character font groups created for monogram embroidery sewing machines, word processors, computers, etc. can be adopted.

For example, each of the character fonts F for the monogram embroidery sewing machine is, as shown in FIG. 4, an outer frame 50 indicating an extension, a character frame 51 indicating a character range, a base reference line 52, and a character center. Line (vertical centerline 53, horizontal centerline 5
4) It has the character information of the character height 55 and the character width 56 and the point data p for obtaining the outline of the character as shown in FIG.

By operating the keyboard 3 or the mouse 8, the control device 1 selects "A" from the existing character font group stored in the font memory 2 as shown in FIG.
Select the three-letter character font F of "BC",
The characters are arranged in the left-right direction in the character order, the straight line portion and the curved line portion are recognized from the selected character font F, and the contour data D1 is extracted.

In the character font F for the monogram embroidery sewing machine, in addition to the character information 50 to 56 and the point data p, as shown in FIG. 6, threads 57 for filling the area within the contour with embroidery threads are used. The thread information such as the type (satin stitch, etc.), the block instruction, and the sewing order is included, but this thread information is not used in this embodiment.

(2) The cutting data automatic creation control device 1 uses the extracted contour data D1 as shown in FIG.
The cut data D2 as shown in is automatically created. This cutting data D2 includes many points P on the contour (each point is XY
It is described by coordinate values. Data obtained by approximating a polygonal line connecting the points (a) and (b), where a portion having a large curvature is composed of high-density points P that are finer than the point data p of the character font F, and a straight line portion is composed of only its start point and end point. This cutting data D2 is the floppy disk device 6
Is recorded on the floppy disk FD1.

As a modification of FIG. 7, FIG. 8 shows the cutting data D2 created from the contour data of the character fonts arranged on a circular arc, and FIG. 9 is created from the contour data of the character font with the changed aspect ratio. The cut data D2 is shown, and FIG. 10 shows the cut data D2 created from the contour data of the character font in which the character height and the character width are gradually reduced in the arrangement order.

(3) Automatic Creation of Embroidery Data Next, the control device 1 automatically creates, from the contour data D1, the temporary tacking data D3 for positioning necessary for arranging the appliqué cloth piece as shown in FIG. To do. The positioning temporary stitching data D3 is recorded on the floppy disk FD2 by the floppy disk device 6.

Next, the control device 1 automatically creates the inner circumference data D4 along the contour data D1 as shown in FIG. 12 from the contour data D1.

Next, the control device 1 automatically creates, from the contour data D1 and the inner circumference data D4, the tack sewing data D5 necessary for the tack sewing of the appliqué cloth piece as shown in FIG. In this embodiment, the E-stitch data was created based on the stitching direction of the E-stitch and the number of stitches from the stitching to the stitching which were input from the keyboard 3 to the control device 1 in advance. However, the tack stitch data is not limited to the E stitch, and it is also possible to create the tack stitch data D5 by another type of stitch. The tie stitch data D5 is recorded on the floppy disk FD2 by the floppy disk device 6.

Next, the control device 1 automatically creates the outer peripheral data D6 along the contour data D1 as shown in FIG. 14 from the contour data D1.

Next, the control device 1 creates satin stitch data D7 necessary for embroidering the appliqué cloth piece as shown in FIG. 15 from the inner circumference data D4 and the outer circumference data D6. The satin stitch data D7 is recorded on the floppy disk FD2 by the floppy disk device 6.

The cutting data and the embroidery data created as described above form an appliqué as follows.

(A) Cutting of appliqué cloth piece As shown in FIG. 1, the appliqué cloth piece cloth 15 is set on the board surface 11 of the cutting machine 10, and the floppy disk FD1 is inserted into the floppy disk device 14. When the cutting machine 10 is operated, the heat cutter 12 comes into contact with the cloth 15 and is driven in the XY directions based on the cutting data D2. Therefore, the applique cloth piece 1 based on the cutting data D2.
6 is fused by heat.

As shown in FIG. 18, the control device 1 uses a floppy disk in order to efficiently cut a plurality of sets of appliqué cloth pieces 16 from the cloth 15 so that the surplus portion does not remain on the cloth 15 as much as possible. A plurality of cut data D2 can be arbitrarily arranged and stored in the disk FD1.

(B) Embroidery sewing of appliqué cloth pieces As shown in FIG. 1, the cloth 17a of the T-shirt 17 is spread on the embroidery frame 24 of the embroidery sewing machine 20, and the floppy disk FD2 is inserted into the floppy disk device 34. When the embroidery sewing machine 20 is operated, first, the needle of the embroidery head 21 and the bed 22 are based on the positioning temporary stitching data D3.
The hook, the embroidery frame 24, etc. are driven to form a tentative stitch on the cloth. The appliqué cloth piece 16 is attached to the cloth 17a by an adhesive or the like along the basting stitch.

When the embroidery sewing machine 20 is operated again,
Since the needles of the embroidery head 21 are driven based on the backtack data D5, a backtack stitch is formed, whereby the appliqué cloth piece 16 is backtacked to the cloth 17a. Then, when the embroidery sewing machine 20 is operated, the needles of the embroidery head 21 are driven based on the satin stitch data D7, so that a satin stitch is formed, and thus the appliqué cloth piece 16 is embroidered on the cloth 17a. It

By the way, there are cases where it is desired to embroider the three appliqué cloth pieces 16 of "ABC" onto the uniform type outerwear (not shown) instead of the T-shirt 17. The lower front body and the upper front body of the uniform outerwear are overlapped and separated with a certain overlap margin, but when the cloth piece 16 for applique of "B" is located at the overlapped portion,
It is necessary to divide the appliqué cloth piece 16 into two pieces.

In this case, as shown in FIG. 16, "B"
The contour data D1 of the applique cloth piece 16 of
By dividing by a and Vb, two divided cut data D2a and D2b as shown in FIG. 17 are created. In FIG. 16, Va on the right side is a division position for the left division cutting data D2a, Vb on the left side is a division position for the right division cutting data D2b, and there is an overlap margin between Va and Vb.
Then, each embroidery data corresponding to both divided cut data D2a and D2b may be created as in the above embodiment.

The present invention is not limited to the configuration of the above-mentioned embodiment, and can be embodied with appropriate modifications as follows, for example, without departing from the spirit of the present invention. (1) The present invention can be embodied in appliqués of various articles such as clothes, bags, shoes and hats other than T-shirts and uniform outerwear.

[0043]

The applique data creation method of the present invention has the following effects. First, according to the invention of claim 1, 2 or 3, for example, by using an existing character font group already created for a monogram embroidery sewing machine, a word processor, a computer, etc., for example, a pickup operation on a digitizer. It is possible to easily create the cutting data of the appliqué cloth and the embroidery data of the appliqué easily and efficiently, and to eliminate the gap between the cutting data and the embroidery data to prevent the appliqué defect.

In addition to the above-mentioned effects, the present invention may be applied to any one of claims 4, 5, 6, and
According to the invention, the character fonts selected from the existing character font group can be combined in an arbitrary order, arranged arbitrarily, enlarged or reduced arbitrarily, and the character height, character width, or width and height of each character can be increased. The content of the applique can be freely changed by arbitrarily changing the ratio or gradually decreasing or gradually increasing the character height or the character width in the arrangement order.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is an overall configuration diagram of an apparatus used in an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a front view of a T-shirt on which applique embroidery has been performed based on the embroidery data created in the same embodiment.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing a data creating method according to the embodiment.

FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram of character information of a character font.

FIG. 5 is an explanatory diagram of character font point data and extracted contour data.

FIG. 6 is an explanatory diagram of thread information of a character font.

FIG. 7 is an explanatory diagram of created cut data.

FIG. 8 is an explanatory diagram of a modification example of created cut data.

FIG. 9 is an explanatory diagram of another modification example of created cut data.

FIG. 10 is an explanatory diagram of still another modification example of the created cut data.

FIG. 11 is an explanatory diagram of created temporary tacking data for positioning.

FIG. 12 is an explanatory diagram showing created inner circumference data.

FIG. 13 is an explanatory diagram showing the created locktack data.

FIG. 14 is an explanatory diagram of created outer peripheral data.

FIG. 15 is an explanatory diagram of created satin stitch data.

FIG. 16 is an explanatory diagram of contour data of another example.

FIG. 17 is an explanatory diagram of another example of cut data created.

FIG. 18 is an explanatory diagram of a case where a plurality of sets of applique cloth pieces are cut from the cloth.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 control device 2 font memory 15 fabric 16 appliqué cloth pieces 17 T Tatsu 17a cloth F character font D1 contour data D2 disconnection data D3 Positioning temporary sewing data D4 inner circumference data D5 Tacking data D6 outer circumference data D7 Satin stitch data

─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ───Continued from the front page (56) References JP-A-6-86880 (JP, A) JP-A-6-327865 (JP, A) JP-A-3-261999 (JP, A) Actual development 62- 13474 (JP, U) International Publication 93/022944 (WO, A1) Patent 3251075 (JP, B2) (58) Fields investigated (Int.Cl. ⁷ , DB name) D05B 19 / 00-21 / 00

Claims (7)

(57) [Claims] 1. A character font to be used is selected from a group of existing character fonts, contour data of the selected character font is extracted, and cutting is performed to cut a piece of applique cloth from a cloth based on the extracted contour data. A method of creating data for an applique, characterized by creating data and embroidery data for embroidering a piece of applique on a cloth. 2. The existing character font group includes:
2. The applique data creation method according to claim 1, wherein the applique data is at least one kind of character font group selected from hiragana, katakana, kanji, foreign characters, numbers, symbols and small figures. 3. The embroidery data includes temporary tacking data for positioning necessary for arranging appliqué cloth pieces on the cloth, tack-sewing data necessary for tacking the applique cloth pieces on the cloth, and appliqué on the cloth. The method of creating appliqué data according to claim 1, including satin stitch data necessary for embroidering a cloth piece. 4. The method of creating appliqué data according to claim 1, wherein a plurality of selected character fonts are combined in an arbitrary order and arranged arbitrarily. 5. The applique data creation method according to claim 1, wherein the selected character font is arbitrarily enlarged or reduced. 6. The character height, the character width or the aspect ratio of each character of a plurality of arranged character fonts is arbitrarily changed.
How to create appliqué data as described. 7. The method for creating appliqué data according to claim 4, wherein the character height or character width of a plurality of arranged character fonts is gradually decreased or increased in the order of arrangement.