More big news on the publishing front! I’ll be writing a new monthly column for the kingpin of contemporary embroidery, Mr X Stitch! It’s entitled Ghost in the (Embroidery) Machine and will have a slightly different flavor than the writing I’ve done for the commercial embroidery industry, but I’m hoping it will prove enlightening for people interested in the art of embroidery digitizing, no matter the sector in which they work. I’m very excited to explore this new voice and audience.

About the title- if it’s not entirely obvious already, I proposed it as a reference to digitizing. I frequently encourage people to do as much of their digitizing as ‘manually’ as possible, meaning here that any sort of auto-conversion tools ought to be avoided. I feel that the best digitizing is done by human beings making conscious, artistic, and functionally relevant choices about the way an image is rendered in stitches and how the machine, thread, and substrate interact. As such, I see the digitized file- the commands that drive the machine, to be a sort of echo of the artistic vision and technical know-how of the digitizer. As such, we digitizers become ‘ghosts’ in the machines- our choices, our ideas, even our personalities at times are encoded into the files, the movements of the machine, and the embroideries they produce. If that weren’t enough, having personally run designs that have survived their creators, I can attest to the ability of the collection of data that is an embroidery design to outlive the one who shaped it. We can animate the machines beyond our own animation.  Besides, it sounds really cool, doesn’t it?

In about a week, the first Ghost in the Embroidery Machine post will be live!  I sincerely hope you’ll give it a try, and while you’re at it, check out all the fantastic fiber-art being featured by the incredible team of writers and artists at Mr X Stitch‘s site. You can read a brief introduction of yours truly and the column to come here.

It’s me. I’m the ghost. I’m in the embroidery machine, controlling your stitches. Catchy, right?

via Ghost in the Embroidery Machine – Meet Erich Campbell! – Mr X Stitch.