Guided, meander and ripple fills

Three stitch types give an area a texture of its own. A Guided fill sews rows like a fill, but bent along a line you draw, so the stitches can flow with hair, fur, water or a ribbon. A Meander covers an area with one wandering line that never crosses itself, like quilting: light, soft and quick to sew. A Ripple sews copies of the shape's outline, each smaller than the last, shrinking towards a centre point. Choose them under Type in the bar above the canvas, in the Stitch view.

Each figure here is the stitch engine's own plan for the shape shown: every line is a stitch, sewn where NextStitch would sew it, and the numbers under a figure are counted from those stitches.

Guided fill

A guided fill shows a fill's settings: Row spacing (mm), Row offset, the pull compensation, Overlap (mm), Underlay and, under Advanced, Travel and Random stitch length (Fill and underlay). What makes it guided is the guide line.

The guide line

A shape you make a guided fill gets a guide line straight away: three points along its longest direction, through its middle, so its rows run the length of the shape. In the Stitch view, with the shape selected, the guide is a dashed line with a handle on each point, and you shape it as you would a path's nodes:

• Drag a point to move it.

• Drag the line between two points to bend it there: a point is added where you pressed. A double-click on the line adds a point too.

• Right-click a point to remove it, or click it and press Delete. A guide keeps at least two points.

Each change is one undo step, and the rows follow as you let go.

Draw guide line, under Stitch settings with one guided fill selected (Redraw guide line once it has one), draws a guide anew instead: click on the canvas to set its points, then press Enter or double-click to finish, or Esc to cancel. Remove guide line takes it away. Without a guide line the shape is sewn exactly as an Auto-fill, in straight rows at its Fill angle (deg); that angle turns the rows only while there is no guide. With Copy and Parallel offset the guide can be shorter than the shape: past its ends the rows run on straight.

One line for several fills

To guide several shapes with one line, or with a line you drew with the pen, select the line together with the shapes and choose Object ▸ Use line as guide, also in the canvas's right-click menu. Each shape that has an area becomes a guided fill with a copy of the line as its guide, and the line is deleted, as it would otherwise be sewn as well. From then on each shape has its own copy, to reshape on its own. One undo takes it all back.

Guide strategy

Guide strategy, under Advanced, decides how the rows are made from the guide. Copy is the default.

• Copy: every row is the guide itself, moved row by row straight across the guide's overall direction (from its first point to its last). All rows keep the guide's exact shape. Where the guide climbs steeply away from that direction, the rows come closer together, because each copy moves the same distance straight across.

• Parallel offset: each row runs a row spacing away from the one before, so the spacing stays even everywhere. The rows change shape as they go: round on the outside of a bend, tightening to a point on its inside.

• Buffer: rings round the guide line, a row spacing apart, like the outline of a thick pen drawn along it.

Copy angle

Copy angle (deg) appears with Copy. Left empty, the copies move straight across the guide's overall direction. A number moves them in that direction instead: the copies slide along the guide as they go, which brings the rows closer together. Every row still runs from edge to edge.

Where part of the guide runs within 30° of the direction the copies move in, they would come closer than half a row spacing, or cross. NextStitch then turns the angle towards straight across, by no more than it takes for the copies to stay apart, or moves them straight across, and a note under Copy angle (deg) gives the angle it sewed and suggests Parallel offset, which keeps the spacing even on such a shape. On some shapes, such as an arch as high as a half circle, the copies come too close at any angle; then the note says so. The note goes as soon as the copies keep apart at the angle you set. Leave the field empty unless you want that slant, and check the result in the Stitch view.

Stitch positions

Stitch positions, under Advanced, sets where the needle points fall along each row. Flexible, the default, shares each row's length out evenly between its stitches, so they shift a little from row to row. Flexible (stagger) steps a full Stitch length (mm) from the start of each row, so the Row offset pattern stays exact along the guide. A guided fill along its guide starts at Even, as guided fills were always sewn.

Repeats, smoothness and end-row spacing

• Repeats, under Advanced once there is a guide line, sews each row Single, or three or five times as a bean stitch with ×3 and ×5. The moves between the rows are sewn once.

• Smoothness, under Advanced and as Smooth in the bar, rounds the rows before they are sewn. It also shortens sharp bends, which can leave a few rows out.

• End-row spacing (mm) belongs to the plain fill a guided fill is without its guide: it is shown only while there is no guide line. It grades the spacing from Row spacing on one side of the shape to this value on the other.

Meander

A meander lays a small pattern of tiles over the shape and walks one line through it, from one side of the area to the other, with random detours wherever they fit. The line never crosses itself, and it is smoothed before it is sewn. It has no underlay; Overlap (mm) grows its area as for a fill.

Scale

Scale (mm), in the bar and under Stitch settings, is the size of the tiles. A new meander starts at 4 mm. Smaller tiles make a tighter, busier line that covers more of the area; larger ones make wide, open loops. The walk is random, so the same scale covers another shape differently: New variation, under Advanced, gives the meander a fresh random pattern, and undo brings the last one back.

Angle, inset and smoothness

• Angle (deg) turns the tile pattern, and with it the line's texture.

• Inset (mm) keeps the line that far inside the shape's edge, 0 to 5 mm, for a border of fabric or room for an outline. 0 or empty is none.

• Smoothness, under Advanced, starts at 1 on a meander and rounds the line's corners; 0 sews the tile pattern's straight steps.

A shape too narrow for the tiles is sewn as an Auto-fill instead, and Problems says so (Meander sewn as tatami): make Scale smaller to get the meander back.

Repeats

Repeats sews the meander's line Single, or three or five times as a bean stitch with ×3 and ×5, for a bolder line. Every pass goes over the same needle points, so the drawings below look alike; the numbers under them count the passes.

Ripple

A ripple sews copies of the shape's outline, one inside the other, each scaled down towards a centre point, from the outline in; each copy starts next to where the one before ended. It has no underlay and no overlap. On an open line, a ripple shrinks the line towards its own middle.

Lines

Lines, in the bar and under Stitch settings, is the number of copies, counting the outline itself and the centre point the last one shrinks to. A shape switched to Ripple starts at 5; a design that leaves the setting out is sewn with 10. Because the copies are scaled, not moved inward, they lie further apart where the outline is far from the centre.

The target

With one ripple selected, the Stitch view shows a target at the centre the copies shrink to: the middle of the shape to begin with. Drag it to move the centre, and double-click it to put it back. Moved towards one side, the copies crowd together there. Where a copy would run outside the shape, that part is left out and the thread runs on inside to the next part.

Where it starts and ends

On its own, a ripple starts where its outline begins (for a shape drawn with the Pen / Path, the first point you set) and ends at the centre. Sewn after another object, it starts as near as it can to where that object ended: on its outline when the needle comes from outside the shape, and then it ends at the centre. Sewn first, with the next object no more than 3 mm away, it starts at the centre and ends on the outline beside that object. A meander is entered and left the same way, as near the neighbouring objects as its pattern allows. Both show start and end markers in the Stitch view, as fills do (Where fills start and end), and follow them wherever they are sewn, first in the design too, as near as they can. A ripple always has one end at its centre: the markers choose where on the outline it starts or ends, and whether it runs in from the outline or out from the centre. A meander starts and ends only where its pattern's line can, so a small one, with few tiles, has only a few places to choose from and may stay some way from your markers. An end point you set replaces the aim at the next object.

Good starting values

• Guided fill: draw the guide with a few points along the flow you want, start with Copy, try Parallel offset where a curve should keep its spacing, and Buffer for rings round a line. Leave Copy angle empty.

• Meander: use a smaller Scale on small shapes so the line fills them, an Inset of about the outline's width when an outline goes round it, and Repeats ×3 for a bolder, hand-quilted look.

• Ripple: 5 to 10 Lines, and the target where the eye should go.