The Mockup Studio, start to finish

The Mockup Studio puts your customer's words on a photo of a real blank, drawn from real embroidery stitch files. The lettering is drawn from the real stitch files in your font library, the sizes are real measurements, and the hoop on screen is the hoop you own. What you send is a piece you can actually stitch.

Sizes throughout the studio are shown in inches by default, because that is how hoops are sold in the United States. If you work in millimetres, change it once on the Pricing page, in the card called Inches or millimetres, and every size in the studio, your hoop list, and your design library switches over. You should never have to convert a hoop size in your head.

Add a blank

1. 1Photograph the garment flat, straight on, and in good light. Fill the frame with the garment.
2. 2In the studio, tap Add a blank you stock, or simply drag the photo in from a folder and drop it anywhere on the page.
3. 3The photo lands with a guessed name and width. Fix both in the boxes underneath: give the blank a real name and type how much garment the photo shows across, in whichever unit your shop is set to. That one measurement is how the studio knows the real size of everything you place on it.

Place the words

1. 1Type the words. Press Enter to put the next words on a line underneath, like a name under a team name.
2. 2Use Add more words to put a separate set of words somewhere else on the garment, each with its own font and thread color. Tap any placed set to select it.
3. 3Pick a font and a thread color. The thread swatches come from your own spool drawer when it has spools in it.
4. 4Drag the words where you want them. Drag the bottom corner circle to resize, and the circle above the words to tilt. The arrow keys nudge in tiny steps, and holding Shift nudges in bigger steps.
5. 5Use the Curve slider to arch the words, the way you would in your embroidery software.

The hoop is real

Pick the hoop you are actually using and it draws on the garment at its true stitching size, mounted the way that hoop really clips onto the machine. Grab it anywhere, on the ring itself or the open space inside it, to slide it around the garment the way you would hoop a real shirt, and use Turn the hoop to rotate it sideways. If the design does not fit the hoop, the studio says so and offers to shrink it to fit. The hoop and the words also snap to the garment's center line, which is the middle of the stitchable area you drew on that blank. On a tote with two straps, that is the middle between the straps, and on a sweatshirt it is the middle of the chest. If the center line ever looks wrong, redraw the stitchable area and it follows.

Check the spelling and send it

1. 1Tap Check spelling and send. The studio shows every set of words next to how it will actually stitch, and asks you to confirm the spelling is exactly right. This is the moment that catches a typo, because once it is stitched it cannot be fixed.
2. 2Download the finished mockup picture to send over Facebook or Instagram, or email it to the customer right from the studio.
3. 3Every mockup picture carries a small label saying it is a mockup, not a photo of the finished piece, so a customer never mistakes it for the finished item.