Your first turtle embroidery

We will now make our first turtle embroidery. We start by importing TurtleThread (make sure that it is installed).

from turtlethread import Turtle

Next, we create a turtle object, which we’ll use to draw with

from turtlethread import Turtle

needle = Turtle()

Now we have everything we need to start making patterns. Let’s start with a line. To draw a line, we use forward and how far we want the turtle to move (for example 300 steps).

from turtlethread import Turtle

needle = Turtle()
needle.forward(300)

This code moves the turtle 100 steps, but it doesn’t make any stitches. To make the turtle start stitching while it is moving, we need to use a stitch-block.

Using a stitch type to create a seam

The simplest form of stitch-block is one named running_stitch (See Overview of stitch types in TurtleThread). In a running stitch block, we embroider in a straight line with a set distance between each stitch.

from turtlethread import Turtle

needle = Turtle()
with needle.running_stitch(30):
    needle.forward(300)

Now, we have made code that moves the turtle 300 steps forward, with one stitch after every 30-th step. This is equivalent to stitching every third millimeter. Let’s see how this looks, and to do so, we can use the visualise-function, which uses the builtin turtle-library to draw our embroidery.

from turtlethread import Turtle

needle = Turtle()
with needle.running_stitch(30):
    needle.forward(300)
needle.visualise()

Now, we have a straight line, and to change direction, we can use the right-command, and tell the turtle how many degrees it should turn to the right (for example 90 degrees).

from turtlethread import Turtle

needle = Turtle()
with needle.running_stitch(30):
    needle.forward(300)
    needle.right(90)
    needle.forward(300)

needle.visualise()

With a for-loop, we can repeat this four times to get a square:

from turtlethread import Turtle

needle = Turtle()
with needle.running_stitch(30):
    for side in range(4):
        needle.forward(300)
        needle.right(90)

needle.visualise()

And if we use another loop again to draw the square eight times, we’ll get a pretty flower:

from turtlethread import Turtle

needle = Turtle()
with needle.running_stitch(30):
    for petal in range(8):
        for side in range(4):
            needle.forward(300)
            needle.right(90)
        needle.right(45)

needle.visualise()

It can often be smart to define some key variables to use in our program. One such variable can be the number of petals our flower has. Let’s make that petal variable and name it num_petals.

from turtlethread import Turtle

needle = Turtle()

num_petals = 8
with needle.running_stitch(30):
    for petal in range(num_petals):
        for side in range(4):
            needle.forward(300)
            needle.right(90)
        needle.right(360 / num_petals)

needle.visualise()

Try it yourself:

• Try to modify the code and change the number of petals to get a figure like the one below:

Click here to see an example of how the finished code can look:

from turtlethread import Turtle

needle = Turtle()

num_petals = 10
with needle.running_stitch(30):
    for petal in range(num_petals):
        for side in range(4):
            needle.forward(300)
            needle.right(90)
        needle.right(360 / num_petals)

needle.visualise()

Saving the pattern

Now, we have a nice pattern that we can save as a PNG or SVG file

from turtlethread import Turtle

needle = Turtle()

num_petals = 8
with needle.running_stitch(30):
    for petal in range(num_petals):
        for side in range(4):
            needle.forward(300)
            needle.right(90)
        needle.right(360 / num_petals)

needle.visualise()
needle.save("flower.png")
needle.save("flower.svg")

Below is the flower.svg file that we just created:

Or, we can save it as a DST-file to use it with an embroidery machine.

from turtlethread import Turtle

needle = Turtle()

num_petals = 8
with needle.running_stitch(30):
    for petal in range(num_petals):
        for side in range(4):
            needle.forward(300)
            needle.right(90)
        needle.right(360 / num_petals)

needle.visualise()
needle.save("flower.png")
needle.save("flower.svg")
needle.save("flower.dst")