There is no wonder the needle painting is called that. It is literally painting with your hand-sewing needle and embroidery thread ie, embroidering realistic-looking designs with small straight stitches, which almost look like paint strokes.
The whole design is filled with small straight stitches, either long and short or of the same length resulting in blending stitches throughout. When different colors/shades of threads are used, the stitches blend into one another, creating a picture-like look that is almost realistic.( Check out the tutorial for Long and short stitches here)
The long and short stitches are the main stitches used in needle painting; because long and short stitches blend the rows of the filling stitches, there is a seamless effect, just like in a painting. Different shades of the same colours are used for the shaded effect.
One very important thing about needle painting is that you should be using one SINGLE STRAND of embroidery thread in the needle at one time at all times. This creates a very soft fine look to the whole work, and the blending of colors looks subtle and realistic.
You will also need several colors very close to each other. For, e.g. if you mean to fill the petal of a rose with red color, you will need 2-3 shades of red to create the needle painting effect, showing the gradation.
Choose a very thin needle with a small eye. A crewel needle 10 would be ideal – it is small enough not to leave any holes in the fabric and big enough that a single strand of thread will pass through the eye.
How to do needle painting?
( also called silk shading/thread painting)
The individual parts of the design are outlined with split stitches, and then the inside is filled with long and short stitches, enclosing the outline.
I would base my needle painting on a photograph.
Check out the post on making pansies for some images of pansies which are great for thread painting.
Checkout this post on turning a photo into an embroidery work for more details on this. Take a printout of the line drawing you have made this way. Trace it onto the fabric using a carbon sheet. Keep the original photo beside you so that you can refer to it all the time as to the colors to use in the project, as well as the shading.
When doing the needle painting, Put the fabric with the design on into your hoop or frame, making sure it’s taut.
You will need to take many embroidery needles. Thread your needle with a SINGLE strand of embroidery thread. Do this for all needles. (single strand -This is very important for the subtle shading effect and fine work).
The more colors you can use in the space available, the better the effect. I am using three colors in varying shades of red to fill the heart design. You can shade the picture with crayons, and heat set it with a medium hot iron on the reverse of the fabric – this can give you a guideline (as well as an excuse for not thoroughly filling the design if you are lazy – the colors will make up for the lack of stitches in gaps).
Start stitching a split outline around the design. This will be wholly covered with long and short stitches afterward. Use your first colour to make the outline.
Now to fill in the design – Start from the edge of the split stitch outline and Fill in as much of the design as required with closely worked long and short stitches.
When you want to introduce a new color, do not do it abruptly. Take one strand of your first color and one strand of your second color in two different needles. Continue to fill in the design, using the two colors together for one row.
Use your second color alone for the next row, and continue to fill in the design. This way, you will get a seamless shaded effect..
You can embellish your needle painting with other hand embroidery stitches like stem stitch, satin stitch, and French knots.
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