Manual1 min read

Import Dialog: Pattern Settings and ROI

A practical guide to colour reduction, dithering, matching, and focus areas.

These settings control how your final pattern looks and how easy it is to stitch.

Import settings panel with colour reduction, dithering, and matching controls annotatedzoom
Import settings panel with colour reduction, dithering, and matching controls annotated

Maximum colours (colour reduction)

  • Lower value: simpler and faster to stitch.
  • Higher value: more detail and smoother shading.

Good starting range for photos: 30 to 50.

Dithering

Dithering creates tiny colour patterns to smooth transitions.

  • On: smoother gradients, but more texture/noise.
  • Off: cleaner blocks, often easier stitching.

If unsure, generate once with dithering and once without, then compare.

Quantisation (palette selection)

This chooses how the app builds the reduced colour set.

  • Keep default first.
  • Change only when you compare multiple results.

Colour matching

This decides which thread colour each image colour maps to.

  • If colours look unnatural, test another matching method.
  • CIEDE2000 is usually a safe general option.

Stitch dimensions and aspect ratio

  • Larger stitch size keeps more detail but increases stitch count.
  • Keep aspect ratio locked to avoid stretching faces/objects.

Fabric settings (cross-stitch)

  • Fabric count affects final physical size.
  • Strands affect coverage and thread usage.

ROI (focus areas)

Use ROI when certain areas are important (faces, text, main subject).

  • Mark important areas before processing.
  • This helps preserve detail where it matters most.
ROI step — draw rectangles or lasso shapes over important areas before processingzoom
ROI step — draw rectangles or lasso shapes over important areas before processing