Tuesday 16 September 2014

Free Motion QAL - The first video tutorial!

Welcome to the first video tutorial in the Free Motion QAL! For today's tutorial I decided to show you how I quilt a simple echo design. This is the first free motion quilting design I tried after I'd done stippling for a while, and it was a good introduction into quilting beyond stippling - so I thought it would be perfect for this QAL.

This is the first quilt I quilted using echo shells - using Leah Day's tutorial. You can see my version of echo shells is a bit different from Leah's - and you'll probably find your version turns out a bit differently too.


You can find my Youtube video tutorial here.

In the video I mention that there are other ways you can quilt echo designs. A few examples are a paisley - for example the quilting design in the black area of my groove quilt:


Or a leaf-shape, like I did on this quilt Susan donated for the bush fire appeal last year. 


The possibilities are pretty endless when it comes to echo type designs - and it is a really fun way to fill a space on a quilt.

As a complete novice YouTuber I would really appreciate any and all feedback on this video. I'd love some feedback on whether the angle is helpful, if my commentary is easy to hear - all that sort of thing. Constructive criticism is absolutely invited - but please try to keep it friendly. I am just using my little point and click camera to film this, so the quality probably isn't fantastic ;o)

I will be back in two weeks (and every two weeks after that) with the next video tutorial - so if you're a bit behind you will have plenty of time to catch up :o)

xx Jess

11 comments:

Renee said...

I love hearing your accent! Your whole blog just took on a new voice after hearing it! Before you just sounded like an American in my head, haha ;-) Your video looked great! It's fun seeing how you quilt.

Sarah said...

I loved hearing your voice so I can put the voice to the blog! ;) the video was excellent. I liked these larger shells, some echo designs are so tiny it would take forever to quilt a large quilt with them - not to mention a ton of thread! The video was very clear on my iPhone, easy to understand, and very helpful! I'm not a newbie but haven't done much echoing. I'm excited to try this design soon, even though I don't have time to do the official QAL right now. Thanks for the great video! Oh, and I don't have any constructive criticism. Anything I thought, "oh she should probably tell a newbie..." you mentioned within a minute or two. The only thing I'd like to see is how you set up your quilt, especially a larger quilt, for ease of quilting.

Susan said...

Oh, my goodness- my donation quilt! I called it "A Dog's Breakfast" but it looks amazing now! Now you have encouraged me to try to improve my FMQ skills! Thanks again for sharing your expertise with us all!

Deb B said...

Great tut! I have noticed that my renditions of quilting designs is always different to the original, similar but not the same! I think it's like handwriting, mine will always be different to anybody else's. Keep it up, I'm enjoying watching and reading about your journey!

Lisa J. said...

Thanks Jess. It looks pretty clear to me and I appreciate that it is fairly long which gives us a real sense of how you are quilting it. You say you started in the middle. When you want to work out for the other half do you flip the quilt around (not sure how to word this). Looking forward to trying this. It's a really nice pattern.

Alyce @ Blossom Heart Quilts said...

Video looked great on my big computer screen! Nice and clear audio too - we can hear you easily over the machine. Great angle too.

DeborahGun said...

really brilliant Jess and super super helpful. Thank you so much. I would also love to see just a quick more zoomed out shot so see how you have your quilt set up on the machine and where you usually hold it to move it around. Thank you :-)

Pedal Sew Lightly said...

Very well done. Pleasing amount of informative commentary without excessive dead time or being too chatty. The camera seems adequate for the job. I'd also love to see how you set up your area and stow the excess quilt while you work. Thanks so much for sharing.

Kali said...

The video was great! I really liked how you acknowledged those little odd spaces that happen when designs happen next to each other! Where a lot of videos or tutorials happen in a wide open area it's difficult to see how an edge should be approached, so that was great to see the design in action.

Katy Cameron said...

Wow, you FMQ like a demon, and you have far less 'Ums' than I did, a definite plus!

Suz J said...

Hi Jess, just reporting in that this tutorial came in very timely as I am quilting around applique - and this was a great pattern for fitting in and around the small pieces. So a good all rounder for big and little spaces. http://suz-allthegoodonesaretaken.blogspot.co.nz/2014/09/this-and-that.html

I had to laugh, you sound a lot less Australian than I do... and I'm from NZ!