January 10, 2026
Thread count vs pixel count
Creating Embroidered Charts with R and ImageMagick
Stitched-by-hand charts? Cozy vibes meet code vs AI drama
TLDR: Aman Bhargava coded cozy, embroidery-style charts using R and ImageMagick, avoiding AI and Photoshop for reproducible results. Comments praised the authentic look, debated code vs shortcuts, and spun into a nostalgia tangent about vintage, monochrome book illustrations—proof that people want data to feel handmade and human.
Bangalore-based designer Aman Bhargava just turned plain data charts into what look like embroidered patches, using R (a stats programming language) and ImageMagick (basically “headless Photoshop” you control with text commands). The crowd’s first reaction: pure delight. “That’s quite an authentic looking effect!” cheered one commenter, while others swooned over the cozy, Christmas sweater energy. Then the thread took a spicy turn: Aman’s stance of no generative AI for images—“even if Nano Banana Pro could do it”—sparked a mini culture war. Purists applauded the reproducible, scriptable pipeline; shortcut fans rolled their eyes, muttering “just use Photoshop.” Cue memes about “grandma-coded aesthetics” and “stitching your spreadsheets.”
The nostalgia brigade showed up hard. One commenter asked for monochrome, old-book vibes, reminiscing about ink bleed, rounded lines, and pre-Unicode cleverness, even sharing an example. That cracked open a sidebar obsession: can modern charts capture the imperfect charm of antique printing? Meanwhile, power users nodded approvingly at the idea of updating data and re-running a script—no fiddly manual filters.
So yes, the charts look like fabric, but the real thread is community pride in craft: code over clicks, patience over prompts, and the timeless appeal of making numbers feel human. ImageMagick stans, rejoice; AI maximalists, consider yourselves stitched
Key Points
- •The author achieved an embroidered cloth aesthetic for charts using R, ggplot, and extensive ImageMagick post-processing.
- •He prioritizes reproducibility, avoiding manual workflows in Photoshop and declining generative AI for image creation.
- •ImageMagick is presented as a command-line, “headless Photoshop” with a consistent command pattern: magick [input] [actions] [output].
- •Basic examples show format conversion (JPG to PNG), resizing to set dimensions, and grayscale conversion via ImageMagick.
- •The tutorial requires some CLI and coding familiarity; installation steps are omitted, and readers can adapt the code to their needs.