hi everyone hope we're doing well for today's video I want to talk about everything you need to know in order to fet crochet so before I get into the two main techniques that we like to use in order to filet crochet first let's just talk a little bit about fet crochet in general and what you're going to need to know and have in order to do it so the short explanation as to what filet crochet is is fet crochet is basically just a mesh Stitch where part of the panel is opaque and the contrast between the opaque and the sheerness creates a design or an image now you should be able to do this technique as a beginner because it only involves double crochets and chain stitches so if you're a confident beginner as long as you know those two stitches you should be fine to learn how to fet crochet however if you're struggling with picking up how to fet crochet I would suggest that you learn how to do a basic mesh Stitch first so what materials are you going to need in order to filet crochet a lot of filet crochet that you will have seen using is something called mercerized cotton however I have filet crocheted with different materials so as a beginner I would probably stick to either double knit yarn or four ply yarn and then as for the hook size you're going to want to use I would suggest that you use a hook size which is a lot smaller than the one that your yarn recommends so the yarn that I'm using today is yam man yarn's mercerized cotton which suggests that you use a 3.25 mm hook but I'm going to be using a 1.75 mm hook and we we do this because using a smaller hook size is going to create tighter stitches so the opaque parts of your panel are going to be even more opaque but then obviously the mesh Stitch is still going to be sheer because it's a mesh Stitch so you're creating more contrast which will create a clearer image now on top of some yarn and a hook you're also going to want to pick a graph that you want to follow obviously I will provide the graph that I'm following in this video in the link below however you can pick any graph that you would like to pick I personally would just suggest that you pick a graph that's no bigger than 20x 20 boxes now we've gathered everything that we need and we're ready to start filet crocheting our first step before we actually pick up our hook and our yarn is we need to figure out how many chains we need in order to create the pixel grid that we've picked how you going to do this is you're going to count the amount of boxes in the width of the graph which for me is going to be 17 then you're going to times this number by two so for me that's 34 and then add four so I'll quickly explain how this works one of these boxes is created by two stitches which is going to be a double crochet and a chain one so each one of these boxes has two stitches so I'm going to get the total amount of boxes that we have and times it by two but if we imagine this that means that our final stitch in our row would be a chain and that's not going to create a box we need to actually add another stitch in order to kind of close off this final box so in my case to finish off that 17th box I need to actually add a 35th chain in order to create that double crochet which will enclose that box and then the extra three chains that I'm adding on top of this extra one is just our turning chain because our turning chain counts as our first double crochet chain one obviously if you're a beginner you do not need to worry about this at all I would just get the amount of boxes that you have in your width times it by two and then add four that's going to be how many chains you need so I've done those 38 chains to start our first r row of filet crochet what we're going to do is we're going to skip a total of five chain stitches so one 2 3 4 5 we're going to work into this sixth Stitch right here if you prefer you can work into the back Loop here but personally I like to go into the back bump of my Stitch but this is just personal preference so we're going to start by entering a double crochet and what this will do is create that first box that we need all we're going to be doing is we're going to chain one stitch and then we're going to skip the next available stitch in the row below and go into the second Stitch from the last Stitch that we've gone into with a double crochet so I'm going to yarn over insert my hook before then doing a double crochet like that so I'm going to do the same thing thing again where I chain one stitch skip the next available stitch in the row below and enter a double crochet into the second Stitch from the last Stitch that we went into and we're just going to repeat that pattern all the way up until we reach the first chain that we made right at the start of our row so I'm just going to do my final double crochet each one of these boxes is kind of representing one of the boxes in our pixel grid so at this this point I would just go ahead and double check that you're happy with the amount of boxes that you've created 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 so I've created 17 holes like this and this matches my pixel grid because the pixel grid that I'm using has a width of 17 boxes so now we've built our first row we're ready to work on our second row where we encounter our colored squares so to start our next row we're going to do a turning chain of three before we then turn our work skip this chain here and work a double crochet on top of this double crochet like this and this is going to create that first mesh box which you can see here following the graph I've got a total of two more that I need to make so you can see here I've created these three holes which are going to emulate those three empty uncolored boxes we now have three colored boxes in a row so what we're going to do instead of a double crochet and a chain like we normally would we're just going to be doing two double crochets so technically this is my first double crochet and normally would do double crochet chain one but we're going to do two double crochets instead and work that into our chain stitch so we're going to put a double crochet in like that and that represents us doing one of our boxes and if you remember earlier we have a total of three so I'm just going to continue doing those two double crochets together and I need to carry this on up until I take the space of three mesh boxes and that has gone through the three mesh boxes which if you compare we have these three mesh boxes below our double crochets so this is going to be an easier way for you to identify how many stitches you've done but now we're back to that me Stitch so I've done my double crochet on top of my double crochet in filet crochet there should never be a point where these double crochets in your mesh Stitch should be replaced by chains instead the easier way to think about it is These Chains might turn into double crochets but they will always turn back into chains but these double crochets in the mesh Stitch will always stay there I'm going to chain one Skip One double crochet and I'm going to continue this up until I've done those five mesh boxes like the pattern is telling me to do so so again I've created those five mesh boxes so now I'm going back to the pattern of doing two double crochets together rather than double crochet chain one and I'm going to be doing that for a total of three mesh boxes if you're confused as to how many double crochets you should be doing when you have a row of a few boxes what you want to do is get the number of boxes you need to go across times it by two and add one so using this as an example the double crochets are to represent a total of three boxes and if we get three boxes and times it by two that's six total add one that's seven and if we look here we have a total of seven double crochets that are together so now I know that I'm ready to start adding my mesh boxes and these seven double crochet are all together and there's a chain on this side so there needs to be a chain on this side or else we just wouldn't have seven double crochets so as you can see I have these three mesh boxes left which kind of corresponds with what the pattern is telling me to do so I know that I'm on the right track and when it comes to working into this first mesh box or from this point on any time you crochet into the Turning chain you're still going to follow the pattern of skipping the next available Stitch or chain and then working your double crochet into the next available Stitch so now it's kind of just a case of repeating what we've just done so each row is going to start by a chain of three turning our work and creating our first mesh Box by doing our double crochet here now if you look at the pattern I need a total of two mesh boxes before I change my pattern so I'm going to add in another meshbox by chaining one and doing a double crochet and obviously the pattern tells me that I now need to do a total of five mesh boxes along which in total if you remember the formula from earlier 2 * 5 = 10 + 1 = 11 so including this first double crochet I should be doing 11 double crochets before I change my Stitch back to a chain I also use the stitches underneath to kind of guide where those stitches are going so if we look at the pattern this row has an extra colored box either side of the three here and I can see within my pattern that that's going to take up this meshbox here and this meshbox here so I could count those 11 or I could literally just look at this point and be like okay all of this is going to be double crochets so I use a mix of both of those approaches to decide what Stitch I'm doing where I feel like everyone will have a slightly different way of approaching it so kind of the long story short is you're either going to be doing double crochet chain one or two double crochets together so hopefully we get the basics of this Stitch I'm now going to finish this panel off camera to show you guys what this method will look like so I'm ready to do my final Stitch and finish everything off so I'm going to cut my yarn and then yarn over and pull that through the loop that's on my hook this panel still needs blocking but this is going to be what our filet crochet looks like with a double crochet chain one filet crochet so hopefully by now you guys kind of get the general concept around filet crochet the one thing I do want to mention here is if you're following a grid that isn't symmetrical you want to make sure that every time you read a new row you're reading in the opposite direction at this point I'm ready to share the second technique that we like to use in filet crochet which is a tiny bit harder maths wise to kind of work out but the principles are are exactly the same the first thing you need to know is that your starting chain formula is going to be a little bit different you're going to get the amount of boxes in the width of your graph and this time we're going to times it by three and then we want to add five stitches so in this case 17 * by 3 is 51 and then add 5 is 56 so that's going to be how many chains I need to start off with now I've skipped a total of seven stitches this time and worked my first double crochet into the eighth Stitch away from my hook and now I'm going to chain two and then I'm going to skip two chains so these two here and into this third chain that's where I'm going to be doing my double crochet and then we're going to continue this pattern to build up our first row of mesh boxes start our next row we're going to chain a total of four not three and now our mesh boxes represent a double crochet a chain Two and A skip to the colored boxes are going to consist of three double crochets so just like before if you want to work out how many double crochets you need to do in a row you want to get the amount of boxes that are together times it by three and then add one and if we get three and times it by three and then add one we're going to have a total of 10 and if we look here that is a total of 10 double crochets so now I know that I'm ready to change two and do a double crochet to create our next mesh box and you're going to continue everything else like we did before so those are the two main filet crochet techniques that we like to use within crochet but at this point you might be asking me which one you should use when and whilst there's not really kind of a correct answer I will give you which techniques is better for what if you have a huge project the double crochet chain one technique is going to save you time because obviously you're reducing your Stitch count by a third or I suppose if we're going mathematically it's probably not exactly a third however the double crochet chain two method is going to be a lot clearer for images that don't contain as many boxes kind of close together so if you have any kind of really intricate detail or specifically just kind of like lines that only consist of a width or a height of one or two boxes you're probably better off using a double crochet chain two technique just because then you're less likely to run into the problem of your image not being clear enough for your project now I say all of this I really don't have a preference one way or another even at this point in my crochet journey I still reach for both techniques so they definitely both have their ups and downs sometimes it's just going to be a personal preference thing but I definitely think that knowing how to do both of these techniques is the most beneficial and then finally before I say goodbye to you I just want to show you how to guesstimate how big your filet crochet project is going to be so first you're going to crochet a Swatch of five mesh Boxes by five mesh boxes I'm going to insert the pattern that I use for this in the description box below you want to measure the total width and the total height of your panel if your filet crochet graph has a lot of colored boxes I might consider doing a test Swatch that include more double crochets rather than just doing a mesh Stitch but that's kind of up to your own judgment to be honest you then want to get your height and your width of your panel and divide it by five and then get the width and height of the amount of boxes in your graph and times it by the answer for both of these sums and that should give you an approximate size as to how big your piece is going to be once you've finished it right that's going to be it from me today I hope you enjoyed this video and found it helpful I do have other videos on filet crochet as well as other crochet techniques so definitely go ahead and check them out I also do have a few filet crochet patterns on my Etsy and Ravelry make sure you're subscribed to this Channel and like this video and comment any suggestions or questions that you have right you guys have a good rest of your day and I will see you in the next video bye