as mentioned by others, there are many ways.. WDS, SCCM, WAIK and windows deployment tool kit etc... to deploy to create the image...
For VMware the best and easy thing you can do is
1- Install windos7 VM and install VMware tools and customize it as per your need
2- Sysprep the image - if you want to regenerate the SID
Now to run sysprep you need to launch Command Prompt as an administrator. Next navigate to the sysprep folder by typing: cd sysprep and pressing enter.
Next, input the following commands:
sysprep /generalize /oobe /shutdown
3- this will Shutdown, the VM.
4- The now, create a Virtual appliance in the OVF or OVA format, in FUSION, select the VM, and in the menu bar > click file > then select the option "export to OVF" then give a file name and location. In the file name give a name with file extension OVA. that is VMxxxxxxx.OVA this will save the applicance as a single file.
5- once done you can use that OVA for other deployment, or just you can also copy the virtual machine VMDK. OVA will consume less space than the VMDK.
NOTE: if you want to do the automatic cusotmization that is after the SYSPREP you need an answer file to automate the rest of the deployment process. you can use free tools like VLITE (http://www.vlite.net/download.html) or Windows System Image Manager (WSIM)
Once the answer file is created, give a name for that file like unattend.xml or Autounattend.xml.
Copy or that unattend.xml file to : C:\windows\system32\sysprep.
then run the sysprep tool
sysprep /generalize /oobe /unattend:unattend.xml /shutdown
An answer file for Windows Vista and Windows 7 is an XML-based file that contains settings definitions and values to use during Windows Setup. The easiest way to create an answer file for use with a Windows 7 deployment is to use the Windows System Image Manager (WSIM) which is a part of the Windows Automated Installation Kit (Windows AIK or WAIK).