Review of Scotweb Tartan Designer and Resulting Product

[Rex_Tremende]

In a previous post in the Tartans and Heraldry section, I introduced a tartan that I designed through Scotweb. I'm not 100% sure, but I think I may be the first user to have actual output from the tool and the various processes involved. I thought it might be useful to others thinking about going this route for me to jot down some of my experiences and reaction to the outcomes.

For starters, be aware that I began this project well before the designer was announced to most everyone else. I have seen it through various incarnations, reported bugs, provided design suggestions (Nick cut me off on that, eventually), and exercised the process while the process was still being worked out. Because of this, my experience is probably quite extraordinary in that I may have a bias toward the service that Scotweb ended up with, and also that the problems I encountered along the way may be unlikely to be seen again, in part for my having trod that road. To be sure, though, I have nothing to gain by sharing this and no axe to grind.

First, let's talk about the designer. It's been a while since I've toyed with this thing in earnest, but I think it's a fairly remarkable feat of webineering. I see they've added some quick tips since I was last there - that's neat to see. But you can start from scratch or browse existing tartans and users' designs and modify them for your own use, too. I designed my tartan from scratch.

Three ranges of colors make it easy to choose colors from common choices, a typical weaver's supply, or custom colors. I chose weaver's colors from an earlier version of the designer. Unfortunately, these were not available when I placed my order, but Scotweb helped sort that out later. I am fascinated by the unlimited color palette in the "Pro" section, but not so much (yet) that I'm willing to find out what it would cost for custom dyes. You can specify the RBG codes to get a particular color if you know what it is. I have a couple of designs in my private gallery (more on that later), that have used this feature, and I like the result on the screen. Would the colors be true on a real tartan? Someday I may find out, but you know - what you see on any monitor and actual colors may vary.

Having said that, when Stewart Robertson later asked for my input on finding approximate matches for the colors I had originally chosen, they listened when I said, "If in doubt, go for darker, ruddier, or more weathered." I was sent a nice sampler and a printed prototype which ended up looking remarkably like the final product. And it turned out the colors were not that much different from my original choices.

Other features that the designer has that makes it easier to manipulate the design include drag-and-drop colors, and if you are unsure which color input is causing the output to look funny, you can point to the stripe in the sample space and the source will be highlighted. You can change or delete the offending bugger - and undo it with a click if that didn't work out the way you thought it would.

You can save your designs and make them public or keep them private. You can opt for public commentary if you like, but there are SOOO many public designs out there, I think it is hard to wade through them all. Maybe a future edition Scotweb will feature a "Rate My Tartan: Hot or Not?" game, with user designs displayed at random - so long as they can figure out how to prevent people from gaming the game.

I think the tool is easy (and fun) to use, but designing a good tartan is not as easy as it looks. Of course "good" is in the eye of the beholder, but the historian, the weaver, and the kiltmaker all may have something to say about it. Before I ordered my tartan, I wanted to avail myself of their professional review service. Now this was where I believe the process was not entirely ironed out. There were some issues related to how a review would be delivered, and the order in which you finalize your design and request a review that prevented you from going back and making recommended changes. The operations people had to do a few things by hand behind the scenes to get my feedback to me and to put my revisions into a usable state. I understand that those things have been worked out now, but I can't speak to it first-hand.

Getting professional advice can be a bit of a shock. You might think your design is lovely and perfect. But when you pay for a critique, you really need to be open to the idea that a concept can be improved in some fashion: From the weaver's point of view, there are practical considerations - some of which have been built into the designer; The kiltmaker may tell you that you might want to avoid a lot of narrow stripes that make tapering difficult; And the historian probably has a completely different aesthetic than your own. Brian Wilton sent me a suggested design revision that looked (to me) nothing like what I had in mind. In the end, I took everyone's input that I got, made revisions that respected all points of view in some fashion, but still did my own thing.

When I finally pulled the trigger on the purchase, I think the expected delivery time was set twice. The first time, I think it might have been a standard wait time for a typical run of mill fabric. But when the issue with the colors cropped up, the date was set for about three months hence. That didn't seem inordinate to me. So, I steeled myself for the wait.

Now, that was a lot of writing, and I'll pause here and come back in a little while with a review of the product - so...

More to come...