Blue or Purple?

[mookien]

Thanks a lot, Matt. You made my day. ;-)

Given then that purple is blue and orange is red, how does a tartan designer unambiguously specify the required colors?

By way of example, suppose a designer wants a tartan to contain repeated bands of the colors (you'll never guess) blue, orange, purple, and red. How are the four colors specified so that the orange bands looks like the fruit on the orange tree and not a tomato, and the blue bands look like the deep ocean on a sunny day and not my face now, as I'm holding my breath?

[gary meakin]

If you follow the blue from the solid to the stripe (with the black stripe) you'll see they are the same color. It's only the black stripe that makes it appear purple.
http://www.futilitycloset.com/2010/1...des-of-gray-2/

[Spartan Tartan]

Thanks a lot, Matt. You made my day. ;-)

Given then that purple is blue and orange is red, how does a tartan designer unambiguously specify the required colors?

By way of example, suppose a designer wants a tartan to contain repeated bands of the colors (you'll never guess) blue, orange, purple, and red. How are the four colors specified so that the orange bands looks like the fruit on the orange tree and not a tomato, and the blue bands look like the deep ocean on a sunny day and not my face now, as I'm holding my breath?

THIS question of Blue-Orange-Purple-Red pattern has made MY day

[Brian K]

Thanks a lot, Matt. You made my day. ;-)

Given then that purple is blue and orange is red, how does a tartan designer unambiguously specify the required colors?

By way of example, suppose a designer wants a tartan to contain repeated bands of the colors (you'll never guess) blue, orange, purple, and red. How are the four colors specified so that the orange bands looks like the fruit on the orange tree and not a tomato, and the blue bands look like the deep ocean on a sunny day and not my face now, as I'm holding my breath?

To be honest, I the two samples shown in the OP and subsequent posts just look blue to me. At Scotweb the Oxford in the designer is a deep rich blue and I feel the same about the Oxford in the sample that you feel has a purplish cast to it. The only thing in the Scotweb weavers colors that looks purple, in my opinion, is Highland Purple - which is now much closer to a real purple rather than the maroon they used to have there.

As someone who has designed a lot of tartans just for the fun of it, I too have wondered how you can keep the distinctions between different colors in the different ranges. If all shades of blue and purple are considered blue, or all shades of red and orange are considered red, and so on, then it would take a closer collaboration between designer/commissioner and the weaver than most of us might have imagined. I can see a lot of yarn samples flying back and forth across the ocean for those of us in the states.

If you're willing to pay the professional colors upcharges it is my understanding that Scotweb will make sure that yarns are did using the Pantone number generated in the pro colors field. That, of course, makes for a much mre expensive length of cloth. As they say, you get what you pay for.

Regards,

Brian

[M. A. C. Newsome]

Thanks a lot, Matt. You made my day. ;-)

Given then that purple is blue and orange is red, how does a tartan designer unambiguously specify the required colors?

By way of example, suppose a designer wants a tartan to contain repeated bands of the colors (you'll never guess) blue, orange, purple, and red. How are the four colors specified so that the orange bands looks like the fruit on the orange tree and not a tomato, and the blue bands look like the deep ocean on a sunny day and not my face now, as I'm holding my breath?

If that were the case then I would specific red and orange, blue and purple both in the thread count. The fact is this would be a rather unusual color combination for a typical tartan, but that's the simplest way to specify.

Usually a tartan will only have one shade of any given color, but in those unusual occasions where there are multiple shades of the same color, you simply specifiy which is the lighter and darker shade in the thread count.

If you really need to be specific in terms of color matching then it falls to you to provide the weaver with some kind of color samples for matching purposes.

[robbiethepiper]

Just to complicate matters: In a conversation with House of Edgar last week I was told that the 13oz and 16oz verions of my tartan ( Kerr, hunting ancient ) look very slightly different.......

[mookien]

If you follow the blue from the solid to the stripe (with the black stripe) you'll see they are the same color. It's only the black stripe that makes it appear purple.
http://www.futilitycloset.com/2010/1...des-of-gray-2/

I don't understand your post. The link takes me to an optical illusion in black and shades of gray. There is no blue to follow. What am I missing? Maybe I've gone color blind from oxygen deprivation. :-)

[Paul Henry]

I don't understand your post. The link takes me to an optical illusion in black and shades of gray. There is no blue to follow. What am I missing? Maybe I've gone color blind from oxygen deprivation. :-)

What he is trying to tell you that all colours change their look in proximity to others, hence the black/grey/white optical illusion, the point being that there is only one shade of grey.

I really think you are over thinking this whole thing, most of us on this thread have said that the working (weaving)colours of any tartan are ultimately down to the weaver and or designer, and there are always going to be variations between different weavers, and at different times when the tartan is woven.
If you want a special colour then you need to specify that , and there is really not a problem with doing that, but many traditional tartans are made from a very small number of different colours, eg blue/black/green/red/yellow, so there was not really a need to be very specific in days of yore!
Today it has become a little different.

There will also be variation between different weight of fabric, as thre threads used are different weights as well, and there is no guarantee that they will all be dyed at the same time either.

As has been said before, if you want a specific colour , you need to ask for samples and then make your choice based on that

[mookien]

Brian K: Have you looked at the Silver Thistle on the Scottish Register of Tartans, ie

http://www.tartanregister.gov.uk/tar....aspx?ref=3789

All three representations of it appear distinctly purple to me. I'm not claiming it should appear the same to you. If you see it as blue, then our eyes are seeing the color differently.

Also, just to clarify, when I look at the woven sample of the ST tartan, the bands in question are distinctly blue, not purple. (Though again, my son said he could see a bit of purple in them.) It is when I look at the picture posted above that I can see a slight purple hue in the blue bands.

Your last paragraph may strike at the heart of the matter. If one has enough money and is willing to spend it (I don't and would not), one should be able to give a (very exclusive) weaver the RGB numbers of the colors you want and get those colors vanishingly close to their exact representation. Perhaps Scotweb is providing such a service. I can't afford to find out. :-)

[mookien]

Matt: I realize the colors I chose would never likely be in a real tartan. I chose them simply as a gedanken example to explore the question a bit further.

You wrote that you would specify "red and orange, blue and purple", but in general from what palette do designers draw their color descriptions?

Do they simply use words that they think best describe the color they have in mind, eg medium red, dark red, sunset red, etc.?

Or, is there some palette (traditional or formally defined) from which they select their colors?

Or, can one provide RGB designations, like those that appear in the SRT threadcounts?

In general what kinds of color descriptions are acceptable to the "authorities" (STA, SRT, CSCS, etc.) when transmitting the thread count?

Thanks, and sorry for all the trouble. :-)