Creating fabrics from customer's sample is one of most common designers work
in factories. In this tutorial you have to prepare a fabric from a sample, which you have received from
a customer as a picture attachment by e-mail.
Open ArahWeave. The program initially opens your default fabric. Let us start with the weave.
Choose Weave > Edit, or simply click with right mouse button on the fabric.
The Edit weave window shows the default weave.
To start drawing from scratch, click on
In Edit weave toolbox to delete contents of weave editor.
Then select Change > Dimensions.
In Change dimensions dialog box write the dimensions of the weave, which you will draw.
To draw weaving points use left mouse buton, delete
them with the right mouse button.
The sample was woven using the plain weave. The repeat of the plain
weave is two by two, but it is often helpful to show more than one repeat,
to get better image of the weave. You will weave with 8 shafts, because the
density of fabric is quite high. By using 8 shafts instead of 2, the number
of warps per each shaft is divided by 4, and this causes less friction on warp threads and lower
weight on each shaft.
Now set the density in Fabric > Density. You can easily
count the number ends and picks per centimeter in sample, if you magnify the
scanned fabric. The density is 26 warps/cm and 14 wefts/cm.
Choose the prescribed colors from PANTONE® fashion & home:
dark green 19-0414 TCX in warp and weft, light color in warp 12-0715 TCX and in weft 16-1315 TCX.
To display the Edit colors window, select Fabric > Colors, and choose Files > Load Colors
and from file selection box choose PANTONE® fashion + home.
In Change > Find color type the color code, and press Enter. The color,
which you have searched for, will be automatically selected. Now you only need to
copy it with right mouse button to the correct position, indicated by A and B in the warp,
and a and b in the weft.
Select Fabric > Yarns to set yarn count and twists per meter in yarn editor.
First you must use the mouse to select the yarn which
you will edit, for example B, and enter the values, followed by Enter. You can copy
the yarn properties to A warp with the right mouse button, color will not be copied.
Now edit warp and weft pattern by selecting Fabric > Thread pattern. In
ArahWeave you can edit warp and weft pattern in two different ways. You can enter
the repeat pattern as number of threads (for instance 2a 2b 2c) or write the
repeat pattern in millimeters (for instance 3.5a 4b which means you have
a stripe of yarn color a with width of 3.5 millimeters, followed by 4 millimeters
of color b. In this sample, it is easier to measure width of stripes, then to count the
number of threads in each stripe. Set the option menu on the top of warp and weft
entry window to mm. Measure the width of stripes in warp and weft
repeat and enter them as a values in millimeters.
Set the option menu on the top of warp and weft
entry window back to Threads, and the program will calculate the number of
threads necessary to fill the specified area in millimeters.
To get the simulation of fabric on a screen, select View > Simulation. You have a choice of 8
simulation levels, the higher the number the better (and slower) the simulation.
By clicking on the desired number in Zoom menu, you will enter desired zoom mode. Number 1 means
100%, 2:1 stands for 200% etc. You can also set zoom in Fabric > Density
to any value between 5% and 1600% (16:1). The current zoom factor is also displayed on the top of the main window.
You should also be able to print the fabric simulation. Choose Files > Print fabric to
printer. On printout you will get what you have on the screen - we follow so-called WYSIWYG
(What You See Is What You Get) principle. If you selected a zoom
factor of 200%, image will be printed in this way. In Printer setup you select
printer or a graphical format, if you want to print to file. Than enter the desired print size
and click OK. You can also click on Print preview - it will be displayed at 1:1 size.
Finally, we have to prepare technical data for the production of the fabric. Choose
Fabric > Consumption. Enter the technical details of your fabric: length
of warp, reed number, denting, weft density, reed space, finished width of the fabric.
Program will use this data to calculate the yarn consumption for the production of the fabric.
You can also use it as a production ticket.
You can save technical data as a HTML document. In main window choose Files > Save technical data as a HTML and press OK. Program will save data from Calculation of thread consumption window in HTML format, and it will look like this. You can then send it by e-mail, and most mailers will be able to show it directly, without additional programs. You can also load it into MS Office products. If this production ticket is too complete for your needs, you can disable some elements, during creation of the HTML file.