WeavePoint

“…It [ed. WeavePoint Software] really makes design and weaving faster and more pleasurable!”                             -- Gerry Woodhouse; Katy, Texas

More customer testimonials

Download a demo version of WeavePoint 6.4.

Click here to find out what's new with WeavePoint.

                                                                                          Now in Version 6.4

Introduction

Benefits

Features

• Basic Features
• Fabric Display
• Instant Drafting
• Network Drafting
• Virtual Beater
• Files and Printing
• Colors, Colors, Colors
• Advanced Features

Loom Drivers

System Requirements

WeavePoint Package

Introduction

WeavePoint is the easiest and fastest way to integrate a computer into your weaving. It combines an unprecedented ease-of-use, derived from the Windows environment, with revolutionary and stunning graphics.

With WeavePoint, you can quickly produce patterns and colorways for all the main loom systems, from tie-up and table looms to dobby and industrial shaft looms; it is also a very efficient tool for trying out new ideas and techniques in a systematic way.

WeavePoint is made to fill the requirements of the professional designer. Also, it can be very useful in learning and teaching. The Design mode can even be used for knitting and other repetitive grid patterns, or to design patterns for a drawloom.

For using WeavePoint also in production, interface options for various loom control systems are available.

Benefits

With WeavePoint, you can accurately visualize a double weave.

Choose to see both sides of the fabric simultaneously or "compress" the cloth to just see the top (or bottom) layer. Plus, WeavePoint's Interlaced View allows you to see how the double weave (any weave) goes together ... both layers are visible at the same time.

How stunning? Now WeavePoint gives you six different fabric views. These include:

• The above-mentioned Interlaced view
• A zoomable Flat Fabric view with thread size ratio displayed according to your EPI/PPI settings
• A "Draped" View for a 3-D look
• Plus the Normal Editing Mode with all four design quadrants visible simultaneously
• A Pattern Grid for free-form design.
• Simulation! See how your weave will look before you weave it!

And all this in twenty different levels of zoom and with over sixteen million colors to choose among.

Best of all, the software is remarkably easy to use. Built-in weaves; automatic design functions; the ability to import any BMP image or export any fabric as a PNG; and a friendly little manual make WeavePoint an outstanding value for any weaver from beginner to master.

More benefits of the WeavePoint software include:

• Works for all looms - treadle or dobby - up to 128 harnesses.
• Provides a dizzying array of graphic looks at a fabric. Choose among simulation, a grid view; over sixteen million colors; a flat view; a "rolled" 3-D-like view; expanded drawdowns, as originally developed by Mary Meigs Atwater; and an interlaced view that will really show both sides of a double weave - great for teaching!

  

• Realistically sized printout. WeavePoint allows you to enter your construction in ends/picks per inch or centimeter and the printer will print according to that sett.
• Explore the Compress function that displays double and complex weaves (such as overshot) as they'll actually be woven. This is a function that is absolutely unique to WeavePoint. Turn it on and one only sees the pattern in a Summer-and-Winter or Overshot. Turn it off and you'll see the underlying tabby.
• Analyzes patterns for the most efficient possible threading, treadling, and tie-up (or peg plan). Enter your design and WeavePoint will tell you how to weave it.
• Gives detailed insight into a design including: length of floats and percentage of color or yarn.
• Telescopes patterns into a workable number of harnesses - automatically. This is a huge capability; it essentially helps one to turn jacquards into dobbies.
• Exports .BMP and .PNG files to other compatible software. Imports images (using .bmp files) from other design software. Bring in any picture from anywhere and WeavePoint will tell you how to weave it, if possible.
• Exports and imports WIF files, the new universal weaving file format.
• Automatically creates Network drafts from your own profiles and "initials". Plus now it includes some built-in initials (which are mini-threadings).
• Includes Project Planner, an easy-to-use worksheet that yields accurate costing for all of your weaving projects.
• Allows for a wide variety of loading and saving options. Blend, add, subtract, or inverse one peg plan onto another. Perfect for both teaching and students.
• A wealth of options. Choose between English and metric standards; treadle or dobby; rising or sinking shed; threading on top or bottom; and more.
• Maximum size is 9600 warp ends and 9600 weft picks. Up to 128 harnesses and treadles
• Easy Zoom: just move the Zoom slider to the left or right for sixteen levels of zoom ... plus the zoom slider is visible at all times.
• Realistic-sized print-outs. If the printer is capable, then the user can enter the exact construction in ends and picks per inch (or cm.) and the print-out will be exactly the right size!
• A wide variety of Repeat Options ... easy fills; one-click for full repeats, plus options for flipping/flopping/mirroring and negativizing a repeat or partial-repeat.
• An Undo command to help you when the going gets rough (that is you made a mistake!). And there are wonderful new functions for Inserting a Threading or Peg Plan. (What does this mean? It means that a user can have a complex weave that looks like it's not going to hold together and they can put (insert) a plain weave - automatically! - on the first two harnesses to hold the weave together.
• Help, Help, Help - To get context-sensitive help on commands and dialogues, the user can press the F1 key when selecting a command. Also, one can click the Help button available in the corner of many windows. Plus, when the cursor is over a menu item or speed button, a short description is displayed in the status bar for most items.
• Interfaces with AVL Compu-Dobby® I, II, and III.

Features

WeavePoint's marvelous performance comes from a core of elegant features. At its heart is a wonderfully efficient user interface. Every element of the design process has been refined to make the creation of drafts as smooth as possible.

Creation and editing of a pattern can be seen in four different styles: blocks of colors, threads, outlined threads, or graph paper. Menu choices are provided for treadle or dobby loom; rising or sinking shed looms; and the full range of other options, such as number of harnesses and treadles, and color palettes.

And WeavePoint's printer controls make the last stage of generating a weaving document as easy and flexible as the first. It now includes the option to set the actual construction of the software in ends and picks per inch or centimeter for realistically-sized output.

Basic Features

• Set your own layout preferences: Select to have the threading positioned at the top or at the bottom (Scandinavian style).
• Weave top down or bottom up (like you see the cloth on the loom).
• Select threading start position on left or right side.
• Select the position of shaft 1 in the threading - at the top or bottom of the threading grid.
• Up to 128 shafts.
• Up to 128 treadles.
• Up to 9600 ends and 9600 picks.
• 20 zoom levels, in all modes (draft, design, etc.)
• Up to 256 colors in one pattern, from a palette of over 16 million colors.
• Switch easily between tie-up, dobby and multi-treadling loom system.
• Rising or sinking shed.
• Comprehensive, online context-sensitive Help.
• Display drawdown as plain, in grid or as interlaced threads, while you edit the draft.
• Marking Lines in grids.
• Draw freehand or line.
• Current mouse position is continuously updated in the status line.
• Undo last action.
• Keyboard input - edit the draft with keyboard only, without using the mouse, instead using cursor keys etc.
• Repeat, Copy, Cut, Paste, Mirror, etc.
• Paste Special to repeat, rotate, create advancing twills and more.
• See your fabric in the floating Fabric Window, while editing the draft.
• Library - pick common threadings, generate endless twill variations automatically, create satins with the satin wizard.
• Design mode.
• Fabric analysis. Analyzes patterns for the most efficient possible threading, treadling and tie-up (or liftplan). Enter your design and WeavePoint will tell you how to weave it.
• Detailed insight into a design, including current repeat lengths, length of floats, percentage of color or yarn, heddle count.
• Annotate your pattern with a note/description.
• Includes Project Planner, an easy-to-use worksheet that yields accurate costing for your weaving projects.
• Program and manual available in English, Finnish, German and Swedish.

Fabric Display

• Display fabric according to your fabric/yarn density settings, per inch or per centimeter.
• Display fabric with a yarn-like surface simulation.
• Explore the Compress function that displays double and complex weaves as they'll actually be woven. Turn it on and one only sees the pattern in a Summer-and-Winter (Kuvikas), Taquete or Overshot. Turn it off and you'll see the underlying tabby.
• Display fabric in "draped" view for a 3D look - and see both sides of the fabric simultaneously.
• Display fabric as 3D threads interlacement, to see how a double weave (or any weave) goes together.

Instant Drafting

Because WeavePoint displays all four quadrants of the drafting grid, you can watch your weave grow as it's being planned. When editing, all changes are instantly reflected in corresponding areas of the draft. Each time you fill in a square, the program updates all technical information. You can even draw directly on the drawdown and see the tie-up or liftplan being updated simultaneously.

This immediate feedback helps make sure that your draft is going to be all that you intended it to be.

Network Drafting

No weave design discipline has so captivated the weaving public's imagination like Network Drafting. Networking drafting's unique ability to shed the confines of straight lines to yield graceful curves and circles on a sixteen or twenty-four shaft dobby loom is perfectly captured in WeavePoint. The amazing thing about it is that it's all so simple. Enter a profile draft in the threading; save it; enter an initial (a basic threading); combine them (by using the Special Load option for Networking); and, like magic, your Network draft has appeared.

Virtual Beater

WeavePoint's Compression function is used when designing double or complex weaves to let you see how your design will actually look when woven. The software will compress the image to hide the bottom layer or ground, thus you're able to see a much truer representation of your weave.

Files and Printing

• Allows for a wide variety of loading and saving options. Load single elements, blend or append one liftplan onto another.
• Also exports and imports WIF files, the new universal weaving file format which lets you interchange patterns with other weaving programs.
• Save fabric and draft as PNG-Image, to let you open large patterns in other programs for editing or printing.
• Import images from other sources (using .bmp files).
• Print your drafts in publishing quality, in selectable sizes and with many options. Add text notes to draft printouts.
• Print your fabric in true, real world size, and with a yarn-like surface!
• Print your threading and treadling/liftplan in color.

Colors, Colors, Colors

Edit colors in the Edit Colors window. Switch colors, change colors or colorways, and more. Palette with up to 256 colors in one pattern

Advanced Features

• Block substitution. Draw your own blocks.
• Translate profile weave drafts into full weaving drafts (similar to block substitution, but using the "drawdown" as profile). Select from a library of weaves or make your own.
• Network drafting - automatic, amazingly efficient, with full flexibility.
• Overlay weaves over your liftplan, "jacquard" way.
• Insert in threading and treadling/liftplan, for example automatically insert plain weave.
• Insert one or more parallel threadings quickly and easily, with selected interval and color.
• Numeric input of sequences in threading and treadling, using formulas like 3(1-8).
• Twill generator.

Loom Drivers

The following loom interface options for WeavePoint are available from AVL:

• AVL Compu-Dobby I (16 and 24 shafts)
• AVL Compu-Dobby II (16, 24 and 40 shafts)
• AVL Air Compu-Dobby II (4, 8, 12, & 16 shafts)
• AVL Compu-Dobby II Cartridge
• AVL Compu-Dobby II Programming Station
• AVL Compu-Dobby I & II IDL (4-24 shafts)
• AVL Compu-Dobby III & III WDL (8-40 shafts)
• Louet (Megado 16/32 shafts, Magic 24 shafts, Octado 8 shafts)

The WeavePoint IDL version runs the revolutionary AVL IDL loom (Industrial Dobby Loom). Features special weaving screen and optional sound signal at pick color change.

System Requirements

Any computer equipped with:

• Pentium, its equivalent or better
• Sixty-four (64) megabyte RAM (minimum)
• Windows Vista, XP, NT, ME, 2000, '98SE & '95
• All Windows-compatible printers
• For loom control, a serial COM port for connecting to the loom.

WeavePoint Package

With your WeavePoint order, you will receive:

• WeavePoint program and sample weave on CD-ROM
• WeavePoint User's Manual with tutorialon same CD-ROM

Contact us today for more information

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