Author: Deb Cashatt

It’s my turn to write about our latest prompt–compromise.  There were so many ideas that crossed my mind about this prompt. Living in California, where water is a precious, often scarce resource, I was going to create something on water. But the idea never gelled. The interpretation I settled on focuses on the Internet and the compromise between protecting your privacy and enjoying free access to oodles of information.

I’m happy to say, I really like the image I created for this prompt, however I’m reminded of another compromise I have to deal with.  For 12 years Kris Sazaki and I, as Pixeladies, printed our own fabric. We would spend hours, if not days, testing color. Minute color changes would make or break our image, or so we thought.

Printing with fiber-reactive dye is a challenge to begin with. You print the image on fabric, then you steam the fabric to set the dye, and finally you rinse out the excess dye that didn’t fix to the fabric. In each of the processes, there was the opportunity for the color to change. But since we printed our own fabric, our turnaround time was pretty quick—let’s call it one day.

Now days, like many of you, we rely on print-on-demand services for our fabric printing.  There are many companies that specialize in printing on fabric, each with their pros and cons.  (You can read a dated article we published here.  An updated one is being edited as I type.)  With turnaround times measured in weeks, I’ve become less picky about color. It’s a compromise I’m willing to make so that we don’t have to do the actual printing. (You can read our reasons for not doing our own printing here.) We decided that the cost of reprinting a piece of fabric is still cheaper than printing it ourselves. However, when you have a deadline, it’s not necessarily cost that becomes the issue, it’s time.

All of these words boil down to the reason that my quilt on compromise will be late.  For the first time I have decided that the color of the print was too different from my expectations.  Since I don’t know if this was an abnormality or that perhaps the company has changed their dye or print settings, I didn’t want to just resubmit a color corrected version.  So I’m having the company print out a small test to see if the results come out the same.  After that test piece comes back, I will know whether I need to make color adjustments or just have the same file reprinted.  After all, sometimes you are willing to compromise, and sometimes you aren’t.