Single bed slip stitch vs ruching

The companion blog post: Reviewing single bed ruching, new designs  shares repeats, and samples knit lifting sinker loops or ladders to form knit folds and textures.
In planning programmed machine knit designs, no matter which cam carriage settings are chosen, unless the carriage(s) are set to knit, N is king, the black pixels and punched holes knit in pattern, the white pixels and unpunched areas do not.
Programmed slip stitch designs mimicking folds grow very quickly in length, with textures visible on both sides of the finished project that are more pronounced when there are larger knit stitch counts between the skipped ones.
Samples found in: New single bed swatches based on random sources of inspiration. In building textures, man made fibers should be avoided, steaming or ironing could flatten them permanently.
If the yarn is too thick, it will make for a stiff fabric, and also reduce the 3D effect.
Repeats can be designed with the slipped areas in black, but the final image must be color-reversed, whether as a converted PNG or using the selection option offered in electronic models. When applicable, punch card users can mark the white squares, and then punch all the surrounding cells.
In this series of tests, patterning of all white blocks several cells in width and height is explored. Multiple side by side stitches are skipped as opposed to every other seen in the first two samples.
The purl side will have lots of floats, for some knitters this is a deal breaker.
All uninterrupted large areas of black cells occurring at the side edges will ruffle unless white cells are added in select needle positions.
Usually skipped stitch areas form floats behind stitches held in those locations, which in turn become lengthened in proportion to the number of rows they are held; that feature is barely noticeable on the knit side in these tests.
The first PNG 16X42color reversed, knit on 61 stitches The same repeat can be executed as a hand technique where stitches are picked up and rehung to form hems.
A section of the resulting textures, knit in a thicker wool, was tested only on 31 stitches to inform the choices in developing additional designs.
There is an operator error included that may become a design feature or offer the opportunity to approve of and pursue less frequent ruching.       A 24X64 larger repeat with deeper folds, executable on a punch card machine, in which case black cells are left white, and all white cells are punched offers  possibilities for color changes in sequences of even numbers of rowsknit on 58 stitches,color reversed using the 930 function,  no horizontal mirroring required The beginning of exploring using slip stitch blocks to form possible shapes, a 38X20 repeat, knit with a random yarn selection, on 58 stitches.
A 2- knit stitch vertical column is added to each side edge;   identifiable shapes begin to appear.  Expanding the design with the intention of deeper folds and adding color(s) striping, with 8-row unit multiples.
The adjusted repeat, 56X32. The programmed test swatch repeat, 60X32 with equal side borders.  Color changes alternating between 26 rows with slipped stitches, follwd by 8 with all-knit contrast.Changing colors with an easy-to-track every 8 rows.  One of the earliest posts on the topic, written in 2013, A random slip stitch, included these.There are infinite approaches to creating secondary shapes of varying size and thickness.
This 24X20 repeat with the floats easily identified on the purl side of the swatch,  builds solid color slip stitch blocks on striped shapes in a brick configuration with color changes every 2 rows.Single bed tuck/ mostly slip stitch fabrics 3, offered a range of possibilities, opening up the option of adapting a previously explored or published repeat to larger scale.
I taught in a design studio, and dozens of swatches pertaining to the specific lessons and assignments were added to or changed weekly covering a large wall display area.
One of the repeats, 24X36, led to these variationsand was now altered in width to 36X36,  knit tested on 69X36 after adding knit side borders, mirrored horizontally for use on the 930, with color changes every 6 rows, yielding a highly textured knit.The top and bottom of the swatch reflect the difference in width between areas that are knit in stocking stitch and those with slipped stitches.
Besides narrowing the pieces in width, these designs also compress height.
I have a sometimes love/ hate relationship with the Brother single bed color changer, but it is hugely helpful when frequent color striping is planned in even number row counts.
Color striping before committing to final color ways in pattern helps to establish whether contrast in chosen shades works well, and whether the changer and its sinker plate works smoothly.

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