Slate Satchel

Our Carry Range was developed in collaboration with professional artist and designer Darren Yeow. Darren set out to create an artist bag that would enable him to create whenever and wherever he was inspired. Darren tinkered with home-made designs and built his product design and softgoods knowledge for years before producing his first “Art Satchel” on the back of a well-supported crowdfunding campaign.

Darren’s initial bag design was unique in that the artist could quickly assemble a stable working platform on location, whether it was slung across the body, or attached to a tripod. After the success of this initial product, Darren wanted to turn his attention to designing more carry products for artists. This led to him joining forces with Yan and Simon to found Etchr. Etchr now ranges four carry products, each meticulously designed by Darren from his home studio in Melbourne, Australia. 

We offer a two-year limited warranty, beginning at the time of purchase on all Etchr products sold. We warrant our products to be free from manufacturing defects in materials, workmanship, and failure or breakage of parts/full products that render them non-functional.

We offer a 30-day money back guarantee from the original date of purchase. The customer is responsible for return shipping costs. All Etchr products are covered by a 24 month manufacturing warranty.

External Dimensions:

• Length: 38 cm or 14.9 in
• Width: 31 cm or 12.2 in
• Depth: 7 cm or 2.7 in

Internal Dimensions:

• Length: 35 cm or ~13.8 in
• Width: 28 cm or ~11 in
• Depth: 5 cm or ~2 in

Weight: 1.7 kgs or 3.7 lbs

Is the bag waterproof or water-resistant?

Our bags are water-resistant and have some waterproof components. Water-resistant is not the same as waterproof. Water-proofing is achieved by ultrasonically welding plastic panels together to create a watertight membrane - an extremely expensive undertaking that would likely triple or quadruple the price of our products if used. Water-resistance means that the item has a higher likelihood of keeping your possessions dry. The Polyester shell covering the outer surface of our products is waterproof and the Toughtek covering high-wear areas is waterproof. The zips and stitching are water-resistant. All these features work to greatly minimise moisture entering the internal compartments and damaging your belongings and art. However, our bags cannot be classified as waterproof strictly speaking. Nevertheless, one of our customers took his Slate Mini out during a Tropical storm (same materials) and the results were amazing.

What components come with the Slate?

Our Slate comes with 2 x Tool Strip, 4 x Corner Tab, 1 x Elastic Tab, 1 x Shoulder Strap, and 1 x Tripod Mount Board.

Some people prefer to keep a few spare components and that is why we have made them available online.

Does the bag come in different sizes and colours?

At this stage the Slate Range comes in black only and two sizes: the Slate and the Slate Mini. We'd love to offer it in the future but probably not in the short term, given that the minimum quantity required by our manufacturer is quite substantial. If the volume of orders can grow significantly, then we will be happy to add the color variation to our range!

What size laptops/ tablets will the Slate hold?

The Slate is designed to carry the 12.9'' iPad Pro. The maximum outer tablet/ laptop dimensions that the Slate can hold (in the main compartment) are 13.8 x 11 in (35 x 28cm).

What size paper will the Slate support?

The Slate is designed to comfortably fit A4 size traditional mediums.

How do different modes of the bag work?

Our bags are flexible and modular in design to help accommodate various needs and scenarios. We have prepared a detailed explanation video for the Slate range to walk you through the functionalities available in different modes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=291d0_1jnug&feature=youtu.be

We love animals. We don't want our products to be made of them. The external material of the Slate range uses a dark grey polyester with black Toughtek front flap accents, and Toughtek for hardwearing areas. The internal materials are felt and ripstop material. The zips are YKK matte black water-resistant.

We use Manfrotto products, in fact we have three of them in our office - two photography tripods and one for video / filming.

Prices tend to range between US$200 - US$1,000 and they're a market leader in the photography equipment field for a reason.
We strongly suggest physically visiting a camera specialist store to try them out in person.

You can often buy the head (the component which your Etchr product will attach to) and the tripod (the telescopic legs) separately.

The heavier build aluminium tripod legs are more rigid and sturdy than the lighter build aluminium legs. It’s a trade off between portability and stability. If your Etchr product is loaded up with gear, lightweight aluminium legs are more prone to instability whereas the extra ballast from the heavier builds offers greater stability. Ultimately, it's a personal decision as to what is more important.

The second part you'll want to look at is the head – this attaches to the Etchr tripod attachment plate. There are a few different types of heads but the most common are ball-heads and three way / axis heads. Our advice is to generally ignore the ball heads, unless you're only going to be carrying very little gear. They're ok for cameras but for our products the ball head mechanism can sometimes slip when you're working with them. The 3 way / axis heads allow you to lock all 3 axis, so it's much more capable overall.

Finally, make sure to look for an easy to use spring loaded quick release plate on the head. A fiddly mechanism to deal with can be annoying in the field.

If you can stretch your budget, the Manfrotto 290 XTRA Tripod + MH804 - 3 Way Head (MK290XTA3-3W) is a great choice.

If that is a little expensive, the Manfrotto Compact Advanced Tripod + 3-Way Head is also a solid choice at only half the price.