Pencil Drawing Of Cape Art
Last week I wrote about the new coat I was getting and I’m going to continue writing about that because that coat arrived in the mail on Friday (it’s Sunday as I write this). Seeing that new coat was a blast from the past. My old coat is thirty years old and is a completely different color black than the new one. Both coats are made of canvas and the old one looks a lot grayer than the new one. The years of wearing it have worn the color off the fabric so that there are flecks of a lighter color among the black. The new coat is a solid black.None of the color has been work off the fabric.
The new coat even feels heavier than the old one. A lot of the lining of the old one has worn away over the years and there are small pieces of the fabric missing from the cuffs and pockets too. The new one is also a lot stiffer so that may be why I’m perceiving it as heavier. Either way it’s weirdly nostalgic to see a brand new version of a coat that I first wore over thirty years ago.
The same company makes the coat. Outback Trading Company. The lining is a black fabric rather than the hatched flannel shirt looking lining of the old one plus it’s missing the old leather colar but otherwise they look identical. The new one even came with a separate fleece lining that I never bought with the old one. It was an extra $40 or so back in the early 1990s. On eBay it came with the purchase of the coat.
Ebay Photo Front of Coat
The first thing I did when I got the coat was to take off the cape (it snaps on and off) so that I could scan it in. It’s a big piece of fabric so I had to scan it in about eight pieces on my 11×17 inch scanner. I then put all those pieces together in photoshop so that I could have a same size digital file of the cape to work with.
Last week I made a drawing of what I wanted to put on the cape. I scanned in the drawing and put it together with the scan of the cape. I wanted to get the exact placement of the drawing digitally so that it would be easily to play in the physical world.
That’s when I ran into a problem. I made the drawing based on a scan of the old coat’s cape. I’ve had that sitting in my files for years. It turns out that the new cape is a slightly different shape than the old one. I placed the drawing the best I could but it didn’t have enough art on the left and right. I’d have to put some there.
When making the drawing for the cape a leveraged a few drawing that I already had done. I went through a whole bunch of scans of my drawings from over the years, picked out some that I liked, mashed them together digitally, and then made a new drawing out of them. This is what I would have to do on the left and right of the drawing now.
Ebay Photo Back of Coat
I ended up not redrawing anything though. I have plenty of scans of finished drawings so I decided to add them in digitally. The right side went rather quickly. I found a couple of drawings that fit well and so fit them in. The left side took some time. A couple of hours. I looked through lots of drawings but every time I worked one into the drawing I didn’t like it. I tried a lot of stuff before I finally got it. It was weird that the right and the left went so differently.
The next step was to print out the drawing and see if I can use graphite paper to transfer the drawing to the cape. I had to prime the back of the cape with white fabric paint first though.
I’ve got some ideas for the rest of the coat too. I’m going with eyes again on the front of the cape on the shoulders but the new idea I had was for the bottom of the cape. The coat goes almost to the ground and on the bottom six inches or so of the cape I’m going to do some drip painting. That’s the abstract painting that Jackson Pollock did where you drip paint off a brush or a stick and paint with it. I think I can make a cool design that way and maybe on the cuffs of the sleeves too.
I bought some fabric paint for painting on this jacket but I may have to buy more for the drip painting part. I haven’t done any drip painting in a long time but if memory serves it takes a bit of paint to make a drip painting. There is even fabric paint that puffs up a little bit (that’s why it’s called “Puff Paint”) and I was thinking about using some of that but maybe a flat look would be better. I’m flying by the seat of my pants here.
I also saw some fabric paint markers. I’m tempted to buy some of those just to try them out but I don’t think they can be any better than using a brush with the fabric paint. The markers look like they’re really aimed at crafters and even children but I still want to try them out. I might end up spending more money on fabric paint than I did on the coat.
It’s September 10 as I write this and we’re still officially in summer. It’s a rainy 74ºF outside today and we had 90ºF weather just last week. I’m not going to be wearing this coat anytime soon so I’ve got plenty of time to get it done. Yet, still I want to get it done soon just so I can see how it comes out. Part of me wants to be moving into the future to see how this coat will look in all its glory and part of me is feeling nostalgic for the past when my old coat was new. Time is funny thing.