Designing before cutting

[PeterD]

Someone mentioned on another thread that the importance of designing your piece before you ever try to start on it and it got me thinking about an oddity I have discovered in my own process. I liken my creative juices more like squeezing water out of a rock than a flowing stream. But I thought it might be nice to hear how others do it. So here is my process for an unconstrained time limit.

When I decide to make a leather item I find that I might take a month or two just thinking about it before I actually start making a pattern or laying out the project. I first have to decide what I want it to look like and how it is to function. It is like 10 % of the thought process takes place in my conscious mind and the rest in my subconscious. I absolutely can not start on a project until I know how I want it to be. An example might be a knife sheath which on the surface would seem pretty simple and is, if you think of the sheath as just a place to safely store a sharp blade. But if you think of it as; waist decoration, backdrop for a beautiful tool, showcase for a technique you want to do, or as a functional part of a tool system it becomes harder. I will decide on a style but can't get going on it. Then I seem to discard for no other reason than it just doesn't seem right. About the time I decide that nothing is working, suddenly a method appears which not only seems good but then is completed from initial drawing to completed project in a matter of days. In fact when it happens I can't stay away from my work bench but have to keep after it. I recently completed two quivers for a couple. The first a crossbow bolt quiver modeled after a picture from the 14th century. (The problem was that the modern bolt is much shorter than the old bolts and the quiver didn't look right.) The second archery quiver was to be a modern, sort of, side quiver which I wanted to be extra special for his lady. I must have agonized over those for six months. before I actually started working on them and finished them off in a couple of weeks. How do you artists acomplish this creative process.

[stelmackr]

Someone mentioned on another thread that the importance of designing your piece before you ever try to start on it and it got me thinking about an oddity I have discovered in my own process...

Your posting reminded me of an old PSLAC RawHide Gazette (www.pslac.org) article I wrote on designing your own work—long, long ago. Here is an excerpt from the article that can be found at: www,pslac.org/member/12_dec98a.pdf (sorry that it is a PSLAC members only article, but needed to generate some moneys to pay for web site, postal mailings, and the Children in Leather programs we run.) So, here it is:

Designing Your Own Work How to Start...

I am often asked: "How long did it take you to make that leather project"?

The answer is always the same: "Two or three days of work and about 3 months of thinking about doing it".

This goes right to the heart of designing your own leather project. After you have done all the kits that Tandy, The Leather Factory, and others have to offer... ...and after you have done all the projects you like in the LC&SJ. ...and after you have exhausted the "how to" leather books -- you want to create something that you design.

This article might give you some ideas and the freedom to "chance it on your own".

Where do the ideas come from? Most are an extension or contraction of a project already in existence. Where to original patterns come from? Same answer.

So what do you want? A belt, shoes, wallet, key case, chair, bag, book, hanging picture, cup, glass, table, door, light switch, clothes..? Anything you can use or think of can be made of, or accented with leather.

Start with a wrinkled slightly torn and stained piece of paper and a pen (not a pencil). Begin by writing down as many items you can think of. Forget about leather for the time being, just write for 5 minutes straight (no points off for misspelling). Stop. Put the pen down, walk away and come back an hour later turn the paper over and repeat the exercise. Stop, Put the paper away (in a safe place) for a week or two. You now have a list of items that will be the basis for you first original project. (See Project Construction section for details.)

Next start hanging out at the library (don't make it too obvious) and grab two or three hand full of books each day (art books, kids books, science books, religious books, etc.), but stay away from the craft or "how to do" books. Find some pictures you like and Xerox them. Get about a hundred. You now have the basis for you own pattern designs for your project.

OK -- Time to start that 2 or 3 month process to design a project. Don't be afraid if the first few projects fail before you even start them, this is natural and healthy.

OK, OK -- You thought it would be easy and you would have a project before you finished this first page of the article, not so! Now some good news. You now have some tools to start designing your project.

That work in the library has some copyrighted material that needs to be considered. It is generally understood that copyrighted material requires the originators permission to use the material, in any form, so why have a Xerox machine in the Library?

Well -- things that you make for your own use are generally overlooked and only things that are sold depriving the originator of his just rewards, wind up in court for copyright infringement.

However, there are publications, such as Dover Publications, which issue a limited "copyright free" use of their drawing. Refer to any of their books for details.

Returning to the copyrighted material, here are several techniques for the amateur artist (e.g. "can't draw a straight line") to take the original material, alter it enough to make it an original work for a leather pattern. These methods will produce artwork that is enough different from the original to not violate the copyright of the original.

The techniques are:

• The Whiteout-Draw-Xerox-Cut-and-Paste Method

• The Computer Redraw Method

• The Photography Method

• Original Line Drawn Art Work Method

These methods can be used separately or in any combination. They will give you an original art work that can be used as a pattern for your leather project.

The pattern itself takes some time to determine the "solid cut" lines and the "dotted" tooling lines. The best guidelines are actually on the old "Tandy Doodle Sheets" or most of the Stohlman Books. The newest addition to the pattern books, by Robb Barr, offers some clear examples of cut lines verses tool lines. Also, check out the Robb Barr Videos for some more examples. Remember to bring the pattern to life, study the subject. Just cutting every line creates a somewhat "cartoonish" leather project. Use some common sense when deciding what to cut and bevel (high definition) and what to tool and model (texture and shaping). Also look for natural flow of the design that is pleasing to the eye. A pattern that draws the eye along the lines of the pattern. (See the Original Line Drawn Art Work Method by Tony Ezettie for a sample pattern in work for an example of pattern flow.)

A neat trick to use with any of the following pattern making methods is to take your finished pattern and Xerox the final copy on an overhead transparency. Save the paper original as a master and use the transparency as the tracing film. It works quite well. As you trace the pattern the Xerox toner gets scraped off so you can see what you have traced as you go along.

Another way to get a tracing pattern is to print the pattern, assuming you have generated it with some computer method (scanned, drawn, or whatever) and print it on tracing paper. This saves the tracing and retracing for multiple images on one project or multiple projects. My HP DeskJet Color InkJet Printer does a fantastic job in making many original tracing patterns. At the end of this article you will find MANY references -- they are just some suggestions on where pattern ideas come from.

So let's start with design methods...

(The article is quite long and has many pictures that illustrate the techniques so please see the original article)

Bob Stelmack

[GampasShop]

I go to the mountains in Colorado to vacation every year. Do a lot of fishing and ATV'ing while there. I have come up with a good collection of topo maps to use in the area. A year ago, the plastic bag I always keep them in was getting a rip in it, so decided I needed to make a leather map pouch. I thought about it and thought about it, bought the leather in Oct. of last year. I am currently hand sewing it together. Just in time to go on vacation next friday.

Now for me the biggest problem was I have never done anything but Tandy kits with directions. Was afraid to go out on my own. Leather isn't like wood where you can cut down and glue a piece in if you mess up.

I don't know how good this pouch is going to look or work, but it has been a BIG challenge for me to get it figured out. I have now had practice skiving and v-gouging where I decided I needed to double over the leather around the opening. Also the hand sewing, had never done that before. Using the awl to poke the holes and sewing is taking me a while. I have always laced (double loop) everything in the past.

Hopefully late tomorrow I will have a finished product that I can post pictures of.

[TwinOaks]

You mean some people actually plan their work?

What an interesting concept....

[GampasShop]

Twin Oaks, last winter I found a predator hunting website and saw where guys were making calls. I looked and thought, man I can do that. Found where to order the reed kits and placed an order. Went to the shop and found some small pieces of wood in my stash (just like leather there is no throwing it away). Had 4 calls turned and finished over the weekend. A couple days later, take one out and called in a coyote. Was great.

But with wood and especially with a turning on the lathe, you can modify on the fly. There really is no planning other than what you want the final product to look like. With leather you are pretty much stuck, cant cut off and add a piece.

To me that means you must do a lot of planning ahead of time, unless you have one of the leather stretchers (like a board stretcher only for leather).

[TwinOaks]

Actually, I do have a board stretcher! I got it off e-bay last year. Modifying the clamps allows me to use it on leather as well.

I'm currently in a bidding war with somebody in Maine for a hole shrinker. I'm really hoping I can get that little jewel!

Last week I found something that I can write off as 'business expense'. I'm an electrician, so when I saw a few adds for 'bucket of Volts' I jumped on it with quickness. I'm sure I'll save some of them for personal use, 'cause you know how 'excess' material gets used up.

With regards to " [with leather], you can't cut off and add a piece...": Actually you can, in some situations. Obviously, not everything is correctable, but with certain skill sets it can be done. A really good example of this is a vest that Beaverslayer made for competition. (I think it was the IFoLG comp.) He didn't like the design right smack in the middle of the piece, so he cut it out, made a better piece, and laced it back in. End result is a masterpiece. I'll agree that some planning goes into most things. However, the ability to modify the work midstream is quite prevalent in leatherworking.

[PeterD]

With regards to " [with leather], you can't cut off and add a piece...": Actually you can, in some situations. Obviously, not everything is correctable, but with certain skill sets it can be done. A really good example of this is a vest that Beaverslayer made for competition. (I think it was the IFoLG comp.) He didn't like the design right smack in the middle of the piece, so he cut it out, made a better piece, and laced it back in. End result is a masterpiece. I'll agree that some planning goes into most things. However, the ability to modify the work midstream is quite prevalent in leatherworking.

I agree I tell beginers that their is an art and craft to leatherwork. The "craft" is the techniques you learn to make your leather project. The "Art is fixing your mistakes. I often have beginners put a leather cover on bottles. It looks nice, is hard to mess up and teaches them saddlestitching, forming leather dyeing, burnishing and introduces them to pattern making. A friend took his bottle home to finish and brought it back complaining that he had screwed up the whole bottle since he trimmed off the excess and didn't leave anything to put ears on for a thong. I showed him how to sew on an "aftermarket" celtic desined strap with holes for the strap. The whole hting ended up being quite attractive with no hint that it wasn't planned.