The first step is nailing your pattern. The pattern for this seat, came from one of my “BAD ASS PANS”. Once your pattern is cut, you have to scribe your design on to the leather. This is done by casing the leather (wetting with water). Let it stand till the leather starts to dry a tad, usually around five minutes. Then lightly trace your design using transfer film. Be very careful because any mistakes, will be visible and will not come out.
Carving (above):
Carving is when you trace your pattern using a swivel knife. This is the part that can make or break a new seat. I usually carve only where I want the most depth. With this design. I only carved the girl. I used other special tools to define the more delicate elements of this design.
Tooling (above):
Now that the carving is complete, I started tooling. Tooling involved beveling (CUT) or matting (depress) the leather to enhance your design, to make it more three dimensional. I generally work my way around the main subject first. Then I add the details when I have finished all the major tooling. I used a pebbler tool on this seat.
Details (above):
With major tooling finished, It was time to add the details. This is where a lot of the 3-D imagery can occur. I use special spoons and modeler tools to capture these affects.
Tooling Details Complete:
When the tooling was finished it was time to decide what type of finish to apply.There are three main colored finishes: Natural leather, dyed solid, or painted.
Here are the pro's and con's
Natural leather:
Natural leather gives a nice mellow glow and shows the tooling well. It also allows the leather to breath well and accepts conditioner well. But it can change color (get darker), when oiled or water proofed. It also has a tendency to become darker when left in the sun. It basically gets a sun tan.
Dyes:Dyes give you the opportunity to color your seat to your liking and can cover up any discoloration in the leather. It also allows the leather to breath well and accepts conditioner. The draw backs are that all dyes fade from sunlight. Some will even change colors with sunlight, generally black to dark brown. Some black dyes will bleed back (where the dye rubs off ). This can be stopped with a good sealer.
Paint:
Paint in most cases are acrylics. Acrylics give you more color options, and will not fade in the sunlight. Also, there are many new acrylics, that contain pearls and custom color affects. The drawbacks are that acrylics can wear off after time. They also don’t let the leather breath well. Acrylic seats should be conditioned prior to installation.
Here at PURE KUSTOM we are decided to paint this bitch up. I am going to be using both dyes and acrylics.
Check back next week to see the coloring process.
–Rocky
http://www.purekustom.com
Tel:480-924-6866
mailto:rocky1@purekustom.com
Mesa , Az
Hey,
Here we go with the coloring process. We covered Rocky’s tool process last week and we’ll hit the next process after the news next weekend. Let’s not fuck around, we’ve got work to do.–Bandit
Coloring (above):
The coloring process begins. On this seat, I put down several coats of black dye. I like to put black dye down first when I use acrylics on top. The drawback is that it will take more coats to cover.
Painting (above)
Now that my dye is down, it was time to start painting. On this seat I decided to go with pearl top-coat colors. This seat has multiple coats of solid red, to achieve a good base coat. When using pearl you have to have a good base (solid coverage, because pearls are transparent).
Shadowing (above):
Once the base dried, it was time to give the subject some depth. This was achieved by adding shadows and highlights. First I added the shadows.
Pearl Base (above):
Okay, now that the shadows were down, it was time to lay on a pearl base top coat. I covered the whole she-devil with a red pearl. I really like using pearls. It is like getting 2 seats in one. You will see when we shoot photographs in the sun.
Highlights (above):
With the base, the shadows and a good pearl base top coat, it was time to put the highlights on. The highlights work with the shadows to give it depth.
The She-Devil Finished For This Week (above):
At this point I’ve been over THE SHE-DEVIL with 16 coats of acrylics. I used a few different products to achieve this without getting a really thick layer of acrylic. It’s still not totally finished.
The Bones (above):Time to paint the bones. I decided that I will use a solid color for the bones. I wanted the She-devil to stand out more than the bones. Not being pearl might give the whole seat a strong contrast. I used three colors of gray to grab the look I wanted.
–Rocky
http://www.purekustom.com
Tel:480-924-6866
mailto:rocky1@purekustom.com
Mesa , Az
