A snapshot in time. A glimpse of the Plettenberger Kleinbahn in 1/22.5 scale.

[Bill Gill]

Wow, that is impressive! If I had a mind to lose in order to get results like that, I'd do it in a flash.

[Ray Dunakin]

Wow!! Great work!

[Hydrostat]

Disturbingly perfect. You have lost your mind. -- Russ

Russ, how are you doing. It has been a long time since we talked to each other. I didn't loose my mind, but I'm a bit concerned about this prevalently heard statement: Not because of any doubt about my mental health but the lack of discussion it provokes. I thank you (and Bill and Ray) for the appreciation, but I'm missing the critisism found here eons before.

I'm in some trouble with modeling curtains. I want to achieve both the fabric appearance in texture and shape. I used paper muffin baking tins because I wasn't able to undulate paper without producing kinks. I think the shape has some potential, but I'm not to sure about the fabric appearance. To my eyes it looks to much like what it is: paper.








I'd be happy to get any ideas which material to use or hints to some good examples of modeled curtains.

Cheers,
Volker

[Peter_T1958]

Volker

As far as I can make out from your pictures there are two "problems" in your curtains.
First, the folds in the fabric become sharper downwards, but for curtains it's more the other way round - or not - secondly, a (very, very) slight yellowish tint, and your curtains would look very realistic to me!

Cheers, Peter

[Lawton Maner]

Have you ever thought of using older linen handkerchiefs?  I've seen them used in smaller scales to represent canvas tents after being dyed with a strong shot tea.

[Lawton Maner]

After thinking about it, maybe a woman's handkerchief might work better because they are made a lot more dainty.

[Hydrostat]

Peter and Lawton,

good points. After Peter's hint I collected some more information about how curtains were made back then at our local petty wears shop. The shop owner is a doll house maker herself and we had some interesting talk about modeling techniques. Indeed the paper tins don't work because of the way they are folded and I think that's what Peter mentiond. Unwrapped it is a circle segment, but the curtain has to be a rectangle, which means, that it is closer and tight folded at the upper end and free falling downwards. The linen handkerchiefs Lawton mentioned are even for 1-22.5 scale a bit to strong textured, but it gave an good idea for the right direction. I bought 3 strips of white satin to test, which is even more dense. Let's see, what it is going to look like. Helmut pointed me to a rotary cutter, which will be very helpful with those small patches of satin.

Thanks again!

Cheers,
Volker

[Bill Gill]

I'm not sure what kind of curtain you want to model. Right now your curtain has the look and texture sort of like a honeycomb shade that was rotated 90 degrees (see first two photos below).Those shades often run in a channel, which also looks sort of like what you have.

White curtains that I have seen have been nearly opaque, somewhat translucent or nearly transparent. They could be cotton, or linen, or now frequently polyester. Whatever the material, there is a narrow hem along the top where either curtain rings are attached or a curtain rod slides into the folded "tube" of the hem. There is also a wider hem at the bottom. Both hems are often very noticeable. (See next two photos below.)

[Hydrostat]

It's rather the kind of curtain in your last picture. The hems are clearly visible. The lady from the shop told me that back then frequently at the upper end some 4 or 5cm of the fabric (including the seam) was fold over and sewed so one could insert a metal or wooden rod. Of course the curtain needs to be wider than the window to achieve the fall of the folds.

This is the annex with a blow-up of the windows.





At the moment I'm back to paper handkerchiefs (which make hems much easier than fabric), because even satin doesn't fall like scale fabric at all: From a distance it has exactly the right lucency, but it looks to coarse in both texture and shape. I'll show some pictures as soon as there's a showable result. Or if.

Cheers,
Volker

[Lawton Maner]

Silk?

[Hydrostat]

  That's funny! I mixed up the words satin and silk: It is silk what I tried, not satin.

[Peter_T1958]

The main challenge will be the fall of the folds. As I may see, on top they are gathered very close but also irregular. Due to the gathers there are more folds then on the lower part. Hmmm, very difficult  to archive!
Here some examples:

Spontaneously, dressing materials come to my mind ...

[Hydrostat]

Some results with a single layer of paper handkerchief, folded around a brass rod (= resulting double layer), drenched with thinned elmer's glue, pushed together and shaped with a toothpick.





I'm not to sure. 

Cheers,
Volker

[Bill Gill]

The paper handkerchief and the irregular folds look a lot closer to what you want.
a couple thoughts:
Peter wondered about all the tucks in the top hem compared to fewer folds for the body of the curtain. If the top inside of the curtain is visible from some viewing angle, you could cut a long, thin strip of the paper the height of the top hem and fold many many tiny accordion pleats in it, then glue it to the many body of the curtain.
The texture of the paper handkerchief looks like curtains that have been washed, but not ironed, perhaps not a characteristic of some households.
Some people have used paper teabags for fabric. If the overall size of a teabag is big enough, that might provide you with a curtain that will have the gentle folds in it, but not look wrinkled.

[finescalerr]

You are getting very close.

I have no idea how well it might work but I wonder whether cigarette paper might be of use. If not for curtains, maybe something else.

Some clarinetists use cigarette paper to absorb condensation from the instrument's tone holes. (Condensation occurs when you blow into a clarinet on a cold night, just like when you breathe on cold glass.) The paper is very thin but might fold more accurately than Kleenex or paper handkerchiefs. Decades ago my clarinet teacher gave me some and I probably still have it. I can't find it or I would photograph a piece for you.

Russ