About final major project, tutor give us some requests. In this project, we have 12 weeks to finish. For 1-2 week, my plans is choose some interesting topic. The topic in my mind is survival. The reason about why I choose this them because of nowadays lots of people still suffering war. And humans are fragile when they face danger. Therefore this idea comes to my mind. I want to know what kind of cloth can protect humans in danger situation. Actually we always face danger, for instance, humans hard live in extreme place, such as jungle ,desert, and the polar region. Therefore I will do research in some extreme places, including the local costumes. Besides the military uniforms also attract me, because of it’s made by camouflage fabric.
And during 3-5 week, I am do research about survival.The first museums I visited is
Imperial War Museum, and there are lots of military transportation, aircraft, and minor naval vessels in various majority exhibition buildings. The most impressive one is an exhibition of military suits.There are various military occupational specialty and their cloth can help them live longer in jungle or some places. For example,this picture illustrate Paratrooper ,and their cloth use camouflage fabric, the shape and color would help them easy to hide in jungle to avoid by enemy.
They use parachutes jumping out of aircraft to land safely on the land and it’s a good way exist to take part in battle. And it’s really attractive me. I drawing different suit, and I focus on some details about uniforms, including materials and color. And I notice them bring sleeping bag in battles. Therefore I draw some facilities about solider. And I got lots of inspiration from here.
Secondly, during 6-8weeks,I went to the scot polar museum, and i saw lots of tools and different clothes in museum. Local people prefer seal skin as fabric to do clothes or other tools. Seal skin is a wonderful material in polar region, because the seals are easy to hunt. Another main usage of seals skin is water proof. Therefore local people would use at least 2 layer to made cloth or shoes.Inside is fox fur to keep warm, outside layer is seal skin to avoid water. Meantime, the polar region is a place which hard to hunt animals, then aboriginal will bring a kayak and sleeping bag to prepare for hunting.
The rest of important things to help local people living are snow goggles ,kayak mittens, fishing reel, and man’s winter equipment. Man’s winter equipment made by horse leather, and the function of this equipment is place different weapons, such as knives and whetstone.Another tool is fishing reel, And the reel and line for cod or shark fishing has three carried metal hooks.When they hunt this fish,the shark meat is used for dog food, while the liver is full of oil and is sold to traders. Kayak mittens also used by man, which have two thumbs.The hunter’s mittens,which protetact against cold and damp, become wet on the palm as water trickles down the paddle shaft.A wet leather mitten is heavy and cold, so to avoid this problem,each mitten has two thumbs which can be used alternately.When the mitten freezes,the thin layer of ice can easily be knocked off.
Talk about modern polar cloth, it’s uses advances in synthetic fabric to produce clothing.Then I draw some details about modern clothes, and I focus on some interesting details,such as gloves and hoodies. It were interesting details for me.
Then I do some research about deep sea and universe. I draw spacesuit with watercolor, and I learn lots about diving suits and spacesuits. The most of diving suit made shark skin or seal skin. Meantime I do some research about safety jacket,and I think safety jackets are important when people face danger in the sea.
About making process, during 9-12weeks, I spend some time to choose fabrics and colors.
Firstly, I do pattern cutting. And I try 3times,then I start do my final outfit. When i finish my basic design, I use velcro sewing in the back of my design. The function of velcro is helping my sleeping bag to sticks in back side. Beside, I use shoulder pads in cloth to keep straight line.Then I did sleeping bag many times, finally ,I saw by my hand. Firstly, I use tape sticking in my fabric. Then use white line and sew by my hand. Actually, I spend a long time to sew the sleeping bag.
This time I finish the all details of my final outfit, and I sew many parts of my cloth by hand. And it’s really tired work for me. Because I use hard materials(plastic),and this materials really hard to sew by machine. All in all I almost finish my final outfit.,When I took photo shots ,I use orange as background. Actually I took picture in Photo-center. And I spend a long time to change the background color. About my model’s make up, I use white color to dyes her browns. And I use sliver color in her lip and eyes. I want to show the different with warm background, meantime I want express my topic throughout my make up. The white browns and sliver lips mean frozen in cold place, and the orange mean emergency situation. When I start my photo shot, I spend a long time to find suitable shoes. Finally I choose this shoes.About accessories, I choose a pair of special earring. It is made by plastic and white peals, so it suitable my outfit. Actually, I have good cooperation with my models. She became my model 3 times, and we can easy understand each other. In university, I will learn more photoshop skills and make up skills. Besides, I will find some friends who good at photoshop or make up and I want corporate with them. I want to throughout my picture and my design to express my topic, in future, I will make plan about my photography’s topic.I choose one photograph to edit. And I used hand written as title, survival. Actually, this photograph was taken by myself and makeup as well. The reason why I have chosen orange as background was this color means emergency situation. That link to my project theme.
Throughout FMP, I learn a lot of wild survival skills. And I saw various documentaries of adventure in extreme place, and I try use different elements in my final design.When I making my final outfit, I face different problems. The most difficult problem for me is sleeping bag. I need to make sure sleeping bag can shape a rectangle. Firstly, I try to use iron wire to make sure the shape, but it’s hard to keep shape in reality. Finally, I use velcro in my design, The function of velcro is helping my sleeping bag to sticks in back, and it is a good way to hold the shape of sleeping bag. And I need to saw sleeping bag by my hand, and I use tape sticking in my fabric to make sure the line straight. Another problem for me is sleeves. Actually It is difficult to deal with details in sleeves. And I have 4 layers to sew. Therefore, I need sew by my hands. In conclusion, clothes have various function in different situations. Throughout these research, I know different fabrics suit in different places. For example, in jungle, camouflage is a good choice. Beside, water proof and anti-mosquito also are important in jungle. In polar region, the function of waterproof and warm are significant. In my final out fit, I will use water proof material as main fabric. Meantime, this sleeping bag has another function that when people do not good at swimming, the sleeping bag may save people. About my other design, I use the elements of safety jacket in my design. All in all, I wish my design can express some informations about awareness of unexpected development to people. Because of recently, people are in a safety and steady environment( no including battle). We have been forget we are a part of nurture. In our life, the most important thing is money. We forget the all skills in wild or danger place, and we forget how to hunt by ourselves. We do not has adventure spirt. Therefore, I wish I can express some information about how people adopt environment in the past.
doris793 