PARTY SCIENCE - OF
ART, MURALS, AND BANNERS
Ambiance is illusion, and illusion is surface. The art of
parties, if it is to be practical, is an art of bringing an
immersion of fabrics, posters, murals, banners, and other decorations
will little more substance than their surface.
Constructing these decorations can be easier than one thinks... if you
have the foreknowledge of how to master the materials. Where
skills are lacking, tools can fill in, and visa versa. You can
succeed wildly with no skill and the right computer-and-press
equipment, or with nothing more than a bedsheet and spraycans once
you've got the knowhow.
SOME PERSONAL ART
PHILOSOPHY
Art in not about slapping a design on a square canvas, any more than
starship design is about crushing components into a Borg cube.
(For the full effect, read the opening chapter of 'Vendetta' by Peter
David. Design by most species is inspired by
birds/sealife/creatures-of-fluid, but to the Borg, design is
irrelevant.) No, art and design are about expressions of form,
reaching deeper into the subconscious.
IMPORTANCE OF SHAPES
Horizontal shapes are tranquil... like lakes, wide fields, or resting
bodies. There is so little force at work that all succumb to the
force of gravity. This is the 'Yin'; the submissiveness of
energy. This inspires feelings of order and harmony.
Vertical shapes are forceful and full of volition.... whether they're
as stable as a tree or as chaotic as flames. They defy gravity,
thrusting against it.this is the 'Yang' the assertiveness of
energy. This inspires feelings of strength, or alarm, or even
celebration.
What of angles and curves? Taking things off angle suggest one
force working against another, and make for an excellent way to express
action. Think about it, a Feddie posing upright, even if pointing
a phaser, is about as dull as a feddie lying flat. Spider-man
swinging straight/orthogonally up-and-down looks like a cat's toy...
but arching around corners at gravity-defying angles suggests some
great action and force of momentum. Hans Solo rounding the corner
on one foot illustrates one direction counteracting another, while all
the while fighting the third force of gravity. If you want an
action pose, make it look off-balance!
Angles and curves also provide the composition with some
Line-Direction... like a circuit the eye can follow to capture the
entire interaction of the scene. Think of it as a rollercoaster
for the eyes, through each and every still frame. In a collage,
Line-Direction is *very* important in tying together the
overall work. In a cityscape, it can deepen the effect of
perspective and parallax depth.
Geometric shapes have their own Psychology, too. Circles
communicate sociability and/or sexuality. Squares and Rectangles
tend to communicate stable structures. Triangles tend to
communicate intelligence or design. Chinese philosophy has a
unique shape for the five elements of wood, earth, metal, fire, and
water.
For a festive effect... Think "kites" and "sails." Think steeples
and towers. Think monumental.
IMPORTANCE OF COLORS
Colors likewise have a Psychology of their own. Red, like blood,
signifies alarm or passion. Orange, strength. Yellow,
happiness. Green, fertile life. Blue, sadness or
melancholia. Purple, individuality, dark mystery, or
royalty. (Please tell me I didn't just somehow describe the gay
pride flag.) 
Yet these are primary (and secondary) rainbow colors... Realism
includes more tints (lighter), shades (darker), and hues
(grayer/mixed). Pure rainbow colors are fine for most abstract
symbolism (banners), but murals should have a more realistic mix, and
these added hues can contribute to banners as well.
Working with colors can be challenging, too. Contrast is key when
you want something to be readable. NEVER use colors of equal
weight/darkness when choosing text on background... ESPECIALLY red on
baby blue {*gasp!*}. As Red and Black tend to be staples of
Klingon banners, a white outline between the two is helpful, or even
necessary.
Painting on Black fabric often leads to an unexpected dilemma... most
paints merely tint the canvas, and practically *vanish*
upon a black banner. What is the solution? A simple drop of
titanium white paint can add enough opacity and reflectiveness to make
even dark colors pop back out from the darkness.
MASTERING MATERIALS
Experience is the best teacher, but it never hurts to get pointers from
those who have been there. Some materials, like vinyl, can be cut
and glued with relative ease. ("Liquid Nails," or similar
all-purpose glue, is effective.) However, extra care must be taken not
to let the glue drip or smear onto uncovered areas of the banner!
Vinyl also creases easily, so storing it flat or carefully rolled adds
to the challenge of transporting it places without damage from creases.
Fabrics can also be cut and mounted with relative easy, but using
different media. Instead of glue, there is a fabric equivalent to
two-sided tape called 'interfacing.' It is available at
most fabric stores, comes in one sided or two sided, and simply irons
the fabrics together when sandwiched between them. This leaves
only the edge to worry about, and that can either be handled by sewing
(long & tedious), or by 'puff paint' (quick but awkward). The
degree of professionalism you desire must be determined by how well you
master either choice.
LEGENDARY CASE
STUDIES
My first Klingon banner was a 3ft x 5ft red cotton banner with a black
trefoil. No white was added for additional contrast, yet the
effect was satisfactory. The trefoil was drawn and painted with
nothing more than a permanent chisel marker. (Try not to ruin any
carpets with bleedthrough... cardboard or newspaper make acceptable
dropcloths.)
Before that, I'd won national concert contests with nothing more than a
bedsheet and spray cans. "The poor man's air brush,'' I call it.
Cardboard stencils and masking tape can help with imaging edges and
speed the process along. My biggest winner was a sword-bearing
angel, with wings the span of the sheet, and colors radiating behind
the sword. it was quick work, because all those "white" feathers
were done with a light blue paint, spritzed across a single stencil of
a feather, time and time again. (You pick up a rhythm) That
alone (making wings) was practically half the banner.
THE 15 FT. RED
STREAMERS
Rather simple here. These were four long pieces of red
cotton. Kinda thin, so they roll real nicely. And Klingon
lettering... we used the piqaDmey 'B R Ch D' you see on the
Klingon gauntlets all the time.
Here, we decided to give it the bold black with the white outline, akin
to some from Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. That meant
we either needed printers ink like from a T-Shirt shop, or acrylic
paint. Luckily, the acrylic has not cracked or worn in the
slightest against the red thin cotton fabric... but for future
reference, you can get a "fabric mix" to keep it flexible for other
fabrics and paints.
Lettering was easy with the right tools. The 'Old School' way is
to project them with an overhead projector. New School says just
lay them out in a vector illustration program, like CorelDRAW or Adobe
Illustrator (or in Linux use Inkscape, OpenOffice Draw, or Skencil),
and then print them onto tiled pages. Tape them together and
Viola', you've got one big honking stencil!
The Upside of this banner is that the lettering is about four feet tall
and only 1.5-2 ft from the bottom... so it works great whether you're
hanging them in a 7ft room or off a 30 ft. balcony! Any excess of
the blank red top just rolls away!
THE 22 FT. STARSCAPE
The blacklighted 22 foot starscape is the product of Carol's vision and
determination. She made an excellent start by picking the right
fabric.... a bolt of polyblend rayon(?) that wouldn't wrinkle when
rolled or folded, all black. Now it was just a matter of painting
a zillion stars.
Painting stars was long work, and there are some tricks we learned
along the way. First, a good artist can tell you that stars are
pretty random... so reread what I wrote above about Line-Direction, and
do the opposite.
There should be distribution, but with a balance of limited
clustering. Also re-read what I wrote about painting on black
fabric. We tried Crayola's brand of phosphorescent paint, but
found it more practical to use the cheap tube glow-in-the-dark markers
from Spencer's Gifts.
Now the fun story: we decided the boldest result would come from
'double-dotting' each of the zillion stars... first a dot of acrylic
titanium white, and then a dot atop that with the glow stick.
Under normal light, they look the same, so the glow dotting would have
to be done under blacklight....
...One day as Carol was laboring by herself under the blacklight, she
was dotting away with the glow stick when suddenly, one of the stars
she dotted began to drift away! Was this a comet? A UFO
perhaps? She had thought that the fumes were somehow getting to
her, but it turned out that a ladybug had landed on the fabric!
It took on the same purplish look as all the other non-glowing dots, so
after she dotted it, it began to crawl away!
THE KLINGON CAPITAL
CITY
Sometimes you just gotta think Monumental... the worse that can
happen is that it will be incomplete... and even that might not
be so bad. To this day, My Klingon Capital City mural has
been to a dozen conventions, and still hasn't been finished. Once
you've got the Great Hall and the House of DuraS done, people just
don't notice that the other foggy-looking buildings are pen outlines
awaiting their turn to be painted.
This started with a long stretch of gray fabric, similar to the black
fabric for Carol's Starscape, but only about 12-15 ft. The trick
was simply masking off one section at a time, starting with the
sky. I just stuck masking tape over the buildings, and
swirled the sky with red and blue clouds, separating and mixing
as the distribution of color felt right. (As you get lower toward
the horizon, you can get greater effect of depth by tightening the
pattern.) The Great hall has a pool in from of it that reflects the
cloudy pattern, but in a cross-rippling effect. Then the great
hall itself was next. It required the greatest mix of colors for
anything remaining.
The under-street gridwork was given a fiery look by using florescent
yellows with the red. The were a frames and pyramids with a bit
of green, which was also used on the Great Hall. The House of
DuraS is almost entirely black gradients... it only has a few 'lighted'
yellow accents in the windows and lighted wall-lamps.
JOLLY ROGERS
We made three Jolly Roger pirate flags for this year's Feast, all from
the same stencil, with varied parts, and all using black spray cans on
white sheets. (Carol goes through a few massage sheets over time
as they get stained with massage oils.) The Skull was about two
feet tall, but could b used on varying sizes of banner by
altering the design.
The two smaller banners were roughly the same size. One got
crossed swords below the skull's chin, so it stretched closer to top
and bottom. The other had two swords crossed behind it, making it
a little smaller, but it got the full treatment in design: the
red bandanna with hanging beads, gold coins, gold sword handles, much
like the skull on the Pirates of the Caribbean movie poster. The
mainsail, largest of all the banners, had the widest stretch of skull
above the swords... and the sail itself was torn and tattered all
around the design, so it fit quite naturally in its center.
TIPS, TRICKS, AND
SPECIAL EFFECTS
Carol's 22ft. Starscape has taken on new life with every party
we've thrown. Even before it debuted, we discovered that glowing
purple hairspray, which washes out, makes a great nebula effect.
We've also tacked/taped/safety-pinned different appliances for
different parties... a glowing full moon, the planet Mars, a flying
florescent dragon... even little "bubble captions" for the dragon to
say, changing as the party progresses.
At a Marscon room party, we had to cover a 15ft window with this oddly
long starscape. We ended up with an interesting 'Origami' fold of
the material, hanging it straight atop the middle, then safety-pinning
the sides, turned vertical, together down the center. it was a
clever way of transforming a long rectangle into a perfect square, with
non-destructive folds.
At our Pirate themed version for The Feast of the Long Night, it saw
its greatest transformation. We made a new sillohette of a
tattered pirate ship from black fabric. Then we used blue
florescent hair spray to create the ocean... rippling tightly up by the
horizon, and loosening the waves as it reached the bottom. with
the same spray, we made billowing clouds of fog centered at the point
the ship would go. We hung our full moon, and we pinned the black
ship sillohette at the heart of the fog. It was glooooorious!
BE PREPARED
These things don't hang themselves... you practically need a
"Decorating Emergency Kit" to cover which option are and are *not* available to you. Bring a jar
of thumbtacks.... but if the hotel won't let you drive tacks into the
wallpaper, bring safety pins. Lighter posters and hangings
can use "blue tack," that gummy office adhesive. Blue tack or two
sided tape may be handy also if you're adding accessories to a
starscape. You may need to pin it to the curtain if you are
disallowed your favorite wall. Consider a frame of boards or PVC
pipe if you feel it can simply lean against a wall. For more
rustic settings, like camp sites, bring nails and duct
tape. And safety pins, even though I already said it...
it's worth repeating.
- joel