i have a solid green wool hunting jacket. i am curious if i can dye some camo pattern design on it.
anybody know?
im curious to see the responses too.
jim
It is going to be limited with what you can do with green as your base color. It is not like spraying some bow limbs to camo things up, where you could go light over dark.
How dark is the green? Green is a great color all on its own if you just have to have one. I would consider getting some walnut hulls that are pretty ripe and maybe do a little shadowing using them. It is a very deep dark brown and would be all natural at that.
Good Shooting,
Craig
How dark is the green? If it's light, then just some dark brown RIT dye will work.
If it's dark green though, your best bet it to try lightening patches of it with bleach, then dying some of that brown.
Or just leave it be :)
You might contact Teresa Asbell.
I would be inclined to just leave it. Wool, even solid colors, absorbs light reflection so well that a pattern realy isn't necesary.
I'd just leave it be.
Terry Green is a wool carpet manufacturer he may have some ideas or tips
I'd have to agree with the rest. Leave it be, but then Craig is right in that walnut hulls are the best and all natural. Let the hulls soak in water and the dye will leach out into the water(crushing the hulls will help speed up the process). Twist the coat up tight so parts dont take dye, basicly tye dying. (remember you could distort the shape and fit) Let it soak awhile and you'll come up with a unique and pattern breaking camo.
I'm not sure the walnut hull dye will show very strongly on a dark-colored, finished wool garment without adding a mordant? It will stain it somewhat, but not to such a degree that you'll see a distinct pattern over the green; just an overall dulled stain. I've done an olive-colored linen/cotton blend overshirt before and it just made it a deeper, browner shade of olive.
How long would I have to soak a pair of woreing blue jeans in the walnut husks to get them to turn brown?
Never tried jeans, so don't really know. Plus, it depends on a lot of variables (strength of dye, temp, original dye color and fading). But here's how we generally do it at reenactments: Smash a bunch of walnuts into a large pot of water. No set amount, but lets say, about 1/3 of the pot volume is walnuts (hull, nut and all just cause it's easier). Boil it up for 1-2 hrs. If it's a small pot, you can drain the water/dye into another container so the leftover debris wont leave uneven spots. Otherwise, periodic stirring will keep things fairly even. Keeping it warm, but not hot, about a half-day soak will give you about the full color of the garment. Soaking all day might give you a couple shades darker, but it probably wont be much more. Soak, then rinse in really cold water to help set the dye, rinse until water is relatively clear. The material your pot is made from will effect the color some, but I've only used cast iron for clothes which gives a nice chestnut brown to white garments. I've used a blue ceramic pot when dyeing traps, and it seems to give it more black/grey qualities?
Its a med dark green jacket. I always feel like Im a big solid blob of darkness.
You cant use bleach on wool.
What about RIT ??
Sorry, hydrogen peroxide to "bleach" it :)
RIT works, but if it's already dark adding something that's darker is only going to make you stand out more. You need the light/med/dark contrast to truly disappear
How about a camo vest?
tie dye that dude. use dark browns and some blacks. it will be pretty natural looking. there was a fella on here that did that to some pants of his i believe. i thought they looked really good. and thought they would really break up your outline. i think he used rit dye. do a search for it