OUAN502 - PPP2: Sewing on A Journey

OUAN502 - Sewing on A Journey:

As I tried developing a new skill for my PPP learning journey, it dawned on me that sewing was maybe not my forte and I should work on developing a new skill in another area that might actually benefit my animation course more. I didn't want to give up though as I was enjoying making things out of scrap material.

To begin with, I had the idea of creating life size clothes that would fit me. Once I had managed to get to grips with the sewing machine that Fiona kindly gave to me, I would then go on to buy a pattern for a dress or a simple item to sew from. I wanted to be able to create clothes for humans first so that I could understand the basics of fashion design and putting basic shapes of fabric together to understand the 3D aspect of flat 2D patterns.

Once I had got to grips with patterns and cloth-making, I would then attempt to make smaller clothes for stop-motion models and dolls. I know this is a completely different skill now as I realise that there is so much more to learn when creating objects on a smaller scale. Materials work differently, fabric hangs across models different to life size people as you have to take into account the stiffness of the fabric and density etc.

So, I attempted my first ever dress last week, starting with a length of 2m fabric and a pattern that I had to cut out and measure to my size and height. At first it went really well, everything was neat and tidy, there was no fraying or obvious mistakes. However, as the dress was beginning to be sewn and put together, there were obvious difficulties. I had no problems on the sewing machine, my stitching was all appropriate and correct for each piece, I had backstitched my final stitches, use a gathering stitch on the skirt and so forth. The individual pieces I had cut out happened to be the wrong length so it looked as if the waist rode up drastically at the front which was unnatural and incorrect. There was no way to correct this so I left the project and put it down to experience.

I will attempt to small clothes for models at some point to get some experience on a smaller scale. I feel that I struggle at solving problems that require visualising things being put together. My cognitive functions aren't that great and I suspect that made my sewing journey rather difficult. I plan to improve and take smaller steps instead of going straight into creating full clothing projects. I will learn from my impatience in this project and take things a little slower in future.