WINDOW PAINTING HOW-TO

by Marie Marfia

This is my own way of making a window painting and you'll doubtless have your own ideas about what works and what doesn't. I'm not telling you it's the only way to do this, it's just the way I like to do it.

First, I measure out the window I'm going to paint and I draw a template in Adobe Illustrator that reflects the size of the pane(s) I'm going to be working with. I print out a few and start drawing. In this example I'm drawing seashells.

Next, I print out the drawing at the size the final image will be and tape it to the back side of the window. This gives me a pretty good traceable image over which to put down liquid leading. I don't try to match my drawing exactly when I apply the leading. Sometimes the lines just can't go the way I've drawn them. Sometimes there's not enough room on the window for all the detail that I put into a pencil sketch. Sometimes I move the paper template around a little or switch an image from one pane to another.

This is a photo showing the dried liquid leading on the window panes. You can see where I moved some of the images around from the original sketch and flipped others so that they're facing in a different direction.

Now I trim the leading with an x-acto knife after it's been allowed to dry for 24 hours. All the little goobers that happened when I drew on the window get cleaned up at this point. If I think it's too far gone to fix I may decide to just take it all off and try it again.

Next, I import the photo file from my camera into Photoshop and convert it into a black and white bitmap file. Then I import the bitmap file into Illustrator and start messing around with color. I don't get really detailed with my color application here because it would take too long and I'm not a patient person. I just want to get a general idea about what's going to go where. I've created a palette in Illustrator that contains all the colors currently available in the Gallery Glass window paint line. It helps me figure out how much paint to buy for each window, too. When I'm happy with what's on the screen, I print it out and label the colors on the page with the Gallery Glass names. Then I go shopping for colors.

Here's where the painting really comes to life. I apply color using my color map that I made in Illustrator as a guide. Again, sometimes I go with a different color than what was originally specified. I like to give myself permission to change things depending on what I see as I lay the color in. I use the applicator bottle to do most of my color mixing as I go. Then I go over the sections with a toothpick, popping bubbles and checking for gaps between the color and the leading.

Here's the finished piece, eyehooks and chain attached at the top, and let set for about a week.

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