# Air brush, dye or pattern fabric?



## Raineyangel81 (Jan 26, 2010)

Hi,

I just went to my first con (ever) and am now very interested in trying to make a suit.  I am fairly sure I'm only going to do a partial, but I have studied several fursuiters and I am more interested in a realistic look.  I know there are realistic synthetic fur fabrics out there, but in your experience (any knowledge is appreciated) if you';re going for realistic; would airbrushing, dying the fabric or using fur patterns be more realistic?
Mind you, I'm going to try making a Snow Leopard suit. The person that did my tail dyed the fabric and then india inked the rosettes on over it.  My thinking is that with most animals, you're looking at two toned (or more) fur.  It'll almost always have a different color on the base line compared to the top half of the fur.  I was thinking of buying the base fur color and then air brushing color on top in order to get the two toned effect.

Any thoughts?

Has anyone achieved this, and if so, do you have an pictures of it?
Thank you for any help you can give me ^.^


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## RoseHexwit (Jan 26, 2010)

I haven't done any airbrushing myself, but I can tell you that sewing the patterns in makes the suit much more durable. If it's airbrushed, the paint might come out in the wash.


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## Jaga (Jan 26, 2010)

airbrushing is hard...but has best effect by far


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## Raineyangel81 (Jan 26, 2010)

I would imagine that airbrushing would take some time to master


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## Sabian (Jan 26, 2010)

I've tested airbrushing on white fur and it is a relatively time consuming process. However if you paint then brush the fur and paint and brush the fur and so on, you can get some amazing effects. 

Beetlecat shows the technique here
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8x0uQeplOiQ


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## Jaga (Jan 26, 2010)

Sabian said:


> I've tested airbrushing on white fur and it is a relatively time consuming process. However if you paint then brush the fur and paint and brush the fur and so on, you can get some amazing effects.
> 
> Beetlecat shows the technique here
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8x0uQeplOiQ



Yeah, you have a good point! Acrylic paint and water is good too for some fun effects


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