Wash's Patch(es?)

POSTED BY: Skymutt
UPDATED: Tuesday, October 18, 2005 12:49
VIEWED: 8899
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SKYMUTT

Monday, October 10, 2005 9:55 PM

I recall a post from a while back, with preview and BTS shots of the BDM, where the patch on Wash's arm was enhanced. I've found several great shots since then, so that's no problem. The thing is, that someone made mention that it looks an aweful lot like a real arm patch from the military or something. Can anyone help me find out what the real patch is?

ROBOZ

Monday, October 10, 2005 11:53 PM

G'day

If you can point me to where the post is with the patches (try saying that three times, fast!) I might be able to help. I've been making Klingon style trophy cloaks which I've covered with genre and other patches for some years now... imagine the usual fannish cloth badge vest, only ankle length and with hundreds of hand painted or photoshop manipulated patches. Insane, I know, but my Ma didn't raise any normal folk! The cloak also wears well with my Predator movie costume, with pretty much the same connotations. Anyway,
I've amassed megatonnes of information about genre logos and insignia and may recognise it if it's contemporary military as well.

Cheerio

Rob Oz

SKYMUTT

Tuesday, October 11, 2005 12:49 AM

Thanks for the offer Rob, but after I stopped being lazy, I found it myself, heh.

Unfortunately, the 'real' patch is oldschool soviet, and might have just been the inspiration for Wash's patch in the BDM, because they don't look much alike. I was hoping that the movie version was a modified original (and I could then modify one), but it must be a custom design.

the clearest pic of the patch is on this page

http://www.livejournal.com/community/firefly_daily/20041.html

it's easiest to F3/search for Wash to get to the pic, as there are a ton of screencaps there.

LUCKYSPENCER7

Tuesday, October 11, 2005 1:41 AM

the patch seems to say "Londono." could that have something to do with the Core planet Londinum? could it be that's where Wash went to flight school?

SKYMUTT

Tuesday, October 11, 2005 5:44 AM

Your guess is as good as mine, though it looks more like LYN than LON. I think it's LYNDONO, but that last letter that might be an O is hard to make out, could be a Q or a zero for all I know. What it means or refers to, the 'verse may never know.

SKYMUTT

Tuesday, October 11, 2005 5:46 AM

Rob, if you see this again, how do you go about actually making your custom patches? Hand painting and Photo-manip are self-explanatory, but what do you paint/print them on to actually make a fabric patch?

ROBOZ

Friday, October 14, 2005 2:43 AM

G'day Skymutt,

Well, that's an easy answer but with a world of
story behind it!

You print out a reverse image of the badge on T-Shirt Iron On Transfer material, whatever brand your printer will take. Iron that onto a base farbic, cotton drill is good, which puts it the right way around again, then either put an adhesive backing on it or just sew it straight on to the garment.

The hand painting comes in either to strengthen the colours or as a different process altogether. Sometimes I put a piece of white cotton drill over the design on a white box light table and sit there and just paint the whole thing by hand. Takes ages, but kind of satisfying in a Zen like way.

I've done rather a lot of this for my Klingon/Predator/Ultimate Fan-Boy cloak project, and y'all are welcome to check it out at this URL

http://www.flickr.com/photos/83287853@N00/sets/

You'll probably need to cut and paste that into a search engine rather than just click on it or your mail programme may try and email to it.

Hope this is of some help!

Cheerio

Rob Jan

WASHBURN

Friday, October 14, 2005 7:15 AM

the patch is a changed patch from NASA.

MASAO

Friday, October 14, 2005 7:33 AM

That's easy! It's a modified Intercosmos patch from the old Soviet space program. Intercosmos was a program to let Soviet allies and satellite states go into space. I think the other patch (downward triangle) was US-Soviet mission patch to Jupiter from the movie 2010: The Year We Make Contact.

SKYMUTT

Saturday, October 15, 2005 4:22 AM

Thanks Masao, I'd seen /some/ styles of interkosmos patches, but never a round one. After you helped confirm what I thought I knew, I searched some more and found several very similar designs that I can use to make my own with Rob's method, or I just might get lucky and be able to buy a real patch to modify! I'll be searching for that 2010 patch too, but do you happen to have any decent links to replicas or screencaps that might help me out?

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