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Adding Capes to Figures
By Jeff Beriswill
Introduction
Putting a cape on a figure can add color and make the figure look more interesting.
 
Adding a cape to a cavalryman will make him seem more natural on his horse.
 
I often struggled with making realistic capes in 1/72nd scale until I happened upon a very simple technique using facial tissue and thinned white glue. The following is a step-by-step demonstration of making and painting a cape on a mounted knight.
Preparing the Knight and Horse
I started with Valdemar’s Teutonic Knight Resting (VP017) and a horse from Italeri’s XI Century Crusade Knights (No. 6009).
First, I mounted the horse on a wooden base with super glue.
The base gave me something to grip without touching the horse and knight during painting. Next, I drilled a hole in the bottom of both the knight and the horse’s saddle, inserted a metal pin in the holes, and used super glue to secure the knight to the horse.
Making the Cape
I cut the shape of the cape out of a single layer of facial tissue.
 
The shape of the cape did not have to be perfect since it would be shaped and folded to fit the knight later. Next, I placed a few drops of dilute white glue from Woodland ScenicsTM on the cape to fully wet it.
 
I shaped the cape on the knight and horse using a small paint brush. The wet cape could be worked similar to a decal. I added more white glue with the paint brush as needed to get the cape to conform to the knight.
 
The finished cape is shown below.
After the cape dried overnight, it was fairly stiff with a cloth-like texture.
Painting
I painted the knight and the cape with a base coat of medium gray enamel paint, and the horse with a base coat of light tan enamel paint.
 
I used two different base colors so that the white cape and surcoat of the knight would contrast with the white covering of the horse. I painted the tops of the folds and highlights of the knight and horse with two progressively lighter shades of color. Finally, I placed the completed mounted knight in a winter scene.
  
As you can see, making realistic capes is a fairly simple task. I have also used the same method to add sleeves, scarves, banners, and hoods to figures in 1/72nd scale.
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