"Painting flags after mounting to pole" Topic

Flags – how do you paint the part that wraps around the pole?
What is your preference?

1) Do you leave it white?
2) Color it the same color as the pole?
3) Carry the colors of the flag around the pole, so there is no dividing line between obverse and reverse?

Thanks

I paint both sides of the flag, then paint the pole brown, then paint (usually white) tie straps top middle and bottom.

Depends on how the historical flag was colored--and on scale. Usually, "no dividing line between obverse and reverse" is historically accurate--but not everywhere.

I usually have a look at some paintings to see what colour it should be. For Napoleonics the colour of the bit which attaches to the pole is well documented.

Most European infantry flags had a tube that fits over the flagpole and is then nailed to it. Most are a single colour but some (particularly earlier flags) have the design carried onto the tube.

Fixing full sized colours with tapes seems a very unstable way of fixing a large & heavy flag. Considering how important a colour was to the morale of a unit it isn't a very secure method and, as far as I know, was rarely used.

I have seen photos of such fixing on ACW flags and on small company fanions though. I have had doubts about the ACW ones being actual colours used in battle but it does seem that at least some were.

A lot of medieval pictures show the bare pole and the illustrator has made the effort to show the fastening tapes. Sometimes, even the crescent shaped billows between tapes are shown.
Some other pictures show the fabric covering the pole. The colour stays the same but sometimes the artists shows a shadow where the pole bulges.

A very few examples have a different coloured sleeve. It might be significant that the arms on the banner are quartered.

A rough survey of manuscript miniatures suggests a gradual switch from tapes to sleeve happening c.1300 plus or minus a generation or so.

>>Depends on how the historical flag was colored--and on scale.

What he said.
Yes always painted on pole after forming (shaping)
~d