beg to differ with other posters, Painting
scrim is no different than paint a standard
drop. If painted on top of
Bogus paper the
scrim material will absorbe the paint and the "holes" will remain open. for reference look up the classic, original design for "the Glass Menagerie", which used a full
stage scrim, painted like the front of the
house. It had the classic opaque look of a painted
drop when lit from the front yet magically "disappeared" when lit from behind wow-ing the audience of the 1950's. To the topic, there is no paint, dye or stain that I have ever heard of that would allow you to paint a
scrim and then remove the paint. Any painting done on a
scrim is permanent as the cotton fibers will soak up the paint and permanently stain them. It's the nature of cotton and pigments. They mix real well. The best I could suggest would be to attempt to
purchase a
scrim from one of the larger suppliers, they sometimes have pieces that they have produced that wound up being the wrong size
etc. They will often sell these at a serious discount. Beyond that I think Sharyns idea of projection is great. Projecting on a
scrim works real well. it gives the
image a much more realistic appearence than just projecting on a standard
screen. One other trick you might look into,
tricot. If cost is your main issueyou might look into using
Tricot. It's that fabric used to
line swimsuits and lingerie. Not everyone knows this but it also works well as a
scrim. 2-3 years ago I needed to
scrim the sides of my
stage but needed them to appear as is they were a graffitied mess. since we are in a very intimate
venue I didn't feel
sharkstooth, hex or
bobbinette would work well enough. so we built some extremely large frames, stretched the
tricot across it and painted it. Worked like a dream. In fact the first night we had the frames installed, sans paint, the sound designer walked right into one of the panels, bent the heck out of the frame.
Tricot comes in many colors the most common being white, ecru, and black. and its incredibly cheap. Speaking of colors, "One day Ceasar walks into the senate. Brutus stops him and says, "Hey nice new white Toga Ceasar !" to which Ceasar responded. " Ecru, Brute'"
Good luck, don't try doing anything to that
scrim is you want a whit
scrim in inventory !
Let us know what you do !