I've been searching for some good pics of Tommy "The Greek" style pinstriping, and haven't been able to find any. Would ya mind posting some pics? Thanks!
Craig: Sure was a surprise seeing you in Detroit, you too Art, wish we would have a little more time. Here are some pics. Herb Martinez did the poster. He also striped the car while I was in Cali for Ego-Rama. See you in L'ville??
so you gonna old school your 40 or for the wifes project. I know its not for the poor ol wagon sitting in the corner...
Thanks for the pics Bob! I was going to call you, but I figured I would bump into you back there at Cobo Hall. Went downstairs to take you up on the offer for the suds, but everybody had gone. Maybe next time. I will definitely see you at L'ville and also at Columbus if you are going to that one. I've got a great Buddy Jesus photoshop that I need to send you as well. Ken- This is for the Stude project......the paint is going to be a suede aquamarine with blue/white tuck-n-roll. I thought a red/white Tommy "The Greek" stripe just above the belt line would look cool, and would look good with a red steelie / spider cap & WWW. Clarey isn't too hot for the pinstriping, so I was looking for some ammo to start convincing her otherwise. The wagon is on the back burner, but not forgotten about.
I am thinking about putting some of the Team III wheels on the 40 to change things up a bit. Also thinking about changing up the interior a bit. Not sure if that will happen, hell I haven't even changed out the blown up tranny!
Sounds like her Stude is going to be cool looking.. As for the tranny, you have a few months to get it ready....... Been talking to Brock about getting a single tube roll bar for my sedan from you guys. need to get a little further along on the project first thought...
Cool! I am sure that we could do that no problem. Brock has been giving me a ration of crap about not working on the car ('40). I might just actually get off my ass and to it in the next couple of weeks. I'm pretty stoked about the Stude. It is going to be a fun car. Hopefully mu picture of how its going to turn out and her picture will be similar.
Here's something I've wondered about for a long time. Most of the pin stripers in my area (who copied Tommy) did the teardrops in a tapered/flaired out layout. See the pic below. Were the real Tommy "The Greek" teardrops always layed out in the parallel fashion as in Bob K's painting ?
I don't know. I'm sure somebody here could answer that though. I think that the parallel design looks pretty cool though.
From what I have seen of Tommy the Greek striping,I would conclude that he usually used the three stripes on the side of a vehicle at an angle rather than vertical and of different sizes on a hood or trunk.Also his side stripes were mostly a triple stripe usually consisting of a red center stripe bordered by a white(or ivory)stripe on either side of the red.There was no gap between the stripes.There is a striper on the left coast named Rory who does a fabulous job of doing that particular style of stripe.
The art of Tommy the Greek art is the pure simplicity. An accomplished striper could duplicate technically. He was great because he knew the true secret of art, that is "A good artist knows when to quit."
Simplicity in style but as most things that look simple it is deceptive.What has always amazed me about his work is the precision with which the teardrops were executed.Looks easy to do until you try it.If you look at the teardrops they are uniform in shape and length and spacing.Most of the copies(including my own) I have seen are lacking one or more of those attributes.Even measuring them out does not guarantee the precision he did off-hand.That and his line quality;I don't think anyone ever equaled that(maybe Art Summers).He had so much more than technical proficiency.
I had peanut motorcycle tank striped my the Greek in the middle 60s. It was painted dark Cadillac metallic green then flamed with long orange flames with a center opening perfect for teardrops. I brought it to him for a white stripe around the flames and 5 teardrops in the center. After ragging on me about " that's not how you lay out flames" he went to work. First putting a perfect white line around the flames them taking out some orange striping paint and holding the brush backwards and dabbing 5 spots in the center of the tank. Then striping around them. Actually all the space between the orange dabs and the white stripes was not filled in. Not sure if he was in a hurry or if he knew it wasn't a show piece. Wish I had that tank now.
Herb Martinez captures the style very well.......at least on all the examples I've personally seen! He would definitely be the first one I would contact.
From what I've been told , Tommy would only pinstripe in three colors, red ,white and black . any combination , just those three. the teardrops were always in groups of three or five . His style was always simple and unclutered,,,classic .
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