Doctor Who Door Escutcheons

[Sorvan]

So this isn't really a prop build as such, but it is meant to reference a few of them.

I've got an old house with old interior doors that have old locks.  When I bought the house, there were no keys to the original interior locks, so when my son became a toddler I replaced a number of the locks so we could keep him out of certain rooms.  While I was able to purchase new locks that fit, the keys were larger than the original ones and didn't fit through the key holes so I had to remove the decorative escutcheons around them and now have ugly holes in the wooden doors in which I insert my keys.

I'd thought about taking an old escutcheon and somehow make they keyhole larger, but then I thought why not make completely new ones.  Here's a design I've started working on (which would incorporate both door knob and keyhole):


There are a few things I want to point out:

• The TARDIS would be a piece that swings out of the way of the keyhole.


• I was thinking about making the TARDIS by 3D etching a chunk of plastic (which is why it's in shades of grey - darker = deeper etching).  I haven't done this for the rest of the design yet.


• All final pieces to be cast in metal.[/]
  

I'm not sure if robes beneath the Timelord head-dress really work, as this would visually place the keyhole at groin level.  Anyone have any other bright ideas?

I want to add a lot more texture to the design.  I don't really want to have a lot of flat, unadorned metal.  I'm not sure at this point what to add however.  Feel free to make suggestions!

If you don an image search for decorative lock escutcheons, you might get an idea of what I'm talking about.

Thanks,
Colin

[warmcanofcoke]

This is a brilliant idea Colin.
The design is well thought out.

now on a silly note- a thought occurs to me. It looks like the holes in the center of the Time Lord Collar are for the Door Knobs. If so, this escutcheon would be a political parody piece, The Time Lords are knobs. I agree! If the time lords were to ever return to the series the first thing they would do would be to arrest the Doctor, because that's what they have done every-time they appeared in the classic show. 


Back to being serious - Those would look good in an aged bronze color patina.

[Sorvan]

a thought occurs to me. It looks like the holes in the center of the Time Lord Collar are for the Door Knobs. If so, this escutcheon would be a political parody piece, The Time Lords are knobs.

That's hilarious!  I hadn't thought of it like that. 

Those would look good in an aged bronze color patina.

That's an interesting idea.  I was thinking that casting in bronze might be the way to go (I have a few friends who've been playing around with casting metals in their back yards) but hadn't even thought about patinas.

Thanks,
Colin

[Sorvan]

I'm really not fond of the 'robe' at the bottom so I thought I'd see what it would look like if I put the TARDIS there instead:

(I obviously just grabbed the first image with the right sort of angle)

Instead of having the TARDIS covering the keyhole, I thought the 'Ghostlight' TARDIS Key might work (I like the look of this much better than the ankh shaped one).  I also shrunk the headdress in relation to the rest as I think it was too large - though if I go with this idea I'll have to rework the artwork so there's more room around the hole for the door knob.

Colin

[warmcanofcoke]

What if instead of the Tardis you had the assembled Key to time just below the time lord collar. and that would move to the side to reveal the key hole.

[Mark]

You could still have the robe as the offending crotch key hole would be covered most of the time.

Does remind me of the 5th Doctor/Dalek easter egg though

The TARDIS key does look better in my opinion, but just to through something else into the Panopticon, what about using a movable Sash of Rasilon ala Deadly Assasin?

[Sorvan]

I'm fairly happy with how the TARDIS underneath the Time Lord head-dress looks, so I thought I'd better redraw it.



I've been thinking about adding some of the Gallifreyan symbols to the head-dress to add some additional texture, but I'm seeing if I can get some vector art off someone rather than drawing them up myself.

Colin

[Sorvan]

I'd been meaning to work on the graphic some more and take it to the laser etcher, but I just haven't had any time.  Since I did have the Ghostlight TARDIS key graphic set up, I started playing around with the laser.  This is the best one so far:


Having also done worked on a little TARDIS, I decided to etch it as well:


I really like how both of them turned out, but I think I have to etch the TARDIS again, this time rotated 90° so the etching lines go up and down instead of across - which would make it look more like it was reproducing the wood grain.

Colin

[Sorvan]

I got back to the laser etcher on Friday and started test etching the main bit:



I tried it out on one of my doors and I think it looks pretty good:



As I was taking it off the door, I dropped it and it broke where the door handle goes through - obviously it needs more material here.  I was spray painting some other stuff outside so I thought I'd spray paint the broken one so it'll photograph better.  I'm pretty pleased with it.



I actually made a bunch more of them as another issue I'm having is that the acrylic is warping due to the heat from the laser.  My thought is that I see how much I need to heat them up to bend them back straight without destroying the detail by melting them.

I've decided to not renew my makerspace membership in June so I doubt I'll get back to this until July.

Colin

[DoctorWho8]

That looks great!  Definitely a unique item that has merit!
Bill "the Doctor" Rudloff