AI have a cake this coming weekend that has a traditional tartan patterned scarf draping from the top. The particular tartan is a dark green with blue, yellow, and orange plaid. I have painted fondant before, but always white. Do you just need to keep going over your color to make it bolder if you are painting on a darker surface? Or would it be easier to tint the fondant a lighter green, and then paint the darker green onto it as well as the plaid? Any advice is appreciated.

That sounds pretty tricky.  Is cutting stripes of fondant out, and laying it in the plaid pattern on the draping out of the question?  

AI had thought about it, but I don't think it will look very nice. It is a thin plaid pattern, and that would start to look chunky :-(

Costumeczar wrote a blog post on this, maybe you could try it. I think it would be easier than painting in straight lines! acaketorememberva.blogspot.com/‎

AI can't get that link to pull up, says the page is no longer available :(