Simplicity 6580: Muslin #2

This is Muslin #2 of my Simplicity Jacket.

I was pretty bummed out after muslin #1 and wasn't sure what to do to improve the fit. But after much researching and a little help from fellow sewists (thanks to all of you who gave me their advice on this blog, the Bursdastyle discussion group AND the Pattern Review message board !) I've now come to this second version.
It still needs quite a few adjustments, but I feel like I'm definitely on the right track. When I put this second muslin on, it felt right away much better than the first one, and it gives me hope for the next muslin, which hopefully will be the last.

So here's what I did:

First I corrected the back width by doing a narrow back adjustment.

I drew two lines perpendicular to the grainline: one 1"below the armhole and one in the middle of the armhole. Then I drew a line parallel to the grainline and starting at the middle of the shoulder seam. I cut out the piece...

...and slid it closer to the CB seam, overlaping by 5/8".

Then I redrafted the armhole seam while shortening the shoulder seam ( I actually went back to the original pattern length, which I'd mistakingly lengthened before), and recut the seam allowances.

After I modified the back pattern, I altered the pieces of muslin #1 the same way and reattached the front and back together to see the difference. I added a 1/2" shoulder pad on the right side and a 3/8" on the left, as my right shoulder tends to slope more. Right away it made a huge difference with the way the front hung.

Then I modified the front pattern:
My main issue was to get rid of the excess fabric at the bust. I didn't want to do a sba, because I didn't want to shorten the bust, I actually needed to lengthen it instead. Someone suggested that I do a "narrow bust" adjustment in the front, which is pretty much the same technique as for the back. So I removed 5/8" of width that way.

Then I lengthened the upper bust by adding 1" below the armhole.
At first I wasn't sure about this modification, as I couldn't find an actual example of a pattern alteration like this in any book/website I read. And the "shorten/lengthen" line on the pattern seem to usually be below the bust, not above. But I eventually ended up on this post, where a reader had apparently modified an empire waistline being too high by adding length to the upper part of the bust. So that's what I did, and of course I altered the back the same way.

Then I recut new back and upper front pieces ( I didn't make any alterations to the lower front piece), and put muslin #2 together with the shoulder pads.

Here is what it looks like now:

I am much happier with the front. At first I found the bust to be a tad bit too long, but I corrected it by taking in at the shoulder seams to raise the bust line just enough. The left side is still drooping a bit so I will probably do a minor sloping shoulder alteration on that side as well.
The bottom part of the jacket looks fine. I actually like the length as it is now, unhemmed, so I will add another 1" to 1-1/2" below the bust to keep it that way.

There is still some excess fabric at the bust, so I will probably make another "narrow bust" alteration of an additional 5/8" or so. Plus I think I will get rid of some of the gathering and take in at the side seam instead.

The bottom back looks fine, but the upper back is still too wide, so same as for the front, I will do a "narrower" back alteration.
On the profile picture you can also see that there is too much ease for the "round of the back". I read somewhere you can solve that by taking in at the CB seam and tapering down.
Here's what it looks like if I pin out the excess:

There's probably a middle ground to be found between this and the narrow back alteration.

So, I still have a lot of work on this, but to be honnest, I am actually enjoying this whole process. It's the first time that I have had to make that many alterations to a garment and though it is quite a long process, it's actually quite interesting and I'm learning a lot.

I haven't done anything to the sleeves yet, I want to get the bodice perfect first and then I'll try and make the perfect sleeves for it. Did I mention I also intend to line this jacket ?