This is how an engraving begins. My design is laser printed on ordinary kitchen baking parchment. The laser printer toner doesn’t stick well to the paper, and with a little encouragement from the antler burnisher, will transfer to the sticky Dammar varnish.
Here’s the transfer on the stainless steel pendant blank
, with a silver backing. It’s about one and one half inches high. Next, I’ll begin engraving all of the layout lines.
Above, I’ve engraved all of my design lines, and begun removing and leveling the background. This will be a relief carving, so I need to go quite a bit deeper than this. As I carve and round over the turtle parts, I’ll end up re-engraving all of these lines several times…
More background removal, using carbide burs now. The left side is about right, the right side needs lots more work…
Above, all sides done, and a little dark patina thrown in to see how it might look when finished. I also find it easier to see what I’m doing when I cut the darker metal. Less glare, as well.
Here’s a side view of the total depth. Technically this is “low relief” engraving, but it’s still pretty deep!
Thanks for looking!