Above is a small test (rose gold inlay) for a new project – an engraving sampler pocket knife for myself, so I have a sample of my work with me at all times. I made my old sampler knife a fair bit ago, and it no longer adequately represents my skills. I’m encouraged by this result, so we’ll continue on with the sampler knife…
Working on an engraving sampler pocket knife for myself, so I have a sample of my work with me at all times. I figured out what I needed to know on the rose gold test piece. Above, the initial lines have all been cut on the CRKT Squid knife.
Adding rose gold inlays to my engraving sampler pocket knife for myself. This is pretty slow going
, the steel is pretty hard and rose gold isn’t easy to inlay. I’m spending an awful lot of time resharpening my undercutting flat gravers when I break them…
Finished with the dragon’s breath gold inlays on my engraving sampler pocket knife for myself. Between the hard steel and the green and two rose golds, the toughest inlays I’ve ever done – there are four colors of gold in each of these two images…
Inlaying 24 karat yellow gold in the dragon’s talons on my engraving sampler pocket knife. 1 excavated pocket. 2 undercut edges. 3 hooks in pocket floor. 4 gold wires tacked in place. 5 wires flattened and permanent. 6 scraped flush and burnished. 7 stoned flush and outlined.
All the gold inlays on my engraving sampler pocket knife are finished and outlined. Also completed the sculpting of the dragon head. Next up, background removal in all of those tiny recesses…
Adding some (sort of) Fine English Scroll to my engraving sampler pocket knife. Also starting to remove some of the background…
Finished detailing the (sort of) Fine English Scroll. It’s really starting to look like fire and smoke…
OK, the Christmas holidays are over, so it’s back to work on my Viking Dragon engraving sampler pocket knife. Working on the rest of the background removal…
Continuing removing the background of my Viking Dragon engraving sampler pocket knife. Sorry this is going so slow, but I just have to push on through this uninteresting part…
The background removal is completed. The next uninteresting part will be stippling the background – not my favorite part, but the results are always so stunning that I voluntarily suffer through it…
Ugh! Stippling the background of the Viking Dragon engraving sampler pocket knife – not my favorite part… several hours for maybe 20% of the task. Lots to go yet…
After heroic effort, I’ve finally finished stippling the background of the Viking Dragon engraving sampler pocket knife! Now some interesting things will begin to happen…finally.
Above I’ve finished the interior hatching on the Celtic knots! Except the spot I missed… Basic rule of engraving – you have to put it in front of somebody else in order to see a problem area…
Finished the Viking Dragon engraving sampler pocket knife! I’ll live with it for a few days to see if I need to do anything else…
Thanks for Looking!
Tom Sterling
http://www.sterlingsculptures.com
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