Jazznow

Hi all, i thought i'd show some of the stuff i made in the last few months, since i have not showed off anything in the last time. So this thread is quite Pic-Heavy. I decided to start to make my crafting a bit more professional by creating more items at once, which results in a shorter work time for the single item. I'm happy about any suggestions to do anything better, because i know, i'm not perfect at all The steampunk themed Messenger Bag is my personal master piece so far. Its carved on the front, on the back and on the flap. Making the design of it was a heavy task for itself, and i'm quite proud of it ;D Best wishes to you all Jonathan P.S. Pictures resume in secon post.

I think is a great update. Have experienced major Speed increase. N my iPad everything's looking fine. Thanks for the work. Edit: even quick reply works on the iPad now. Before the update I had to hit return twice to get the effect of a Break. Is it possible to allow image uploading from the iPad? I guess that not, but it would be great

Hi. I know your problem. I always have difficulties to price my stuff too. At my last fair I had a nice chat with some of the other craftspeople and they all were like 'woah just 200 eur for that bag, that is a joke isn't it?' (it was a full carved steam punk messenger bag, but with a simple construction) And I thought 200 is at the higher end of the scale, lol. Im glad I don't have to make a living with my craft (though I want to someday). As long as I do it as a hobby, I can take any price I want. A price that feels good to me. And when I gain some confidence I will eventually make them higher step by step. Greetings Jazznow

Thanks for your reply. I was afraid, that I needed to mix it myself. I guess I have to try. Have a nice Sunday

Good luck to you. Don't be frustrated to early. It needs a little time to start earning money with leather. I'm doing this now for 6 years I think and just started to get more money than I spend for materials, fees for stalls at fairs etc. just got my first custom order for a belt and hope it will result in follow up orders With the quality of your carving after only one year of experience and the benefit of living in the USA you shoul be faster than me on a level where your hobby pays for itself.

Beautiful work. Would you share how you got the purple color in the 9th pic? It's exactly the color I need for a personal project. Maby greetingsJonathan

Very cool purse. Like it very much.

Don't worry, if I remember correctly, mr. Befriend of bear gallery is a Dutch who spent several years in USA and Australia before he settled in Germany.

Hi there, I can recommend kobel leather too. Best I used so far. For tools you can also give the guys at Bear gallery a call (bear gallery.de). They will send you a Tandy catalogue and a price list. They have all the Tandy stuff plus some great other tools (at thei website) plus fiebings dyes and leather. Great people to deal with. Lederkram and worring leder have been mentioned already. Wolf-borger-messer.de is building some outstanding round knifes. Lederhaus.de has got a wide variety of leathers and tools too. There are many other small online shops, but I don't think you will find anything there, that you can't find in one of the mentioned shops. Good luck Jonathan

HI, I cant Compare their swivel knifes with the high quality ones you mentioned. I bought their most expensive one as an upgrade to my cheapo Tandy knife and it works like a Charm for me. Ball bearing makes a big difference and you can fit the length o you hand. It improved my work and made it easier to work longer. Maybe tha helps. Greetings Jonathan

Bellys are good for anything that needs to be wet formed, because the structure of the skin s not as denser than on shoulder or back, hence it stretches better over a form. Wet formed zippo holders can be made out of small pieces. Greetingsjonathan

Thanks or the link Ray. I will order one there as soon as i can afford one. In September I'll have a craft fair and hope to raise enough money for one Still have to decide if I want my name on it or the name i will use in the future when I turn my hobby into a part time job (yes I already have a name, lol). Stay wellJonathan

Thank you for the additional information. The size of an small Jaegermeister bottle is great. (advantage: the stuff tastes good before the bottle becomes useful, lol). Didn't know that Jaegermeister is sold in the USA Greetings Jonathan

Hi and thanks for the tipsCould you please make a picture of your bottle with an inch ruler beneath, since I have no idea what size the bottle is Did I understand you right, that I put only as much dye into the bottle as the cotton balls can soake in ? I'd gues the dye would spill otherwise wouldn't it? Greeting Jonathan

Hi ray, Interesting topic indeed. I've done two courses and the 3 weeks I spend with you in your workshop. Comparing both I have to say, that I learned more in the courses considering their duration (1 day). BUT it's more than a year ago and I forgot almost everything I learned in his courses. When I'm dyeing something I do it the way I learned from you, cutting, stamping etc. the same. The time I spend in your workshop was much more effective in terms of learning (and it was more fun :D ). This was because I had time to do repititive work so my hands learned what to do, not only the head. Since here is no time for repititive work on 1 or 2 day courses you have to give your students the possibility to do this repititive work at home by providing detailed instruction sheets or similar. I tried to write down important things in the courses I visited but I always missed something the instructor said while I was writing down what he said before. Another aspect you have to think about is what the topics of your courses will be like. Will you do one project in on course like building a bag, stamp/carve it, dye it, make nice edges, assemble it, finish it. In this case you will have to think about aspects that you can skip (you could use edge cote for finishing the edge instead of going the long way with wax and much elbow grease or you could precut the parts of the bag) since time may become a critical factor. The other possibility is to do one or two aspects of leather working in extreme detail. So you can say ok on this course we will learn different dyeing techniques and different edge finishing techniques. In this case you could give your students some 8" belt cutoffs and work on these. It allows you to handle more aspects of the same topic in one course (block dyeing, Normal dyeing, antiquing, antiquing with prior resists and so on, building up certain effects like shadowing at the corners etc.pp.) You should think about how many students you want to have in a course. More student means you can take less money for the course to get the same amount at the end of the day. But it means, that you have less time for every single student too ( and I think it is important to have enough time for every student so you can work on individual mistakes everybody is making. Last but not least make sure to have enough tools for everyone. Buy some sets and ask them if they want to take it home, if not you can use the same set for the next student if yes, you made some extra dollars. I hope this helps ,) Jonathan P.s. if you need an assistant teacher gimme a call and I'll see that I can get some free days at work. After all I'm the perfect example that people can learn something when you are the instructor

Looks very clean and professional. She will like it.

I use a lead block for punching holes etc. for a year now and it works ok for me. Since lead is a very soft metal, it doesn't harm your punches which are of much harder steel. Only tool I had problems with was a cheap Tandy stitch hole punch (4 diamond holes in a row) the single punches bended but that had happened before too because that stuff is just cheap. I got the tip to use a lead block from a leather worker who is doing this for years now. Since he makes a living with leatherwork he's punching quiet a lot holes and I can't imagine why he should use a lead block when it's damaging his tools... Greetings Jonathan

Ok, Thank you all. I will buy a jig the next time I'm ordering leather stuff and will put the blade aside until then. Hope I will get it right then :D GreetingsJonathan

I tried the white compound sold by Tandy nd a red one a friend gave me. I used the angle that the blade already had and maintained it by hand. I succeeded with this on the cheapo blades. Dunno why it oesnt work now. Greetings Jonathan

Hi folks I bought an as swivel knife blade some months ago, hoping a better blade would improve my work. I worked with cheapo Tandy blades until now. The prob is, that I can't get that damn thing sharp. I do everything as I do it with my other blades which are sharp and polished. Im sharpening it with my stone which is a 2000/8000 high quality one (I get my knifes razor sharp with this stone even without polishing) and polish it afterwards but even after a hour of polishing there are still tiny scratches on the blade and when using it, it shows "drag". Ont know what to do anymore, maybe you can help me. Greetings Jazznow.

If you don't like the daubers, you could use a strip of felt, folded one and put between a clothes pin. Read about that but never tried.

vEry nice stuff. I. Like the blue one. Greetings Jazznow

Add me please. Want to see the nasty stuff too, lol

I Agree with Sylvia here, but that may be because I'm from Germany. Here we follow more or less the definitions sylvia quoted. A worker is doing repetitive work that in most cases needs little skill (there are exceptions like sewers who sew together shoe uppers). They usually get only low wages. A craftsman is doing complex task that need a great amount of skill and practice. In most cases u have to stand quiet hard exams after an apprenticeship of three years to call yourself an craftsman or more exactly a saddler, shoemaker, tool maker and so on. To call yourself a master craftsman you have to visit another school or do certain courses and stand another hard exam. Some years back it was neccessary to be an master craftsman when you wanted to work on you own/have your own shop. Today only ths is only the case in certain crafts that effect health or security of other people (like an orthopedic shoemaker, an electrician or an car repairsman). Often you can work on your own without doing any exam (I can do leather work without one, but I'm not allowed to call myself a Saddler, shoemaker, bagmaker since those are official crafts and I would need an exam. Note: in Germany we have a law for everything and everything that is not explicitly allowed is forbidden lol. Greetings Jonathan