Reaves Leather

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Sheridan flowers, cow fur insert, basket lacing, silver concho flower centers, deer skin lining.

Another option which I have found helpful to get a wide array of tools is to look through the books find the names and check ebay. You can find antique tools and tool "lots" that you can really score on. I've gotten 4 - 5 different tools of the same type that I now use for different flowers or vines.

It's easy to tattoo leather, just like skin don't skip any steps.Why you'd want to, I have no idea.

Leaf liners go on the leaf down the vein.

Kev, if you're using the gel there are a couple ways to do it, you can add water to get a more dye job on the leather then wife off with a damp sponge. You can then add the gel and wipe off with a damp sponge to really get the antique look. I like to do this to keep any streaking down.I have a bottle of thinned gel with water and a normal bottle.

Tandy makes 3 different ones, one is a hand tool that you have to sharpen the other two look like smooth bevelers. You can also make one out of a nail for next to nothing intead of buying a bk for $25. If you already have one I'd use that instead of spending that money.

I'd say decorative cuts on the stems. Also for inspiration look at saddles by Don King. Look at the differences between your work. For the antique do some research because it looks very uneven. Take a look at Sheridan Style Carving the book aka "The Bible" it's very helpful. The overall design is good, but you need to do something with your tooling to make it come alive. Also try to make your swivel knife cuts smooth as can be.

It looks a lot better

Get the book Sheridan Style it goes over a lot of the style and has a lot of pictures too look at. Look at your circle of leaves and notice how everything flows to the center, now look at the leaves on top and see how they don't flow towards the center at all. Try to make your stems fatter to achieve this. Like in this piece, notice how all the leaves flow to center and to get them all together the stem is fatter.

The only reason the background is that way is because I didn't care about it, I'm cutting it out. Check the Bronc Halter I posted, that's how I normally do my background. Thanks for the comment though!

Let me know what you guys think.