Cyberthrasher

Well, it sounds like you really want to focus on assembly type projects and not so much the tooling. If you want to too, the starter set is a good way to go. For assembly, I would first get a diamond stitching awl. It sounds like you're all setup for lacing, so I don't think I really have much to add there. There is a series of Al Stohlman books on case making available. I believe it's called "The Art of Making Leather Cases" or something like that. It's 3 volumes and each goes into different specific projects and there's also another one called "The Art of Hand Stitching Leather" which is a great read too. Tandy has both available for purchase in their digital PDF library.

I was looking at that one yesterday on Shutterstock. If I had a seat pan to use I'd be all over it.

Very nice!! Can't wait to see what it looks like finished. I was planning another bracelet too, so now I gotta kick it up a notch.

That's more celtic than tribal, so it's Ok. Tribal is ALL I ever did when tattooing and I really grew to hate it. They're looking great. That "Mr. King" thing is more of an inside joke/reference that we had decided on because Kerry King is crazy enough to have written a song about himself and just hidden behind the name of Gein

Yeah, we always post the carving or whatever at that stage as the contest submission then update with the finished results. I have some ideas rolling through my head, but nothing I've settled on yet.

Yeah, you gotta rock out with your feet in that situation. But, it works great for tooling - Especially if you're listening to "Dead Skin Mask"........."mr. king? I'm not having fun anymore"

Besides that, according to the rules, NO SWIVEL BEVELERS!! So that might take Chancey down a hair temporarily

I think there's a total of 3 people on this forum that might understand that....... and look, we're all right here.

So, for clarity, we HAVE to have both a Tiki and some flowers of some sort at a minimum?

I have that same problem. I'm getting better at it the more I do them, but I'm still thinking about a filigree blade to help out some.

Personally, I like to take what Glendon posted and then consider the item itself. A close friend of mine does some serious intricate engraving. When we first met he offered to make me a money clip or something and pointed out that he can't usually sell stuff like that because with his craft time it's worth $500 plus based on the above calculations, but nobody's going to pay that because in the end it's still just a money clip. Just a good example that easily translates here too. That being said, if you have people willing to pay you for it and your work is "good" at a minimum, then the $125 range sounds fine if not a little low. I haven't seen your work and only you know what it's really worth to you. I'm finishing up a Kindle cover for my wife right now and I'm going to give her an average price to tell people when they ask about it - $160 to $200 depending on the complexity of the tooling design and how quickly I can work.

Hey, I can use the normal beveler too. And I'm all for trying to do something different with the others. I just think it's more of a challenge if we're forced to figure it out with 1 of them.

My vote was for the normal 3 that we all seem to use plus one additional that MUST be a style from the lucky 7 (cam, veiner, pear shader, or matter). But, we'll find out what the decision is for sure in the morning

You'll get there. The stuff I'm doing now was WAAAY over my head just a couple months ago. I'm seeing a consensus on 4 tools so far.

Oh yeah, I've got the lacing and stitching for leathercraft pdf on my desktop - with that page open right now even. Basically the same but some of the pictures are a little clearer and there's some better information on how to end some of them, like ending the double loop when you're not going all the way around. For some reason Tandy didn't find that important to tell people even though it was a requirement for their own kit piece.

yeah, it's hard not to have our work look like yours when you come up with so many cool ideas

Man, you gotta give me the recipe for that dye I'm going to master that triple loop tomorrow hopefully

Ok, They Suck. Now, do you want the truth? I think they're really good. That airbrushing came out really cool and I can tell the difference in cutting vs. stamping. I think it makes things pop a lot better that way. Keep it up and make sure you post the other ones. I'm supposed to start on a belt soon that's likely going to be the same color scheme, so we can compare notes at that time

I'm still going to order some of that stuff and check it out I think, but I just cut out a little piece of lining leather today and glued it over the base of the snap. This particular problem is with my wife - so I get to test it all out. But, there are some other people who have asked me for stuff who are in the same situation.

I like it. So is it the Eco Flo that's caused the brown to show through, or was that how it was when fresh?