YinTx

Really cool use of the muleshoe stamp there. Kinda like a scale - dragon, snake, fish anyone? Or maybe feathers on an owl's chest. I didn't know you could heat treat damascus after it is formed without altering the qualities that make damascus so good? Or do I need to revisit my Science and Engineering of Materials book again? YinTx

Awesome, thanks for the info! YinTx

Rossr, Thanks much. The dove was my favorite part also, strangely enough. YinTx

Does the gel formula work well for leather? Issues with gumming up needles/awls, burnishing edges, etc? Or work the same as regular contact cement? YinTx

Neat combination of inverted carving and standard beveling! Tiny details are difficult, no recovery from a slightly misplaced tool. Yours came out really well. YinTx

I'm no expert, but I'd say you nailed it with the petal lifter! YinTx

That looks like it came out pretty well! Can you take a close up of the leaves where you used that petal lifter? I am curious if the shape of your lifter made a difference on the end result... YinTx

That looks super clean! I like the design and the contrasting stitching, which look pretty good from these photos. What kind of leather is it that you used? YinTx

Finished item here: YinTx

Come to think of it, I do have some of that leather. I might try it on the wallet that came out really thin from the tooling, and see if I like it or not. It isn't my favorite leather, but this might prove to be a purpose for it. YinTx

Managed to do these when the family was looking the other way - will be Christmas gifts. sorry bout the hurried photos, didnt want to get caught So, tooling, painting, dye, antique, stamping, carving, stitching, edging.. a bit of everything I've managed to learn here... YinTx

lol, dont know about cost effective, that took me half a day to tool! I imagine that rice didn't get done in five minutes! I think its best if I let the rice art experts do their thing and stick to my leather.. YinTx

Can you share a photo? How thick is it? I am trying to keep this wallet really thin, so that is why I am using 2 and 3 oz leather. I have used some softy pig skin that was vegetable tanned on some checkbook covers and some bible covers I just finished, but it wrecks edges and is fairly heavy. YinTx

I really thought about that but... will it wrinkle when the wallet is opened/closed 1000 times? And I don't really have any thin thin pigskin...or kangaroo... and I have to be done by Christmas Eve... or am I worrying about it too much ? YinTx

I thought I was going to punch through just beveling! Now that it has dried, seems like it might work ok for a wallet back after all, but don't know how long it will last before something gives way. Thanks for the compliment. One of the things I don't like about some of the tooling works I see on Etsy, etc are the shallow looking carvings, so I am always trying to get as much depth as I can, but I think it has more to do with the design and the coloring that gives perception of depth. All I can do is study and try to get better. Thanks Ross. I am a self taught amateur as well, but I did sleep at the Holiday Inn last night. My wife keeps complaining about how nice the stuff in the scrap bin is and that I should sell it...I keep adding to it. LOL. Also, for those interested, the tiny tools in question: I have no idea how old or new they are. Top one is new, the Craftool Pro beveler. Second one is the bar grounder (A101) from Kyoshin Elle. The rest are Craftool USA. I believe the F925 is being closed out by Tandy, but is on sale right now for all of $2.99. YinTx

I see in my batch it works as an emulsifying agent as well. I also saw 1 gallon containers of glycerin at the local feed and tack store, that unfortunately went out of business. Was debating getting a bottle, but it said for animal use only? Wanted to make lotion out of it...along with the casing solution use. I also have a bar of glycerin from Fiebings that I use when tooling, really slippery stuff. YinTx

Those look really cool. Maybe next year I'll make a couple. How do the bells sound? Do they actually work when you open the door? YinTx

@Rossr, are those hot foil presses I spy? That is a nice set up, well arranged for production it seems. YinTx

Oh. Yeah...maybe... YinTx

I must be doing something wrong... I made up a mixture totaling about 3 cups, and it is already gone, working on my second batch that was about a quart. And I've only been doing this a few months...am I using too much? YinTx

Thank you. I've been staring at it all day, and up close, so I've been feeling like it was a bit of a mess. Perhaps I need to step back and try to see the beauty in it some. Change my perspective... Thanks, all but one of them are Craft Tools, and the beveler is one of the new craft tool pro Sheridan style tools. With the exception of the beveler, they were all in a collection that I purchased a number of years ago, and have just this August/September gotten the nerve to try out with any bit of seriousness. The flowers can pretty much fit under my thumbprint, and the leaves are smaller than the quarter, so tiny tools are a must for this design. I didn't even know I had a veiner that tiny, let alone the pear shaders! Had to look really close to make sure it would work like a veiner, but it's an F tool, so I suppose it is not. The bar grounder is a Kyoshin Elle tool. YinTx

You'll do fine, they said. Can only go up from here, right? Not really a piece to show off, other than its the first time I've ever bar grounded something, and the bar grounder was smaller than the letter "B" on the quarter! Still need to get a smaller knife, I think it might help a little. As would a pair of magnifiers: could barely see the ends of these things! I did this on 3 oz Hermann Oak leather, might have been a bit heavy handed for as thin as it was. Pointers always welcome so I can actually tool something nice! YinTx

In a previous topic, I posted this: There are a lot of casing solution recipes on this website. Here are the few that I gleaned: Bruce Johnson’s casing solution recipe: 1.5 cups water, .5 cups Lexol conditioner, 1-2 tablespoons baby shampoo, 1 tablespoon listerine (brown). Ed the BearMan’s recipe: 4 Tablespoons of Lexol, 3 Tablespoons of Glycerin, 2 Tablespoons of Brown Listerine, about 40 drops of Dawn, or Joy , Mixed in 7 cups of warm Distilled water HidePounder’s recipe: 1 teaspoon of (Joy) soap and 1/2 teaspoon of glycerin to 2 quarts of water. There are others out and about the wide world of internet. I sort of cobbled my own off of a combination of the above, using glycerin, baby shampoo, Lexol, Listerine, and water. The water in the above recipes ranged from 1.5 cups to 2 quarts. Mine was the 1.5 cup version, I will add more water to reduce the ratio of conditioners to water, I think it may help. As you can see, they all have some type of conditioner already in them, so any additional neatsfoot oil after the fact I think becomes overkill. They do really facilitate carving and tooling tho. YinTx