CitizenKate

Regis, Yes, that is black dye I used for the squares. I spray it on with an airbrush, with the squares masked off with painter's tape. The dye goes on gradually, in layers. I spray it on a little at a time for each pass until the area is fully saturated with color. The painter's tape really does a good job of keeping the dye just where I want it; the dye does not bleed under the tape. ...Not as long as you make sure the leather is nice and dry, that is. (School of Hard Knocks, lesson #322.) Also, I buff the residue off before removing the mask. That helps keep it from smearing over the lines. (School of Hard Knocks, lesson #74.) Thanks for the kind words, everyone. Hope to have more to post soon. Kate

Here are some photos of my latest custom job, a Chess board design based on a movie theme. The person who ordered it is an art director in the film industry. He created and directed a short movie titled Apple Jack, which won some film festival awards. You can see the IMDb profile on Apple Jack here. The ominous little guy in the corners is a rendering of a mask made out of tree bark that is worn by the main character, a little boy named Jack. And I do mean little - I had to carve the corners almost under a microscope, and had to create a couple of my own custom stamps from nails to get into places my regular stamps were too big for, like the spaces around the eyes. I also had to create a crude custom stamp to do the film sprocket holes all around the border. Clay - it may interest you to know that I ended up having to trace the corner artwork the "proper" way (with the artwork facing up and impressing the lines through the film with a pointed stylus), since I was unable to produce a clean line art version of the mask and transfer it my preferred way. I probably wouldn't have thought to try that if we hadn't had that discussion about transferring patterns awhile back. All these years, and I never caught onto that method! But it's handy to have it in this kind of situation. Kate

What's the finish? Laquer? Also, did you treat the flesh side with anything? Kate

Nice, Holly! I guess you know I like that Celtic stuff for some reason... Kate

I see your point about the acrylic. I would never have guessed you used acrylic on that last piece. Kate

Here's a custom Backgammon board someone ordered from me around Feb of 2004 that also isn't on my site, since I never got a shot of it when it was complete. This one is also of celtic influence (...I do seem to do a lot of that, I guess). The photos are of work in progress, pretty much finished, but not yet trimmed and framed. Kate

Check the main topic, Jim. I'm diggin' around in my photos to see what else I have.... Kate

Here's something I don't have on my web site yet (...after about a year and a half!). It's a custom Chess board that was a collaborative effort with a very talented artist I work with at my day job. It's a celtic influence, as the customer wanted a continuout knot pattern all 'round the border. As I remember, the backgrounding an beveling were mind-numbingly tedious, but the results were worth it! (I'm going to charge a lot more if I make any more of these, though! Sheesh!) Kate

My pleasure, sir. :-) Hope you get to try it sometime, it's so fun when you see it work. Kate

Ha! You can hijack a thread of mine anytime. Not so sure about that artist ranking yet. The financial end of it stinks (so far, anyway), but maybe at least history will be kind... ? Guess we'll see (on both scores). Thanks so much for the feedback - it is always welcome. Kate

No, these are not lined, although I may make some that are. Meanwhile, thanks for that tip - I didn't know about nickel being a known skin irritant. The rivets are from Tandy, but the closures are nice mini-anorak snaps from Dritz, which appear to have some kind of resin coating on them. I will do as you suggest on the rivets. Kate

Jim, to color the celtic/tribal design, I covered the entire carved portion with solid yellow dye. Then started working back from the tips with reduced oxblood. When I got to the parts where I wanted the red to fade into the yellow, I used a dry brush technique very similar to what Peter Main describes in his books. This involves loading the brush very dry, then working from more intense color to where hardly anything is coming off the brush. This produces a kind of feathering of the color with your brush. The edges had a little reduced brown dye sprayed around them with an airbrush. Then I antiqued with my usual formula (the recipe is in another thread, but I can list it here, too, if you're interested. Usually, I have a hard time getting the yellow to show much after I apply the antique, but the formula I use now seems to let the dye colors come through a little better, so I was pleasantly surprised to see that yellow still showing after the antique had cured. The other wrist cuff was colored entirely with an airbrush. Solid brown over the entire thing (as well as the trim pieces), then the edges were shaded with some brown dye that had a little black mixed in. Same antique formula as the celtic/tribal design. Kate

Of course you can ask! When I have a little time this evening, I'll write more about that. Thanks again for the kind words. Kate

Thanks for the kind words, guys & gals. Do you have something specific in mind to post? If not, I'll go through my photos and see what is there that might be of interest. Kate

Just finished up a couple of wrist cuffs I decided to make on a whim. I've been seeing high school and college students wearing ones they got at Wally World and Hastings that are made of plastic. Every time I see plastic "leather", I just want to spit! :ranting: But this time, instead of spitting, I made something. Kate

Great post, BG! A lot of great insight there. Some of the things you mention, like how you tested your product (and the water, so to speak) before getting medieval with the pricing is right on. One thing I have always believed about marketing handcrafted leather items is to focus not on explaining to potential customers what you do to produce the item but on the difference between what they are getting from you or Cabela's. They don't care how much work it takes; all they care about is what they are getting. I've been trying to find the best way to word this, and you hit the nail right on the (proverbial) head. Kate

I was given a quiz in high school that included the question, "TRUE/FALSE: We eat dead animals." You'd be amazed how many students answered FALSE. I dunno... maybe they were all veggans, ya think?

I've heard of a phenomenon known as "food aversion", in which people don't recognize a basic source of their sustenance, like a deer or cow (since slaughterhouses take care of the "dirty work" for us nowadays). If they don't get it from the supermarket, they don't recognise that it's food. People are losing the connection between "beef" and "cattle". The same goes for vegetation that is found in the "wild". So if they were ever in a situation where they had to hunt or forage for their own food, they would actually be repulsed by the idea of having to eat the very thing that sustains them. The military seems to know a lot about this, I suppose because they have to re-train soldiers to be able to survive in a world without supermarkets. PETA seems to have taken this concept to a new level, eh? Kate

Whenever I drive past a field where there are cattle grazing, I see racks of tanned leather. Maybe I should get a therapist.

Exactly, Clay, you got the point of what I was saying. With the marks made by the diamond hole chisel, it's very easy to get the awl cuts at consistent angles. My stitching rows also tend to be easier to keep straight with a chisel, too. These are probably not as big of an advantage for someone who is fairly skilled with the use of an awl and an overstitch wheel. That group does not yet include me. :biggrin: If I get to a point where I'm doing a lot of sewing, sure enough, I'll probably want to switch to the wheel to help me work faster. At that point, it will be worth the practice to learn to get the same results that I get now with a chisel. Kate

I will still use a diamond hole thonging chisel to mark where the holes will go for saddle stiching. The holes are exactly the same distance apart as with an overstitch wheel, but I like the chisel better because it's a lot easier to control. I also like the way it marks a perfect angle for the awl to go through. Same here, I noticed that the leather was noticably weaker where I cut a stitching groove - I could almost tear it with my bare hands. So I also decided it was better to just make a pressed groove, rather than a cut groove. It's an excellent book on stitching, alright... but a few of us have been debating the value of learning to punch the stitching holes while you're also holding two needles. Maybe it's faster, but for me it was actually faster in the long run to punch the holes before even picking up the needles, because of how much faster and smoother the stitching process was. I hear that! (See the thread on the biker wallet... that was quite a journey for me.)

So... like, meat is actually just a by-product from the leather industry? I guess this implies that they are opposed to eating, then? Whew - global warming has nothing on this!

I decided to revive this thread, after doing some experimenting, I discovered the answer to my own question. The reason(s) you don't want to drive the thonging chisel all the way through the leather is that 1) the thonging chisel creates a bit too large of a hole, causing the thread to be somewhat loose in the hole. It seems better to have a tight fit through the hole for the thread, especially where you backstitch, to reduce the chance of having it come out at the ends, or in the middle should the thread become worn through. 2) the stitching awl (if it's kept sharp) slices through the leather, but the thonging chisel, if you drive it all the way through, puts little tears in the leather, which weakens it. In the short term, you won't notice much difference, but in the long term, I think the sewn seam would tear loose more easily. So I will probably still want to pre-punch the holes, but on my future projects, I'll use the sewing awl with a piece of foam core, rather than the thonging chisel. Kate

Thanks for the kind words, guys. Someone asked me how I colored the wallet, and I thought I would share the response with all... The inside of the wallet is completely natural. I just sealed the parts and sewed them together, as per the customer's request. The coloring on the outside was done with medium brown Fiebing's spirit dye, sprayed on with an airbrush, with heavy shading around the edges. For the antique I use the following formula: 1/8 cup Fiebing's neutral Antique Finish 1/2 cup Tan Kote About 10 eyedroppers-full of the dye color of my choice (for this I used medium brown). I mix it up good and pour it into a squirt bottle. To apply, I squirt it over the leather, smear it around, then lightly wipe off the excess with a paper towel, allowing the formula to settle into the carving and tooling impressions and natural irregularities of the leather. A lot of people don't like the imperfections of the leather to show up like that and put down a resist under the antique. I prefer to go for a more natural and somewhat distressed appearance in the leather. This is much easier to work with than the antique paste alone, and much more stable once it cures. You also have a wider choice of colors you can make your antique. Kate

Whew! How right you are. I sure have some horror stories to tell, especially with Fiebings Antique Finish and acrylic sealers. Just when I think I have the technique of applying them "down", I get bit in the keyster with yet another gotcha! I've changed to using other antiques and finishes now, that have worked better for me, but even the ones I use now are not foolproof. I always just take a deep breath before I start, and resolve to just walk away from it for at least 10 minutes if something goes wrong. I've saved quite a few projects just by not reacting too hastily when I screw up a finish. Then again, if the project is already deemed lost, a well-considered attempt at a remedy is a no-lose alternative. Kate :scared: