What am I missing... Or am I missing anything?

[LRBespokeGoods]

I've been having a bit of an issue with my tooling but I've tried several things to sort it with no success.

When I tool or stamp I'm not getting the satisfying burnish on each tool stroke consistently. Initially I thought it was my casing so I've tried several different moisture levels from a little damp to nearly dry, then I considered the amount of pressure on the tool and struck with a range of pressures on the varying moisture levels... Nothing was working so I bought different tooling leather and repeated the process....

Am I going totally quackers and missing something? I also won't be offended if the answer is simply I'm doing something fundamentally wrong.

I'll drop a photo of the piece that started my conundrum in the comments when I work out how to reduce file size on my phone...

Edited 14 hours ago by LRBespokeGoods

[Beehive]

Try slicking the leather before you stamp. Burnish it with denim or glass when it's dry. Case and stamp it. 

Compare the results.

[LRBespokeGoods]

Thanks, I'll give it a go tomorrow.

And I've just seen this is probably in the wrong place... Is it possible to move it?

[Beehive]

You can also burnish it after it's stamped. Same things, denim or glass. If you use glass, it'll level out the highs and lows on basket stamp. Go easy using glass. Irregular shapes, I use denim. 

Edited 14 hours ago by Beehive