Prototype Notepad holder

[YinTx]

Finished this one up today, not my best work, had lots of things I wasn't happy with.  This is version 2, Version 3 is slated for an IPad cover for a customer, so I wanted to get some practice in to perfect things a bit.  Version 1 never even got to the dye stage.  Oye.

Heavy Campbell's Satin Laid linen thread.  All kinds of different dyes, leathers, antiques and finishes.

YinTx

[bikermutt07]

It looks perfect to me.

[JKHelms]

Very very nice!

i love that cream colored thread. I use it a lot

[YinTx]

2 hours ago, JKHelms said:

Very very nice!

i love that cream colored thread. I use it a lot

Thank you.  Might be the camera, the lighting, or your monitor, but that is actually a bright yellow thread.  I have a cream thread that looks good against brown also, and use it a lot as well.

5 hours ago, bikermutt07 said:

It looks perfect to me.

Thanks, Mutt.  my stitching wasn't up to my normal standards, and my figure beveler work wasn't so good - this was a really stiff dense leather, so I was having a bit of a time getting a smooth look around the cross.  You can see the impressions a bit too well there.  Ah well, the third version was better!

YinTx

[bikermutt07]

Did you try smoothing the bevel with a spoon?

I still think it looks perfect.

[YinTx]

21 minutes ago, bikermutt07 said:

Did you try smoothing the bevel with a spoon?

 

I made a feeble effort.  As mentioned, this was pretty dense stiff stuff.  Perhaps I should have gotten a bigger spoon from the kitchen.  

(Get a bigger hammer philosophy)

On version 3, I used a less dense leather, and used the large smooth figure beveler as a spoon to smooth.  We'll see how it looks when it comes time to take photos. Thats usually when I see all my big mistakes that didn't stand out in standard light and zoom.  

YinTx

[Fire88]

Looks quite dandy to me!

[Rossr]

Looks nice to me.

I see the bevel goes way out.  But I know one thing I have done to help smooth is after i bevel with the mallet and tool. I will just take the beveling stamp and if its a smooth bevel I will take the bevel and kind tilt it one way and drag it along to smooth it out.  Not sure that makes sense.  But its does work well.

[battlemunky]

Is the hinge spliced in between the inner and outer covers? Any chance you have a close up of that? I'm with the Mutt....I think it looks great.

[YinTx]

1 hour ago, Rossr said:

Looks nice to me.

I see the bevel goes way out.  But I know one thing I have done to help smooth is after i bevel with the mallet and tool. I will just take the beveling stamp and if its a smooth bevel I will take the bevel and kind tilt it one way and drag it along to smooth it out.  Not sure that makes sense.  But its does work well.

I think that is kinda what I did on version 3.  It is a bit better I think...

1 hour ago, Fire88 said:

Looks quite dandy to me!

Thanks much!

10 minutes ago, battlemunky said:

Is the hinge spliced in between the inner and outer covers? Any chance you have a close up of that? I'm with the Mutt....I think it looks great.

The spine is two pieces of leather, the outer cow veg tan and the inner is a veg tan ( I think) pig liner.  Soft and stretchy though.  These two are sandwiched between the outside tooled layer and the inside smooth layers of veg tan.  I did a bit of a skive to help out there, but the results aren't something I was really proud of.  I keep wanting to put the spine on the outside of the cover, but I have a mental block about it.  I keep thinking the stresses aren't right and the spine has to be on the inside of the covers to keep from pulling on the stitching, and I don't have my mind set on how to make sure the spine sets on the outside of the cover right after I've tooled it.  And I don't like the lump on the inside, so I compensated by putting the sandwich in.  Still not happy with the results, but it works.

YinTx