Lets talk about WOW factor in leatherwork.

[bikermutt07]

5 hours ago, immiketoo said:

@bikermutt07, still waiting to hear from you!

It's a little rambly, but here goes....

 

Well, I had to reread the whole thing to gain some perspective. It seems once we can make our edges smooth and straight with decent color and stitching, we have reached the "wow" factor for the blind eyes.

  "Blind eye" is a term I use in my craft, carpentry. I always felt that if I did something that I would feel proud of in my house, the blind eyes would love it. And that has always seemed to work for me. I have had very few complaints in 25 years with my work. 

But, leather is my hobby. And I have seen some things on this site that I will probably never strive to achieve.

   When I first started coming here in late '14, some one posted a messenger bag that had dragons clawing their way out of the flap. It had a huge fantasy castle behind them and I thought "WOW"!!! 

  I knew then I was way outta my league. I don't know who did it, but it was awesome (if anyone knows let me know).

And like @YinTx said, there are just so many genres, styles, and categories. Even playing around the last 4 years, I'm discouraged by how much I haven't tried. I know tooling won't be in my skill set. It's too painful on my banged up hands. But, I'm looking forward to shoes, and more totes or a brief case. Heck, I still haven't made a decent holster for my revolver yet. 

But, I keep playing, or dreaming about it, and when I am doing it I'm having fun. I doubt I will reach anything near a master level in any aspect of leather.

So, for now, I will continue to wow folks with decent construction and maybe a cool feature or two. 

There are some members here who are held very highly in my book that I may never "wow". And that's ok by me. 

I'm here to have fun and make stuff that will out last me. And that's enough.

[YinTx]

1 hour ago, bikermutt07 said:

I don't know who did it, but it was awesome (if anyone knows let me know).

I believe it was Samar.  He has a facebook page, amazing work.  Definitely has the wow factor.  That bag is ingrained in my memory as well.  Not sure where it is on this site, I think he had a different user name at the time.  Will look around a bit.

YinTx

[YinTx]

I think this was the thread.  Very sadly, the photos are not there.

YinTx

[bikermutt07]

@YinTx, I'm pretty sure that was it. Just another reason people should post their pictures here.

Thanks.

[Retswerb]

On 5/2/2018 at 8:33 PM, YinTx said:

 

I think this was the thread.  Very sadly, the photos are not there.

 

Now that’s just cruel - two dozen replies of people gushing over his work and no pics to look at!  

[immiketoo]

4 hours ago, Retswerb said:

Now that’s just cruel - two dozen replies of people gushing over his work and no pics to look at!  

I was disappointed too, although I am pretty sure I remember it.  Oh well.  Not the last awesome piece to grace these pages.

[Rockoboy]

On ‎3‎/‎05‎/‎2018 at 9:18 AM, bikermutt07 said:

There are some members here who are held very highly in my book that I may never "wow". And that's ok by me. 

I'm here to have fun and make stuff that will out last me. And that's enough.

I totally agree with @bikermutt07.

I do what I do for my own appreciation and sense of pride in achieving something for myself.

I will never achieve the carving, stamping, stitching, cutting, design or whatever of many people on this site, but I will definitely enjoy myself with what I do manage to make.

[KingsCountyLeather]

Totally agree with @bikermutt07 and @Rockoboy

I have this knife for ages and thought it would be good for leatherwork but it never felt comfortable in my hand. I tried this stitching for the first time the other night and now it’s soo comfortable now i think I will be using it a lot more. I know it’s not the best stitching but I am really happy with it.

 

[Rockoboy]

9 minutes ago, KingsCountyLeather said:

I tried this stitching for the first time the other night

Looks like a fair effort at a baseball stitch to me. I found with my baseball stitching, I can sometimes get the thread to lay better if I 'tweak it' with a stylus.

IMHO, if all the thread on each side are laying parallel to each other, it improves the entire job.

I have a scalpel handle the same as this one, so I might try this out for myself.

[KingsCountyLeather]

I honestly didn’t try too hard with this project and because I really do like it I think I will re-do it again and be even happier with it. It was very easy to do too, I wrapped masking tape a few times around the handle and cut the seam on the knife, then I peeled the tape off and used it for my template.