Couldn't resist. I have a client who is getting married soon. No, that's not distressing news. They're wonderful together and very happy as they should be. But they do want an antique/distressed look on their rings, a look that says the ring has been out in the elements for decades, of not centuries.
I have a number of tricks up my sleeve on this one, but I thought I'd start with hammers. I have a couple of hammers I use for transferring earthy textures. One hammer, a cheap, Pakistan-made chasing hammer, I deliberately cut using cutting tools I have here in the studio. The other hammer surface was "made" the old-fashioned way - by beating it against concrete. Both yield interesting textures, one clearly more aggressive than the other. See below:
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| Beaten on concrete. A few nicks with a diamond wheel. |
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| Criss-crossed with a cutoff wheel. |
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| It's a cheap hammer, but a real favorite. It's reserved entirely for texture work now. |
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| On a piece of copper scrap, first hammered to add texture, then filed a bit to take the high edges off. |
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| Hammered first with the chasing hammer, then filed a bit, then hammered with the hammer that received the concrete treatment. |
Shortly, I plan to have more to show you, with a couple of real rings, next time in 950 palladium.
5 comments:
Thanks for sharing John- interesting textures.
Thanks Sylvia. We'll see how it turns out on something that counts!
A question - Do you anneal before texturing with a hammer?
No, too much work! (Might even require handle removal). I just cut the faces with tooling that's hard enough for the job.
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