Last week I attended Diane Scalese flare cut engraving class at the GRS Training Center and I would like to share some of my work from that class. I was very happy with the results from the class. I learned alot from Diane. She is a great teacher. Please any and all critique.
You are catching on to the technique very well. Your cuts appear very uniform as to depth, and the flow is smooth and continuous. The only problem area I see is that some of your lines don't exactly line up after one element crosses under another. Sometimes the under element seems to have grown in width when it emerges. Just watch for that in the future, and your work will really pop.
Well Cody, It looks like your headed down a good road,time well spent with a great instructor.Hope to see some of your upcoming works!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I would say that is very clean cutting, and Diane is a great teacher, congratulations!
As to critique, Ed made some valuable points.
Winging it can be fun, however if your intended design is symmetrical, some grid lines can be helpful. Human eyes, without training, are expert in noticing small deviations from intended symmetry. We are sensitive to tiny changes in faces, etc., so free flow floral is good for winging it. I took one half of your nicely cut pattern and flipped it to a mirror image, as a comparison, which balances it in one axis?
Another tip is when you have an underlying curve or scroll, cut it first, but cut it very lightly where you intend the overlying element to impinge, this gives a continuous line that can be thickened later where necessary. The thin light line is wiped out by the overlaying element.
the design & cutting are truly nice. not a critique-- but how would this look with a lightly textured, dark background ? i think it would be even better that way.