maybe I should leave him here for several years til I know what I'm doing better? how do I learn to really master this craft? I've seen some bulino masters work area by area to perfection. I wonder how they ensure no scratches to the surrounding metal and how they sharpen and hold their chisels... how they make such tiny dots compared to mine. I'm wishing I had someone to sit over my shoulder and tell me where I'm going wrong... what they do that I don't and so on
having a go at a cat in 925 but it's so very hard to make small enough cuts. soft fur is tough too. and light shades of grey that still indicate fluff and shape etc. kitty is a good challenge.
thankyou thankyou thankyou
line engraving is a nice easy to see and efficient way of doing things. those are cool. I'd be tempted to sand at the little lips that form beside cuts in softer metals from the downward pressure of the graver displacing metal as you're cutting. but that's just me. you could even polish or leave them satin and optionally mix methods in where the cross-hatching is. like some burring out blended to nothing and stippling like in a background but blended to nothing. in Lindsay tool terms super super find gentle stippling can be achieved with even like 5psi and extreme gentleness. it's faster than cutting your dots out with a chisel but again you get lips from displacing metal which MUST be sanded off in my most humblest of opinions.
