Today I Crafted

[kerravonsen]

After my visitors had left (a good time was had by all), I started playing around with some of my recent purchases. First I watched a long video on youtube about metal stamping, then I attempted to stamp some metal. It did not work very well at all. I think I need to get a two-pound hammer. Or to give up on stamping and get a texture hammer - texture hammering seems to be easier, partly because it is required to be random.

So then I took my ballpein hammer and hammered some of the copper tags (the Anodized Aluminium attempt I simply threw out) so as to cover up the failed stampings and get some nice texture in. Which I did. Then I tried a few different methods of colouring and finishing. One I did blue permanent pen, then steel wool to take off the top layer, and that looked rather nice. Then I did something similar with a copper tag which had previously been given a brown patina (that one didn't stand out so much). Then I made a mistake: I was over-generous in my application of my newly-purchased Vintaj Glaze... and instead of drying, it started oxidizing the copper in one case, and dissolving the ink in the other case. So I had to give up on those two and scrub them back to bare metal. (sigh)

What I then tried - which did actually work, mostly, though it had its own problems (there is glittery stuff all over my clothing) was embossing ink + embossing powder + heat gun. Six pendants came out of that effort. (See below)


Various pendants, decorated with embossing powder. The round ones are black Anodized Aluminium; the square one is hammered copper.

I like the top two, but I don't much like the other four. (sigh)

The copper one was first textured, then had embossing ink pen draw jagged hatchings over it, then silver embossing powder, then embossing ink over the whole of it, then clear embossing powder. That makes a much better seal than the Vintaj glaze, all nice and smooth.

The round tags were done with either pens or rubber stamps, but the rubber stamps were a bit blurry. Then I went over them again with more embossing ink and more embossing powder and more rounds of the heat gun. Some of them built up quite nicely, others were a bit of a mess, which I then tried to fix up.

I'm pondering whether I should throw out the bottom four pendants, since I don't like them.

Comments

[tree_and_leaf]

These are awesome!

[kerravonsen]

Thank you!

[capri0mni]

Hooray for experimentation!

[kerravonsen]

8-)

[watervole]

The middle two are beautiful! (and I like the bottom two as well)

[watervole]

There's a lovely organic feel to them, like coral.

[kerravonsen]

Thank you. 8-)

[vilakins]

Gorgeous! Actually I really like the last four, especially the tree and the silver spirals.

[kerravonsen]

Thank you!
I've decided I want to get more colours of embossing powder. 8-)

[saki101.livejournal.com]

Don't throw out the bottom four! I like them. Perhaps you will come to like them, or some of your friends will like them.

I see why you favour the top two, they are lovely. The colour and shine of copper is entrancing (I actually like it better than yellow or white gold); it must be beautiful to work on. The design of the other is evocative, forest-like with things glimpsed beyond the branches including a starry sky.

Of the bottom four, the upper left reminds me of fireworks and the bottom right of feathers.

What a day's work!

[kerravonsen]

Yes, I'm growing to like copper very much.

I think part of my frowning at the bottom four is that they all didn't turn out the way I wanted, all of them had to be "fixed up" from the mess they became:

Top left: I was trying for something similar to the copper square but put too much ink on, so the centre was a big blurry blob. I fixed it by overlaying the "firework" lines, first in copper-coloured embossing, then in brown.
Top right: that was a leaf stamp, but it was much too blurry. Overlaid it with thinner lines of copper, but I don't think that improved it much.
Bottom left: a curly stamp that was even blurrier because it slipped. Overlaid it with a thin line of black, to get back the original curl-thing.
Bottom right: such a mess-up that I basically obliterated the original design, putting layers on layers so you couldn't see it any more. Very ad-hoc.

[saki101.livejournal.com]

Was it mainly frustrating or did it spur some new ideas?

[kerravonsen]

A bit of both. One thing I would like to try in future is to see how putting black embossing powder on top of a few layers of other colours works, since it gave an interesting effect with the pendant on the bottom right.

[vjezkova.livejournal.com]

This is somthing I have never heard of! But i have seen similar pendants. Hoy can you say you don´t like those four ones? I think this is another magic here!

[kerravonsen]

8-) Thanks.

The pendants you saw may have been enamelled rather than using embossing powder. Embossing powder is normally used with paper-craft, to create raised images; embossing ink is a special slow-drying ink so that the powder will stick to it. I think it is called "embossing" powder because it is a way of getting a raised design, while the other more standard method of getting a raised design on paper is by using a press and a raised metal plate with a design on it to create a raised design, and that method is called "embossing".

Enamelling is similar to embossing powder + ink - there is a sticky medium, and powder that you sprinkle on it. But in this case, the powder is powdered glass, and you have to apply much greater heat, either in a kiln, or with a butane torch. I didn't feel like laying out for that sort of equipment! Not to mention, really hot very dangerous.

[vjezkova.livejournal.com]

Wow! Thank you very much for your explanation, this is very interesting. How much skill, art and work is behind such a tiny pendant! I really didn´t have an idea about these techiques and you are right, I probably saw enamelled ones.
And I admire your art, skill and knowledge even more!!!

[jaxomsride.livejournal.com]

The bottom four have their own charm, I actually really like the top right and bottom left of the four. Top right makes me think of red coral.

[kerravonsen]

8-)

Top right was based on a leaf stamp that was too big for the disk. 8-/

[catyah.livejournal.com]

I really do like all of them, they've each got an individual charm and interest of their own.

[kerravonsen]

8-)

[sallymn.livejournal.com]

I especially like the first one but also the last and the third last one :) They're very clever!

[kerravonsen]

Thank you!

[entropy-house.livejournal.com]

My favorite is the middle right! Definitely looks like coral branch. But they're all nice. I wouldn't throw any of them away. You might like them better if they were on a necklace with simple, solid color beads (maybe onyx or jet?) to set them off.

[kerravonsen]

Hmm, that's a thought. Or some black + metallic beads as highlights. I have some black + gold and black + copper beads that could do nicely.