ICAP: One Done NOW WITH BETTER PHOTOS!

I pulled out the photo cube setup today to take some pictures of new listings for the store, so while I had it out I took some better photos of the One necklace for ICAP.  Here are the photos made with the pretty lights:

I've also enabled commenting, kids, so have at it!

ICAP: Break Saw Blade, Cuss, Threepeat

So, now that One's done my brain has returned to the Three design.  I've got two competing designs in mind and I can't decide between them.  Fortunately, both require lots of little 3 shapes to be cut out of copper.

To create the 3s, first I made a template out of cardstock, and I traced the template onto the copper sheet using a sharpie.  I started by using the scrap copper left from cutting out the 2s.  If you look, you can see the curve of the upside down two on the edge of this piece of scrap.

Then I use the jeweler's saw to carefully cut out the shape.  This involves lots of a) broken saw blades, b) cussing, c) more broken saw blades and d) more cussing.  Basically, there's a lot of cussing involved in sawing.  And that's VERY satisfying.

This shot, by the way, is not really me sawing.  I can't saw and hold the camera at the same time.  I only have two arms.  Anyway, lots of horrible sawing noises later, and I have some small copper three components to play with.

Next, I'll have to file them to make the edges smooth and make sure no one cuts themselves on sharp corners.  After they've been filed, then the fun part begins:  texturing.

ICAP: One Done

I've been working on the necklaces, but not blogging about them.  Partly this is because I'm not used to taking pictures while I work, so I was just working away without documenting anything.

Thanks to the lovely jump rings, I was able to finish the One Necklace.  First I used the bubble hammer to texture the big ones, and then I started punching holes and using jump rings to put it all together.  I also "oxidized" the words on the strips using a permanent marker and put a light coat of Renaissance wax to inhibit tarnish.  Wanna see?  It's not the pretty product shot that I take with special lights and a photo cube, but it's enough to give you a sneak peek:

The necklace looks even better on a person than on the jewelry bust!

ICAP: All the Little Bitty Parts

In any design, there comes a point where I just have to put it together.  I can imagine what it will look like if something goes here or there, but it's not the same as seeing all the components pieced together.  In order to put the One necklace together, I had to make my own jump rings.  Jump rings are those tiny circles of metal which hold links and components together.  For some odd reason, circular copper jump rings are very hard to find in jewelry and bead catalogs.  So, I hauled out the trusty interwebs, watched a bunch of videos, and figured out how to make my own.

First, you have to coil your copper wire on a mandrel.  Of course, I don't have a mandrel of this size and I didn't put one in the budget.  So I prowled around the garage and found a....a nail!  That works.  Then I put the nail and the copper wire in the drill chuck and slowly coiled the copper wire onto it.

Then, I had to undo everything, slide the coiled wire off the nail and use a jeweler's saw to cut the rings.  This is a little nervewracking because I had to hold the tiny coil in my fingers.  I was certain I was about to make "Saw IV:  The Necklace" WITHOUT the fake blood.  Fortunately, if you go really slow and use lots of CutLube (keep your minds OUT of the gutter, thank you) there is no cutting of fingers.

As I cut, the jump rings just fell onto the bench block.  And my lap.  And the floor.  And there's one in the basket of stamping supplies...I think.

After the cutting is complete, the jump rings are all bent and not in one plane. That's not going to work well, so I patiently tap them all with a plastic mallet to flatten them.

Yeah for jump rings!  Now I can start putting the One and Two necklaces together to see what they look like.

ICAP: Two Too To Tutu Necklace

The two necklace.  This piece is the easiest of the four necklaces, I think, because the design has been clearest in my mind since the beginning.  I love the swoops of the 2s, and want to use them to create this lovely set of drops.  So, first I spent a couple of days sawing out five number 2 shapes.  I swear, I was dreaming about the number 2 by the end of this.

After what seemed like endless sawing and filing, I started stamping the second verse.  I was terrified I'd reverse a letter and have to start all over, but I managed to stamp correctly.  (If you see a spelling error DON'T TELL ME.)  Then I went out in the 35 degree weather and pounded these on my driveway to add texture.  I was freezing by the end of it.  The texture doesn't look so great in these quickie photos for the blog, but it'll look good when I get out the photo cube and lights out for the final product shot.

ICAP: One Necklace...Like an Ostrich

I'm slowly working on the "one" necklace for this project.  This weekend, I started by stamping the lines of the poem into copper.  For some reason my brain snagged on the line "like a ostrich" and I kept humming "Like an o-o-o-o-strich, touched for the very first time...."  Thank you Madonna, for scarring my brain.  Then I cut out a 1 shape as well as strips of copper with the words from the first stanza stamped on them.  Initially, I thought I would go with this design:

But I don't really like the way it looks.  Even though it does look birdlike...like an ostrich!  I decided to cut out a second "one" and use the ones to make a v.  I have two ones instead of one one in the designs.  Maybe no one will notice it's now an Eleven necklace.

Today I was working on texturing the components.  The changes I made are very subtle.  I used a center punch to mark where the holes would go in the poetry strips and punched the holes. I used a "1" stamp to create a line of ones in the big copper ones.  It reminds me of the seam in a baseball, which is ONE continuous seam.  Ha.  It's a one.

I may still use the bubble hammer on the big copper ones.  I also need to put holes in the big copper ones so I can attach the poetry strips.  I'm not quite done with this one (ha!  see my bad pun?)  My plan is to walk away and work on the 2 necklace for a while before finishing this piece.