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Well, I've given this a lot of thought. Considering there have been no comments, safe to say, this blog has been for my benefit. And it's been fun, but honestly, the reason I picked up anticlastic forging was to distract myself while waiting to create in my Precious Metalsmithing class at the Craft Barn.

Now, I've made my first ring. I have one class to go out of the 6 week, once an evening class. And I know I've learned the basics, and this is what I want to take and run with.

I"ve got a good start.

One life to live.

Give yourself permission to change your mind. ;)

Day 28

Yes, I eased up on the 'every day or else' mentality! Dayjob work starts soon, and I'm beginning silversmithing, which began at the same time as hammering! Here's my first ring:

..and reluctantly I have to accept that there are only so many hours in a day.

Before

 On to copper! I wanted another stubby. I still sometimes confuse which way the curve goes when hammered.

After

I am thinking simple pendants. AND I needed to do something polar opposite from spidey yesterday. :D

Day 26

12:33 - Close enough, time wise!

Before

Middle

After

So it was interesting to shape and hammer, but not that much fun to play with. Sort of a part upside tarantula take in metal.  : /

Day 25

First some fun with galpal Jill and the stamps we ordered. Still planning to add a stone.

11:49pm : Thought this would be interesting. Although I was disappointed at how little the metal moved, compared to how yesterdays did! I really expected the thinner half to move more. Although now it seems obvious why it wouldn't. 

Before

It was still fun to move around. A pretty gold color too, after pickling and heat coloring. Looks gold!I wonder how that happened?

After

Day 24

7:55pm - I wanted skinny on yesterday, so I made tall and skinny! I tried to hammer halfway in the width, but I wasn't always successful.

Before

 I hammered until it formed a full circle. Quenched in water, pickled in vinegar.

After

Fun! I annealed (score!) and it was fun to twist up. Serpent-ish. And I wanted to combine it with yesterday's stumpy. Here are the two entwined, with a Mexican Crazy Lace egg shaped cab nestled in stumpy. I also got the chance to polish a bit with bobbing compound on my new toys, and heat colored it. Although if I solder on a bezeled stone, I'll have to repeat that.

How do you like my new lighting set-up? I need darker paper I see. Work in progress!

Day 23

11:12 pm: Skip today. Unless you want to be bored. : /

Before

I had high hopes! I was thinking it would turn into a tall curling tip, and a ruffled 'flower' on the end. Silly me. So did not happen. It got 1/2 again as tall, not much of a curve, and I got what I *should* have known would be a stubby leaf. If I had more experience. Which is why I'm doing this blog!

After

Here's 'stubby.'

Tomorrow, I'm going to try and do a narrow double strip and see if I can put it together. Hmmmmm...

Day 22

10:01pm:
Well. I finally figured out that I've been doing this whole thing 1/2 baked.

 Or in this case, 1/2 annealed.

I'd like to preface this that I have no experience with heating up metal. So when I read that you needed to get it hot, I figured it was hot enough when I got the nice pretty red colors on copper. When I read about Lawton-Brain suggesting that you should 'open' the copper shapes with quickly with your hands, I just thought, 'Wow, he has strong hands!' The copper still moved, just not as much as pictures I've seen. But I'm just beginning, so I thought it was hammer facility~

before

I started with the basic shape, my objective was trying to get it to ruffle. Pretty ruffles that I've seen googling 'anticlastic.' I read somewhere that you hammer the unfolded side. I did that yesterday. It was different than hammering the folded side, but no ruffles. Then I thought, well, maybe I need to hammer one time on the unfolded side, creating hammer marks that would work like dams, and then continue to hammer the folded side. NO ruffles.

Then, in my slow logic, I remembered my class from last Wednesday, and the teacher was showing us with silver, how it needed to glow a deep red, almost molten! for it to be annealed. And then I remembered the night before when I soldered the thin 30g copper bezel, and how it turned slightly molten looking and ended up a dark grey blue, and after I quenched it, it was like butter!

So I heated it up. Until it was past the pretty colors. Past the light torch trails tracking on the metal. Until it was a dark blue steel color. Then I quenched it.

WOW. It was soft. I felt like Superman manipulating it!

After

Of course, I will have to polish it and color it, since it will have to be pickled to get rid of the residue, but this opens up things for me! (see what I did there?)

Day 21

Before

  8:46pm - I wanted to try a square piece of copper. Paper jet, anyone? 

After hammering, it was...uninspiring. Maybe more aero, but not interesting at all to me.

So the good thing about this is the freedom to do any darn thing I want. So I got out my snips.

NOW here's a discovery I made. I don't need tin snips to cut this gauge of copper sheet! Argh. I just ordered not one, but two different kinds of cutters. 

My many year old Fiskars cutters work just fine. Sigh.

Snipped

So I snipped. Those little flaps are removed, and I hammered more.

End...almost

It's only a bezel loosely around my agatized dino cab, because I still don't have tools to solder at home. Or...sheet copper for the bottom. But you get the idea! I like the curl over the cab. And the inklings of adding wire wrapping murmured in my inner ear. 

To leave myself freedom to fill 365 days, some days will be handforging, others may be putting components together, and 'finished pieces' or ideas pieced together. Yes, I already began stressing how this is going to work when I go back to work after summer is over, and already looking at my 'to do' as far as other obligations. 

AND, thankfully, I think my spending spree is pretty much over, and I should have the basics of what I need on it's way.

NOTE: Borax and salt for homemade flux bombed. 

Day 20

A pair!

11:46: So I made a matching pair! Luckily, I took pictures yesterday of the shape after I was done hammering it, or I wouldn't have been able to match them as well as they did...that's something to remember, if I don't do them at the same time!
- which is not likely, but hey.

Day 19

Rockhound friend, Daniel, shared the work of Charles Lawton-Brain with me!!! One day, one year, I'll have to make a pilgrimage to one of Mr. Lawton-Brain's workshops!

So inspired, I am taking 2 days to create a pair of 'Rueger Fold' earrings!

Before

one hammered

An earring!

11:08pm - My challenge is to make a matching earring tomorrow.

Day 18

Before

11:45pm: Under the line! Well, actually I got it done earlier, but I was gaming with family. Yeah, I'm one of those. Well, I wanted to try this again, but hammer on one side, on each half. Got it?

Hmmmm.

after

We have some scroll action! Add copper plate with word and rings. Maybe word plate vertical to the left. Note to self: order alphabet punches.

Day 17

Before

3:03pm - Went back to acute angles and trimming corners on my original 1" x 3" copper rectangles.  Because I CAN. And I found these anodized aluminum sheets to put under my anvil, and over the wood counter, especially when I'm playing with a micro-torch. I wanted to buy a ceramic tile, but 1) I'm cheap.
2) It would probably crack from my hammering. duh.

Part way

8:33pm - So I have figured out that hammering on one side causes it to curl in that direction. And I wonder if that effects the final piece. Maybe. I'll find out tomorrow!

Scroll,anyone?

It looked like a scroll to me! So I cut out and added a little copper plate that has room for a word. Like 'kittens'....or something. And the cab is a purple CA obsidian from Kris and Jo via Paul.  Yes, it's scotch taped on for the photo op. I so need to learn how to bezel soon. And buy a set of alphabet punches. Sigh.

Day 16

11:10am - Aw, cute! It's a little shed.

I'm already getting distracted to do other things, other hobbies. I have purses to sew, socks to knit, rocks to slab and cab. Silver to solder!! Much less my dayjob when school starts. And cleaning house...bwahahahahahh! snort.

So I'll undoubtedly do things like this to entertain myself. 349 days to go.

Before

After

7:09 - Yes, I split it, layered it. As soon as I learn how to solder (I ordered a book from Amazon) and bezel (hopefully this week in my silversmithing class) this will be a pendant. Malachite I cabbed. Hint: for malachite, I go to the basket of already polished pieces of tumbled rocks at the local rock shop.
That way I can choose the best patterns that are perfect little cab sized nuggets. There can be a lot of uninteresting malachite buying rough.

Day 15

8:31am - Back to basics, sort of. Will it end up looking like a tribble?

Before

6:04pm - I made an earring! ONE earring, alas. It's so light, and strong! Soon, I need to make a pair of earrings.

Day 14

8:09am - A variation of yesterday. And posting the before early in case, of you know, difficulties.

Before

After

11:18pm - A bit predictable, yes? Which is nice! I keep seeing round cabs with these.

Day 13

I claim technical difficulties. I did my fold yesterday but am posting today EARLY BEFORE COFFEE.
Note: Do NOT accidentally lock me out of the house when the cookies are almost done. I don't react well.

The fold

oops

1:00pm - What can I say. We fought. It was going in opposite directions, just like I folded it.

Soldered and cozy with an ammonite

 2:00pm - Bubby showed me how he solders copper pipe. And then I play with his Dremel to clean up the solder and sharp parts. I think I'm in love with the Dremel!

Day 12

10:45pm - Hey, this format sure makes it easy to make a title for my posts!

But a bowtie. I need to order scissors. I'm tire of my tin snips.

I'm thinking a round carnelian in a bezel would look nice on this. 

Day 11

9:10pm - Not only am I working with REAL jewelry tools, I'm working in my new 'studio'! INDOORS.
Okay, more like in a shed in the backyard, but it's IN a door to sit down in a chair to hammer! I hope this doesn't spoil me....

Day 10

 11:07pm - I've taken to hammering folds that aren't 'opposing' - it seems that the curve is countering if too close in proximity! Small labradorite cab will be bezeled and soldered in where it sits in the pic.

I've upgraded! My little 4oz. jeweler's hammer and steel plate 'anvil' arrived today. I admit the copper is MUCH less beaten up. 

Old

New!

Day 9

10:28pm - Just got back from my brother's new place. Now to experiment hammering and torching in the dark! Stay tuned...

11:59pm - Advantages - could see the flame so well, I know my little butane is getting a clogged tip. Disadvantage - Realizing my front porch light goes out after every few of minutes, unless I stand up a wave at the light to trigger the motion sensor.

I don't stop playing with the anticlastic, until I can see how it can hold a stone. That's it's purpose to this rockhound. I find my folds made it seem less organic, and I find I enjoyed it a little less.

Stone is an unfinished lemon chrysoprase.

Day 8

Introducing Anticlastic Daily v.II!!

Starting on this memorable Day 8, I'm going to start taking pictures of the copper before, so this might actually be useful for me if I want to recreate a fold.

I wanted to try thinner, and it's a simple fold, but not too exciting, but a nice stone in the lower left would do wonders.

...but that would be v.III, after I learn how to solder.