Showcase 500 Art Necklaces

I have a piece in the new book Showcase 500 Art Necklaces.  I haven't seen the book yet, but my parents said they received it in the mail a few days ago.

Here's a picture my friend sent me:

Cheongju Finalist

I just found out my necklace was one of 210 pieces selected as finalists in the Cheongju International Craft Competition. The next step is to send the actual piece to Korea for the next round of judging.

last couple days

I am so glad I am done with that necklace. I finished it Saturday night. These things always take so long. There's always stupid unexpected things that make it take longer, like I had all this tape residue stuck on the front of the piece from when I put masking tape on the front to protect the finish while I was working on the back. I have no idea why masking tape left residue, I thought it wasn't supposed to? Aside from having to deal with the tape residue I still spent several hours finishing it. I'm not even sure what I was doing that took so long. I remember my teapot was the same way, the final finish took hours. I should clarify, I don't mean I am going from rough filed to final finish, I am talking about I already pretty much have the finish on it, it just has some little scuffs and things from the other work I am doing on it and I just need to reapply the finish and make sure it looks good. Still that takes hours. With this necklace I scrubbed the front with a toothbrush with soap and pumice powder, then I sanded in one direction with a "fine" grit 3M sanding sponge. The back of the piece I finished Friday night, it's sand blasted and the balled ends of the wires are polished with a flex shaft and rubber wheel.

Below: Scrubbing the piece with pumice powder. Lighter fluid (top left) was what I was using to get the tape residue off. I started using the blue painter's tape (covering the gold scales on the ends) after I realized the normal masking tape was leaving residue.


Sunday I took some more photos and did some retouching to them. The back ground I shot on was this 32" x 43" sheet with a gradient on it. It's kind of a heavy plasticy paper, but the gradient is printed on it and it's really delicate. So even though I don't use it very often, and I try to take care of it, it still has a lot of scuffs and marks on it. Which means I always have to do a lot of work in Photoshop with the healing brush taking out all the scuffs. I don't want to buy a new one cause the thing wasn't cheap and it doesn't hold up to having things set directly on it.

Below: Photo set up for most of the non-model shots.


Today I am just taking it easy and cleaning up my studio. The place always gets so messed up when I have am trying to meet a deadline. Tomorrow I have to start on all the jobs I was putting off while I was finishing my necklace. I told a lot of people I could start on their work after the 22nd. Other than my commission work, I think the green enameled bracelet will be the next thing I will make.

Below: Some random photo from when I was almost finished.

finished at last

1665 pieces, cast and hand finished.
Approximately 250 hours labor.

taking photos

My friend and his wife came over today for the photos of the scale necklace. It went ok, I think I got some good photos. I wasn't sure how it would go since I have never photographed a piece on a model before. One problem seemed to be using a fast enough shutter speed since even slight movement with a slow shutter speed will cause blur. I ended up shooting most of the photos at 1600 ISO, and then reduced some of the noise with Nik Software Dfine in Photoshop.

This was another situation where I realize how much I love digital photography. I can shoot as many photos as I want and immediately see how they are turning out. Today I ended up having to reshoot some after looking at them on the computer. If I was using film I would have to pay to have the film developed and then wait at least an hour before finding out the pics were unusable. The seam in my backdrop is visible in some of the photos, but it's not a problem. I can take it out in Photoshop with the healing brush. With film there's nothing I would be able to do about it. One has to be a better photographer to take good photos with film.

None of this is new to me, I have been shooting digital since 2005. But I was just thinking of how much more work it would be if I was using film, and I am so glad I don't have to use film. Film does have advantages, I believe 35mm can be printed bigger than photos from my 12 megapixel camera, medium format and large format can definitely be printed bigger. But I have never had a need for large prints.

I'll post the photos once I have taken the other photos of the piece.

still working on the necklace

I am taking a break from working on my necklace right now. I guess I am mostly done. Wednesday my friend's wife will come over to model the piece for some photos. I don't think the back of the piece will be finished for those photos, but that doesn't matter cause you won't be able to see it. By Friday I will finish up the back of the piece and take some more photos of it not being worn. I haven't been giving too much thought to finishing the back, it might be a more time consuming job that I am thinking. There's nothing I can do about that now, so I will worry about that when I get to it.
Time to go back to work.

scale necklace update

I'm still working on my scale necklace. I don't want to be working on it, but I am hoping to get it done in time to enter in the Cheongju competition. I have a couple other ideas for bracelets using a similar construction method, one of them is the enamel piece I am thinking about. I would much rather start on the bracelets, but I need to keep working on the necklace. Sometimes it's hard for me to stay focused on these things when I have so many other ideas. I think my attention span is shorter now than when I was younger.

Having a deadline for a competition or exhibition is good for motivating me to finish things I have been dragging out. When I enter a competition or juried exhibition I try not to think about the outcome, I just enter and try to forget about it till I hear the results. It's not too hard when I already have finished pieces to enter. But it is hard not to think about the outcome when I am working hard to try to meet a deadline. The hope that rushing to meet the deadline will pay off is what keeps me going when a deadline is coming up. But the more I think about getting into a show or competition, the harder it is when I am rejected. So sometimes when I am working hard on something like this scale necklace, I am wondering if I am just setting myself up for a big disappointment.

scale necklace and procrastination

My goal is to finish my scale necklace in time to enter in Cheongju next month. There's no reason I would not be able to finish in time, but the problem with these major pieces that get dragged out for years is they start to feel like they will never end. I started that piece in grad school in spring 2005. So while the piece is nearing completion, I am also feeling like after 4 years, is 5 more weeks really going to be all I need?

It's kind of embarrassing when a piece takes so long. Cause there usually isn't any good reason for something to take so long. I have identified 3 common reasons why my pieces end up taking way longer than they should. The scale necklace has been victim of reasons #1 and #3. My teapot was victim of reasons #1 and #2.

1. Other more important things come up that need to be finished (like work that I am actually being paid for). This happens with almost everything I am working on that does not have a deadline and I will not be paid for immediately after finishing (like work that I hope to sell in the future, rather than custom orders).

2. I have to make a decision about the design and don't know what to do. I never have pieces totally designed when I start on them. Some times I get too indecisive about certain things, and end up putting the piece down thinking I will decide later. Some times "later" is not for several months.

3. Work gets too boring/tedious. Like making these scales. Making waxes from the rubber molds, spruing trees to cast, casting, cleaning them all up. It's just so boring. The finished part of the necklace has over 100 hours of labor in it already. Boring boring monotonous labor. Or with my carved scale brooches, when I feel like I am not making any progress.

Sometimes when one of these reasons comes up and I stop working on a piece I will put it away and just forget about it.

When I sign and date a piece I usually just mark it with the year I finished it, not the years I took to finish or the year I started. I'm not sure what other people do, I usually don't bring up the topic of pieces taking years to finish due to procrastination when I talk to other jewelers or metalsmiths. I really have no idea how many other people do that sort of thing.

Pictured below are about 450 sterling scales for my necklace. They are almost ready to be attached to the necklace. I have about 50 more that I am still working on. After I attach those 500 I should be about finished except for the edges.

scale necklace

My burn out kiln broke during the summer. I kept putting off fixing it cause I didn't need to use it. I finally got around to opening it up a couple days ago. A wire had become disconnected, that was all. So I resoldered that, and it works now. I didn't even have to buy new parts.


Now that my kiln is working again I will go back to casting scales for my silver scale necklace. There is so much work to do and it is taking so long. I have not been working on it on a regular basis, but I started it in spring 2005. I work on it for a while then put it down for a long time. Usually cause I get sick of it. Its kind of depressing to work on something like this for so long. All I am doing is making the same little pieces over and over. Hundreds of them.

This is how it looked in Sept 2005. It is much bigger now, but I don't have a recent picture.


Each scale is cast sterling silver. I have 4 rubber molds of the original, so shooting the waxes goes pretty quickly. I usually cast about 20-25 at a time. It looks like I have more than that on this tree.


Cast scales.