Casting Grain & Computers

 I initially attempted to carve this ring design from wax for my lost wax casting project. It initially started off well, but I am not particularly good at carving anything, much less wax and I was running out of time, so my professor thankfully suggested I stick with 3D printing which I'm a lot better at. My first instinct was to make the design flat and then shape it as I did with the butterfly ring, but there was a lot of risk in cracking the design if I did so. I ended up going with the design on the right, but after seeing the finished ring, I rather wish I went with the left. I also ended up making the band too thick. It was initially fitted to my middle finger, but fits my thumb a lot better. Ah well you live and you learn I suppose. 

 So I originally ran this exclusively from the Fedora partition of one of my laptops and I got too comfortable with my password manager when I did something risky and broke it, but I suddenly remembered what it was so I'm back. I will continue to record the various things I make. 

So for my university program, I had to take a class called "Digital Design Fundamentals". It was really interesting, but by the end of it, I had decided that I wanted to base a piece of jewelry on a logic gate or a logic gate set. A friend suggested that I base it on the 6 NAND Positive Edge D Flip Flop as he found it particularly aesthetically pleasing, so thus this journey began. The design that I used to base off of my ring looks a bit like this. (It is a very quick sketch done on a free program for the purpose of showing the design of the ring. It is not necessarily a functional flip flop as is because the program would not allow me to make some of the proper connections)

It was predictable, but *insert shocked pikachu face here* on my part when clean up for these pieces took FOREVER, between cleaning the investment off of and out of them, and just general clean up of the pieces themselves. The d20 was especially difficult, not only did I have to get rid of the giant sprue (that was 100% my bad) but I also had to polish every single face. However, it ended up being my favorite of the three. It is decently balanced, but I don't really want to ever use it in a game for fear that it isn't as balanced as my set of approx. 40 test rolls indicated. The thimble and button turned out pretty cool though!

This actually isn't my first time trying lost wax casting. I was lucky enough to go to a high school that offered a sculpture class that taught me to carve wood, weld, and lost wax cast. That was honestly one of my favorite classes and is something that I seem to keep coming back to. If I can find my cast from then, I think I'll do a comparison between my first lost wax cast and this one which is essentially my second lol 15 year old me could never. This is a project for a university casting class that I am taking, and our task was to find things that could be melted off in a kiln and lost wax cast. I chose a button, a thimble, and a D20 die. These are to be cast in bronze and I am greatly looking forward to seeing the finished product! Here they are set in brown sticky wax and are ready for the flask to be put over them and then have investment plaster poured over them and then be put into a kiln. After the plaster is cured, they will be ready to be cast!

I am still pretty new to making jewelry and the like, and have thus run out of past projects to post about tbh. We are now in the current age of things that I am currently working on, for better or for worse! At the time at which I am writing this post, I have finalized the design shown in the first two images and have printed it, and gotten it to look the way that I wanted it. Unfortunately, however, I do not have a picture of the print and will never get a picture of it (unless I reprint of course) because I am lost wax casting the ring and the print has been burned out in a kiln. More on that whole shebang in my next post. As for the third image, I really like swans (as you've probably noticed lol) because reasons that I'm not willing to post on the internet at this point in time. It is a pendant that I designed before I decided that I wanted it on a ring more than I wanted it in a pendant. I will likely go back to it at some point, but as for right now, it remains no more t...

Here's the first and only (for now) time I've cast anything in brass. I wanted to make some brass buttons for my Taako cosplay so I made a button with the Bureau of Balance symbol in Fusion 360 and then tried sand casting it. Admittedly, sand casting might have not been the best casting method to do this particular design in, but alas it was the only option immediately available to me. I also didn't like the way that the brass looked once cast. I could have drilled the button holes in using a drill press, but I no longer wanted to do all of the buttons in brass for aesthetic reasons. I instead opted for printing them and then painting them with a metallic paint. I have yet to find a purpose for the failed brass button, but I don't want to melt it down and make something else either. I think I might try to make it into a pendant or key chain at some point in the future.