February Challenge - "That's new to me"

Erin Austin Our February team challenge was

"That's new to me" 

Make something totally new to you (i.e. new technology, new technique, thing you never did and so on...).
If you fill like sharing please tell us about your experience in few lines.....

Kerry Alice / Twigs and Heather 

 "This is my first attempt at making a cut-out in the back of a bezel. I like it! The ring is pretty comfy too. Man, I think I'm getting the hang of making rings a little more!!!"

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Shirlee / Lichen & Lychee Jewelry

 

" I've never before done a turtle setting, not that they're hard but just never had a project that called for that style. This one did. I've been playing with the idea of embroidering through metal for a LONG time and this finally popped out."

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Maria Whetman / Fluxplay

"Here's my "first time I've tried it" entry for working with sheet pewter and soldering it together. Inspired by my cluncky damaged left knee which is soon to be operated upon. There are 3 forged forms soldered together. The small dome is soldered from the back into a hole sawn into the largest form. Shaped with Bossing Mallet and BallPein hammer, textured with BallPein and Creasing Hammer and a grit-blaster. I already do lots of casting with Pewter such as 3 and 4-part cuttlefish moulds for 3-D pieces and 2-part sand cast moulds for making 3D pieces, but I've never ever worked with sheet or soldered it. I found the forming lots of fun, it's beautiful stuff to work with but I failed at fusing it (melted 2 pieces altogether) and my soldering here, is not great. I'll need lots of practice and a finer flame. I have a couple of books I'm referring to, but being used to high silver soldering temperatures, I think that soldering and fusing pewter will take me a while to learn. "

"Here is a 2nd "first time ever tried" experiment. I learned to crochet over Christmas (my metals workshop was frozen over, so I was stuck in the house). These are my first ever, tentative efforts at 3D forms in crochet. Since these, I have become addicted to the calming activity of crochet and I've made 3 hats, a skirt and am now into a jumper. I will come back to crochet in wire in the future. "

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Erin Austin 

"Today I tried out the origami pleat fold in metal for the first time. It was quite the challenge to get the final shrimp form as I started with 26 gauge and was folding 4 layers at the end. I need to remember to think about what gauge I'll be dealing with in the final folds when selecting the starting gauge. The smaller ring is out of 30 gauge and was really fun to make. "

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Inbar Bareket

"Playing with inlay + rolling mill + patina + hammer 

I love the rough look"

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Our March Challenge due to February 28th is:

"Space"

The first Spacewalk by Soviet Cosmonaut was on March 18th, 1965

NASA website