Rusticated Pot and reject blowfish

[Ocelot55]

Well I finished up two more this week. The first is my first blowfish (calm down, Ernie! I started it before you posted TJ's comments on how newbies shouldn't ever attempt a blowfish without first completing three thousand straight billiards)

I was pretty pleased with it, but when I was stamping it I broke off the shank extension. I glued it back together and now I have an interesting little shop pipe.









The next is a simple black rusticated pot. Not much to write home about. As usual any critique is greatly appreciated.

[wisemanpipes]

that pot is very nice ocelot. love the cant of the bowl!
is that blowfish vibrating or did you double stamp
all jokes aside
opinions:
it does look like the extension on the blowfish really ISNT all that flush, but its probably because it broke.
i would have liked to see the blowfish in a darker contrast stain since it doesnt have the WOW grain of a virgin pipe but other than that i like em.
very nice work, and take my opinions FWTW!

-evan

[The Smoking Yeti]

Question- how did you attach the shank extension in the first place?

I wouldn't quite call the first one a blowfish, however, I find the aesthetic very interesting and compelling. I think you need to do a 2.0, and play with the lines, especially the concavity along the sides. I think this design has a lot of potential if you choose to explore it!

About the stain though- it looks like you did a subtle contrast stain, didn't you? The effect is nice and subtle to me, perhaps something a bit more poppin' would be cool too, but idk, It looks beautiful!

[wisemanpipes]

Question- how did you attach the shank extension in the first place?

I wouldn't quite call the first one a blowfish, however, I find the aesthetic very interesting and compelling. I think you need to do a 2.0, and play with the lines, especially the concavity along the sides. I think this design has a lot of potential if you choose to explore it!

About the stain though- it looks like you did a subtle contrast stain, didn't you? The effect is nice and subtle to me, perhaps something a bit more poppin' would be cool too, but idk, It looks beautiful!

yeti, why isnt it a blowfish to you? what is it missing. is it a fugu?! whatever the difference may be (i thought fugu was just japanese or something for blowfish).
and yes it looks like a sutble contrast, but your right it needs more pop in the grain.

-evan

[W.Pastuch]

i would have liked to see the blowfish in a darker contrast stain since it doesnt have the WOW grain of a virgin pipe

That's an interesting opinion. I actually see it almost the other way round.
You need nice grain if you want to contrast stain it- you are emphasizing the grain, so it has to be very good in the first place. If you do a contrast stain on a pipe with mediocre grain you're just wasting stain to bring out something that doesn't really deserve it (unless you're covering small sandpits, but then a plain dark stain is enough).
On the other hand, I don't think an unstained pipe needs to have WOW grain at all- if it is flawless enough to be left unstained, then leaving it a virgin is always a good choice because you are simply leaving it the way mother nature created it.
That's just my humble opinion

[The Smoking Yeti]

It lacks the stark asymmetry you find in a blowfish shape- it's a bit asymmetric sure, but not the same way a blowfish is.

This strikes me as a blowfish, http://assets.smokingpipes.com/images/p ... 0005_2.jpg

See how the panel on the left side is way larger and bulges whilst the panel on the right seems to be sucked in? Just my two cents possibly, but something along those lines is aesthetically necessary for it to really be a blowfish- now, I know this subject will devolve into endless and unresolvable debate, but that's why I said I didn't think it was a true blowfish.

I still think it's a sweet shape with lots of potential for development and experimentation, I just would hesitate to call it a blowfish.

[rijks]

Blowfish or not, it's a pretty good one !
Congrat'

Best regards,

[Ocelot55]

It lacks the stark asymmetry you find in a blowfish shape- it's a bit asymmetric sure, but not the same way a blowfish is.

This strikes me as a blowfish, http://assets.smokingpipes.com/images/p ... 0005_2.jpg

See how the panel on the left side is way larger and bulges whilst the panel on the right seems to be sucked in? Just my two cents possibly, but something along those lines is aesthetically necessary for it to really be a blowfish- now, I know this subject will devolve into endless and unresolvable debate, but that's why I said I didn't think it was a true blowfish.

Interesting observation. You might be on to something. So what you're saying is make the asymmetry more exaggerated?

[Ocelot55]

Question- how did you attach the shank extension in the first place?... About the stain though- it looks like you did a subtle contrast stain, didn't you? The effect is nice and subtle to me, perhaps something a bit more poppin' would be cool too, but idk, It looks beautiful!

Shank extension was trouble from the get go. At First I turned a tenon on the end of the stummel and put my zebrawood and ebonite ring on that. Somehow during the process I screwed things up. I thought I was going to have to discard the block, but instead I decided to turn the tenon on my zebrawood and insert it into a mortise on the stummel, just reverse things. The tenon on the zebrawood really wasn't long enough for a really good hold. With enough pressure it broke the tenon on the extension.

There is a light contrast stain. For this one I used light brown. I thought about a darker contrast, but I felt this matched the zebrawood pretty well. Plus the briar was very clean.

[The Smoking Yeti]

Ah gotcha, I'm not quite sure if more exaggerated will work. The concave panels aren't quite blowfishy to me, but I do think they're worth exploring more in future designs, they're very interesting.

As for the tenon, sometimes I use 3/8" delrin sleeves, they work nais.