FMP Cut It Out 21 April

FMP   Cut It Out   21 April

With another day done, I had to start making some major progress in order to finish my project in time. These half days are no help. I started with sorting out how to set up my jewellery bench. With the college having limited supplies and tools, I was happy to see that they not only had a proper jewellery bench, but it was one that could be set up and moved. This was extra useful today because it seems that everyone was in 3D.

Once I had my bench up working, and I set my chair up, I could clamp my copper to the bench and start cutting. This was a long and slow process. I had to make sure that I didn't go over the template I had drawn over the copper. Every now and then I had to keep changing the position of the copper so that I could access it.

Because the section I wanted to cut out was in the centre of the copper, I had to be careful to get the right angle for the blade. Keeping that in mind, the thin blade could be easily snapped if I twisted it while I cut. I started by cutting out a small section in order to give my hand saw room to turn and manoeuvre so I would be less likely to make mistakes and snap my blade.

After continuing with this method, I managed to cut out my centre diamond shape from my template. This has given me a lot of things to think about as the time it took me to do this was a lot longer than I thought. Seeing as this was my second time using the hand saw, I'm sure that after a little while and a bit more practice, I will be a lot quicker.

I then moved onto making the edges as clean and smooth as possible, filing down all uneven and rough edges so that I could then move onto cutting out the rest of the template and making the hinge tomorrow. Once some of the filing was done, I was called in to discuss and analyse my sketchbook.

Luckily what was said was positive. There were some very interesting comments and suggestions on research and things to look into, such as the fashion industry. I could also look with more detail about how bespoke designers work with the customer to create something that they are happy with. I know through my project that getting the balance of your style and the customers need is a challenging thing to do. Every step you take with the product you create then has to me approved by the client, and if they are unhappy, it has to be changed. In order to do this the designer then has to give themselves time to redesign in case of any changes that need to be done.

With another day done I'm starting to get somewhere with my work. I should be able to get a lot of work done tomorrow and be one step closer to finishing.