Some "stick and pick" work in progress

It's ironic that you posted this because I was thinking a couple of weeks ago about what a scene would look like with the animal going away from the viewer rather than the typical "portrait" style poses. It was a photo I saw that made me think of it and now I wish I'd saved it…

Those brass double ended pin vises are a watchmaker thing and could probably be found on one of their forums or at a "mart" that the NAWCC hosts from time to time. I have one myself and they seem common enough but they're old.

Edit: I just did a search and while not exactly like the ones we have, there are some similar ones made by Grobet and of course other knockoffs that are about 8 bucks. Ebay, Midway USA, Amazon all have them. I saw the very one I have on ebay but the collets are pretty beat up. Searched for "watchmakers pin vise".

Thanks for the comment Roger...I will discuss that with the bluer.

Hey Tim, those "south" end photos are hard to come by. I had to extrapolate from the two I found to make what I wanted. By the way, my "smartphone" is so smart it stays at home on the wall where it belongs!

Dang, Sam, that's nice. I recently finished my first animal. A Kudu. It looked like a Holstein cow that got run over by a Borden milk truck by the time I got finished with it.

It is always good to see a master at work.

The man that use to do my rust bluing use to take the rust off by hand using steel wool, He wouldn't put it near the carding wheel and that worked well.
Thanks for the response, Always a key factor with the bulino scenes on how they are finished. Thanks again.

Thanks for the comment Jerry. It is nice to see you posting on the forum. For those of you who do not know Jerry, he is an exceptional knife maker, bladesmith and also engraves his own knives. Keep posting Jerry, and show us some of your work!

PS...my first animals (40 plus years ago) almost looked as good as your kudu...

Here is the finished floorplate. Now on to the rest of the metal, which will get scroll work and a bit of gold line work along with a small amount of lettering on the barrel.

That is wonderful. I love it. So graceful.