A Knife Just Finished - Could use some feedback

[graniteguy52]

A couple of photos of a inexpensive knife I just completed. I would love to hear some feedback as to what the rest of you think of it - things I should do different or improve upon. Sorry - the photos leave a lot to be desired.
Thanks,
GordonLeupold Knife 012.jpgLeupold Knife 011.jpgLeupold Knife 010.jpg

[jetta77]

shade the backbone. the bottom scroll kind of looks like a bike from tron, too much of a flat top on it. otherwise shading looks nice

[jetta77]

also on a border of that size i would have my scrolls overlapping the edge so your design sits on top...

[rodsta]

In general the shading looks nice but you may want to vary the length of shading lines on some of the foldovers so they look more part of the leaf instead of added on. That would help the flow.
Rod

[sam]

granite_guy_critique.jpg

I think you're reasonably close to having a good design. A few things that I see that need to be addressed are:

1.) you have too many shade lines. Or I should say that you're not ready for this many shade lines yet. Until you're able to control the tones of light to grey to black, less lines will be better.

2.) the direction of the shade cuts in the two areas I've marked in red show that they don't follow the growth of the scroll, but point outside the design. Also the density is too great in some areas...too many lines = too black. The object is to go from light to grey to black in gradual tones.

3.) the backbone, in my opinion, isn't working in this design. I would have had the internal elements growing from it as opposed to it being a separate element. I think this would keep the backbone from standing out like it does.

I applaud your efforts You definitely put forth some serious work and effort into this this piece

[Ed Westerly]

First impression, very nice. Looking closer, a few backbones have flattened curves. the left side is better than the right, I'm guessing you did the right side first. I don't know if you did your layout with just the backbones first, but if not that would help you spot the misdirection more easily and correct it before cutting.
This may sound harsher than I mean for it to sound, so I'll add that I am picking nits here. I just want to give you some pointers for improvement. It is easier to improve if people don't tell you that everything you do looks fabulous!

[Tim Wells]

Others have pretty much covered everything but I would like to say that your lettering is superb! That style is harder to do well than many other letter styles. Well done.

[graniteguy52]

Thanks for the feed back,

Jeff, Tron bike needs more spring in it's frame and I agree that overlapping into the border would have added to this design. More erasing in the planning stages (wouldn't it be so much easier with an engraving eraser - "set in stone" comes to mind) is in order.

Rod, I see how some of the fold-overs stand out instead of extending the leaves - something I didn't see while engraving.

Sam, Time to drag out a practice plate and work on varying the darkness of my shading. It has taken me a bit of time to see how the marked leaf shading points outside the scroll, and finally, after getting hit with a brick of "how obvious can it be" this morning, I should not forget this lesson too soon. I think I see what you're saying about the backbone - would shading it (on this knife) make it less obvious? (like Jeff suggests)

Ed, Thanks for the comments, Truthfully I don't remember which side I did first - a disadvantage that goes along with my age (except when it comes to watching movies - there are a lot more movies to watch if you can't remember what you've already seen!) I will defer to your judgment - I did the right side first! And I'm glad those nits get picked - My wife loves my work, and loves to tell me, but I have learned nearly zero from her about engraving.

Tim, Thanks for the kind words - I have felt good about this style of lettering, and after lot of thought, realized it has been my go-to style (in drawing) for about 50 years (damn that makes me sounds old !)

Thank you all for taking time to comment - it has helped me!

Gordon Alcorn