engraver/jeweler/metalsmith mindset

[simone-cervellati]

I've been thinking about this for a while, and probably writing it down is sinning by pride.

My teacher once told me: "people that do this stuff are not normal, you have to be a bit crazy to do our job", then he thought about it and said: "Hell, I AM more than a bit crazy" then thought about it some more and said to me: "Ye'r crazy too, that's why you like this stuff!"

I don't think we're crazy, I started to think metalworking is making me smarter or, at least, sharper, hence I look crazy to the rest of the world.

I've been on this "train" for two years, and since I started I learned:

• Another language (English since I'm Italian)
• Critical thinking (you start looking for the details and the finish and how something has been made etc..)
• Reverse Engineering (tell me there isn't somebody here that didn't try to figure out how something was made? how such technique looked that way when finished)
• Drawing, not much but now I can do it
• Speed reading (my teacher had this huge library how was I gonna read all of that stuff otherwise?)
• problem solving (when you want to do something in our craft you have to plan ahead, you don't want to riun precious stones or carefully crafted Items we are going to disassemble for engraving)
• Patience (no need to explain this)

Plus a TON of informations on how machines work, how metals behave, what heat alone can do, and probably another 30 or 40 subjects and datas that are floating in my mind right now.

And last but not least I read somewhere that since hands have a huge numbers of nerve endings, precise work actually stimulates the brain and effectively makes you a bit smarter, or at least it's gonna keep you smart during the years.

So I'm sitting here reading a book about mnemonics and hoping one day I'll be able to show off by telling all the properties of any given kind of precious stone off the top of my head.. and wonder:

what strange skills and knowledge do the othe guys here have?

 

[oiseau metal arts]

WE ARE NORMAL! Everyone else is crazy for not trying it.






Special "skills"....... i can identify some metals by smell, taste and sound when being cut.

 

[Roger Bleile]

Simone,

I am amazed that you only started learning English two years ago. I would never know it by reading your post.

One of the other skills that many top engravers have is playing musical instruments. Some that come to mind are Rod Cameron (guitar, mandolin, and flute), Alain Lovenberg (violin), Ron Smith (guitar), Sam Alfano (banjo), Fred Bowen (guitar & bass), Tira Mitchell (flute), Brian Powley (percussion), Winston Churchill (guitar), Phil Coggan (guitar), Marcus Hunt (mandolin), Weldon Lister (guitar), Ron Landis (guitar), Tim Wells (dobro), and I'm sure there are plenty more. BTW I don't play anything so I'll probably never be a top engraver.

 

[rod]

Hello, Simone!

Great post!

Roger you have a great musical instrument, the human voice, and I look forward to sharing some more of our songs together in Reno or sooner!

Best wishes to you, Simone, and all of the engraver musicians!

Rod

 

[pilkguns]

Simone, this is one of the best things I have ever read on the Cafe. Thank you for posting it!

Roger, your tops in my book! and when are we going to Midland?

 

[simone-cervellati]

I knew a bit of english already, but I could sustain maybe 2-3 minutes of conversation, making an awful lot of errors.

and it's a trend I also noticed, most of the jewelers/engravers I know speak at least 2 languages one of my teachers spoke italian among the languages she knew, and she would stop speaking in english and switch to my own language only when I did something really bad (and trust me, it works, you'll remember that error if your teacher spoke in another language when you did it)

interesting that most of the instruments cited above need high finger dexterity to be operated, might be a trend..

Simone

 

[peteb]

WARNING: Problem solving leads directly to TAS.

 

[Ed Westerly]

My machine shop teacher always told me when I came to him with a problem about how to go about cutting some project: "You have to be smarter than the metal!" That was not really all that helpful, but it made me go back and think harder about the solution.

 

[Gargoyle]

Simone, great post. Auguri.

Where in Italy do you live? Where did you study?

 

[Tim Wells]

Add watchmaking and machining to the list I suppose. Is this the same Simone that lives in Florence that came to the guild show a couple years ago?

 

[Marrinan]

I would add few others like leather work, lapidary, metal finishing, accounting, small business management, public relations, marketing. salesmanship and of course collections. Fred
P.S. first aid, jig manufactur, concept development and on and on and on

 

[simone-cervellati]

Nope guys, I'm the Simone that lives in Bologna and is slowly starting out his own shop!

 

[BrianPowley]

I've boiled down every skill, every piece of knowledge, everything I can do or have done to just one word: "Desire"

 

[Beathard]

Hardest thing I've had to learn is estimating and the ability to say "stop, that's enough, it's done!"

Roger, I play the bass, banjo, dobro, mandolin, guitar, saxophone and bagpipes.

 

[silverchip]

Well, I learned the trumpet in school and the banjo while recovering from a broken ankle about the time I started learning about silver work. Since then I have learned to be a plumber,carpenter,auto mechanic and G.P. fixit guy,cause they cost more money than I was making at the time!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Chujybear]

Besides carving. Perhaps in spite of it, I've run a good career in forestry. Cut block evaluation, particularly as it relates to plants. They really are separate worlds but I suspect that an eye for detail might be the common thread.
Semi retired

 

[SamW]

Tim, that was Simone Dainelli from Florence.

 

[txtwang]

I once showed a practice piece I had engraved to a guy and he said "You must be one of those tweakers" I was confused and asked "What's a tweaker" , He told me it was those people who used speed, would stay up days on end and become engulfed in whatever they were doing. I guaranteed him I wasn't a tweaker. I told him first off, I probably couldn't afford the habit, can't stay awake much past 9:00 and I didn't think tweakers lived this long! But I do play guitar!

Jerry

 

[Jeroen]

To get my tax-number over here, I had to enlist what I'm gonna do. I wrote on the paper everything I thought I do, would do, would have to do... as a goldsmith-engraver-stonesetter. My list became 5 pages long. Too long for some of the tax-people as they now send me papers to let them know "what exactly I do in the food-business" while there is nothing in my list that about. Apparently, "normal people" pick one, ore two occupations.
This reminded of a same situation in the US mentioned in an earlier thread, where some of you enlisted all their "occupations".

Jeroen