I've done up a tutorial on the inlay of the silver owl as seen earlier in the "metal painting" thread posted in new work.

You can see the tutorial HERE

Any comments or questions are welcome here.

Hi Jim,
Great job on the tutorial! Thank you.
Dick

Very helpful tutorial. Thank you jim.

Ekrem.

Thanks for the comments guys.

Jim,

As always your tutorials are great, nice color on the shibuichi, and the owl.

Thankyou

I haven't been here in a while, and spent some time just looking around. I am humbled and amazed by the work I see here! Thank you for the tutorial on inlay. Your pictures are very clear, and your craftsmanship is an inspiration. I've downloaded the pictures for further inspection, and to remind me that my engraving and chasing are more than a way to earn a living. I am inspired to a higher level, art is calling.

goldcutter

Click to view attachment

Click to view attachment

Jim,
Could you show a more detailed shot of the trees? I would love to see how you achieved the 3D look in such low relief.
Thanks

Goldcutter, thanks very much for your comments. I'm glad you find it useful.
Very nice sculpting on the ring.

Mark, here is a close-up of the trees although I don't think, because of the flat light, there is much revealed.
The middle tree has some relief. The other two flush with the surface. I'll see if I can find another photo that may show this better.

thanks Jim, the photo showed what I wanted to see. I am always looking for new ways to approach things. This technique is similar to how tombstones are carved, simple but effective. I do appreciate the detail and depth you achieved. Thanks for not only showing the work but the process as well. Great piece!

Thanks Mark. Here is the beginning of the relief and carving process for the middle tree. Started with a slightly ronded chisel and finished up with filing, stones, paper and horsehair brush. After shaping, the tree detail was engraved and chased.

Jim,
Thank you once again for your generous sharing of both your wonderful works and your knowledge. I wish I had more time to just explore all the nooks and crannies of this site. I just went through your inlay tutorial and the patination as well. I was given an answer to a problem I've struggled with for years - that of obtaining a truly even and polished surface (especially on flat recesses). I have tried using scrapers, burnishers and tiny sandpaper sticks but have never come across the die makers stones you refer to. I have known that was what I needed but didn't know where or what to ask for. It seems most jewelers are not needing such finishing. Also the horsehair brushes - Beautiful - Thank you.
This site is a constant source of inspiration and the knowledge needed for me to reach out for higher levels of craftmanship. I am deeply touched.
Blessings,
Magnus
P.S.
I must add that every time I see your peony vessel Jim, I am much moved - lovely work!

Jim, I love your work. The Owl is great. I use a technique on woodcarvings that may aid you here. When I carve a low relief tree and want it to stand out I put a slight bevel on the edge I want to highlight. It reflects light and makes it look like the last frame in your tutorial. If you will look at it you will see a highlight. A beveled edge makes it stand our even more.

Don

Thanks guys. I'm on the road, but will follow up when I get back Sunday.

Hi Jim,
I really like the color of the backround plate. What is the composition of the shibuichi?
Regards,
Patrick

Hello again,

Magnus, thanks very much for your comments. The use of stones is something not well understood. At some point I will do a more detailed summary of what I use.

Thanks Don. As you will see in the photo below, that highlight comes from actual shaping of the tree, which is slightly raised above the background.

Hi Patrick. It's 70%copper/30%silver.

Thanks all.

Another shot after all carving(except owl) and during the polishing.

I found a link to a class at Revere Academy next month. of course the timing and location doesn't do me much good,but maybe someone else is interested.

Zougan Inlay

That's not far away from me. Where was that class 8 years ago! Ford taught me most of what's offered in that course to me a couple years ago, but I am still tempted it never hurts to get as much exposure as you can to various teachers and there individual expressions of the craft.
Patrick

Thanks Jim,
I have been fleshing out my palette of alloys. Experimenting with the coloration, mechanical properties, and such. I have sheet stock containing from 75 to 2 percent silver so far some with gold and some without. I am not getting that kind of gray with any of them yet. I have darker and lighter versions so far. I am still working on different solution strengths and proportions of Roshuko to Tampan. Fun stuff.
Patrick

Hi Patrick,

you won't get any appreciable change in colour of these shibuichi alloys by varying the colouring solution ingredients. It's definitely far more reliable and practical to concentrate on the alloy compositions. One thing to watch though, is having the metal at liquidus for too long once all the metals have melted. If the mix is allowed to become too homogeneous the alloy will tend to yield a much deeper, (and duller, in my opinion ) colour. It will also lose the discrete nashiji grain structure.

Cheers, Ford

Thanks Ford,
That saves me some Roshuko.
As you told me, I put the silver into the melt at the last possible moment. I am getting visible nashiji in most of the plates as a result.
Patrick

Hi Patrick,

I believe I used a ratio of 4gr rokusho to 3.5gr tampan(copper sulphate) which is the formula given on a chart I got from Tokyo Geidai for mid range shibuichi. Supposedly this chart was from Natsuo's writings. There are so many variables in the patination process, I try to keep everything as consistent as possible, so when something doesn't pan out, you might have a clue as to why. I agree with Ford that keeping the liquidus time to a minimum will yield the most interesting results. Using your imagination along these lines could yield some interesting unique effects.

Ford

aloha

Karl Carvalho, a new member here. Could you please clarify your comment concerning nashiji? Are you refering to the alloy's ability to be made into grain, the as cast structure (which I understand is forged to change grain structure before rolling) or the ability of the final material (after rolling) to "take on" a particular texture?
I have read about nashiji in relation to laquered inro surfaces, but am wondering if terms apply to the alloys themselves. This applies to my immediate circumstances as I am currently undertaking the process of making a range of shibuichi alloys at the local arts center.

mahalo
Karl

Hello Karl,

Nashiji in shibuichi is a particular macro, as opposed to microscopic, grain structure that is sometimes visible with the naked eye on the surface of polished and patinated shibuichi. It occurs when the silver content has not entirely diffused throughout the copper matrix to form a true alloy. The copper molecules at this stage are still discrete clusters which are more or less evenly distributed. Think of raisins in a cake or think of the silver as mortar between the clumps of copper. When the alloy is finished "correctly" (?) it appears that the metal has a graininess to it. It is similar to the lacquer effect, just a bit finer. Nashi; are Japanese pears and they have a grainy patterning on the skin, Ji; means ground or surface.

Hope this helps.

Ford

So does this mean that the shibuichi I made the other weekend (25%) that I've been rolling out & concerned about the copper flecks just visible on the surface actually *should* look like that? I was assuming I'd have to remelt it...

Hello Peter,

hard to say without seeing the piece in question but if you are annealing ( and make sure you let it air cool slowly!) and then pickling the piece to clean off the oxide you will be slowly depleting the surface of the copper. It's the copper oxide that makes up the scale. Repeatedly stripping the oxide off will leave the surface silver rich. You may be seeing flecks of copper that have now been redeposited on the plate. In any event the final surface must be ground or polished back to that pale pink colour. . You won't see any grain structure until you've polished it to quite a fine finish, and not by machine, and then patinated using the traditional solution.
I'll post a photo of the grain a little later today.

Of course it may be that your alloy is not mixed well enough, it's all a bit of a trick really. A bit like cooking.

cheers, Ford

Whilst looking forward to Ford's nashiji, I'll post a bit of my own on a shibuichi(85%copper/15%silver) vase.
This as cast surface shows the graining to maximum advantage. Any project where you want this effect must be thinned(rolling or forging) as little as possible. On this piece you can see(along with the dust particles ) areas of general finer grain and areas of larger crystaline formations, some of which can be seen in the field above the peony.

these two images (of the same piece of metal) will hopefully illustrate what I'm describing.

Actually Jim, the effect you see on your cast shibuichi vase is called "kesho" in Japanese. It's the dendritic structure that invariably occurs in "as cast" objects. It's a result of the rapid cooling and consequent shrinking of the molten metal. If you recall, a while ago, Garret McCormack posted some images of an ingot he'd cast and then forged down to make a tsuba. I commented on exactly this aspect of his piece at the time. This dendritic structure can often be seen in cast ingots of practically any of the cuprous alloys and of course copper itself. Incidentally, the term "kesho" is also applied to the fairly large crystalline structure seen in Sentoku alloys.

Nashiji is a completely different phenomena, whereas dendritic structure is generally broken down in the forging process when making sheet metal, true nashiji always remains visible. If you are finding that you have to keep the processing of the cast metal to a minimum in order to retain the apparent nashiji effect then the chances are that the metal was held at liquidus too long and the silver molecules have dissipated too much.

The piece posted below was cast as a hamburger type pattie into hot water and was forged down from about 12mm. It is now a tad under 1mm.

Hi,
It's amazing how much misinformation we get in college classrooms. When I was taking metal working in undergraduate, graduate and even post graduate courses I was always taught to quench the metal after heating to a bright red to anneal it for rolling. I often had trouble with the metal cracking. I also taught students the same thing. Fortunately I had a friend who was a professional goldsmith who made all of his gold sheet stock who had been through the apprentice system and had not studied art in college. He showed me how to not over heat the metal and to let it air cool slowly! I sure wish TCP existed back then but of course back then the only computers were the size of tractor trailers. Thanks to craftsmen like Jim and Ford those mistakes can be avoided. Thanks guys!
Dick

this is an example of the effect called Kesho. You'll notice some areas of quite distinct and large crystals and other areas, notably above the head of the dog, where the structure is so fine as too appear as if it is grained. Sorry about the poor quality of the image, yet another scanned photo .

Hi Dick,

my comment about air cooling in this instance was specifically for shibuichi alloys. There are actually some alloys that do need to be quenched while still relatively hot, though red hot is probably a little extreme. You can however, forge copper and fine silver while red hot. You do tend to get lots of blisters though!

Thanks for the clarification Ford. I remember that thread now. Wouldn't you agree that the close-up of the vase shows both kesho and nashiji?

Aloha Ford, Jim et al

Just taking a quick break to check on my query. Fascinating stuff. It actually answers questions on many levels.
Earlier attemps at alloy casting produced what appeared to be very large crystals (1-5mm). The literature indicates that this all needed to be broken up by forging.
My wife took some scanning electron micrographs which showed a very interesting "beehive?" structure. (It is difficult to understand how the alloy can hold together cohesively, yet distinctly through all the compression and stretching.) Ford's explanation helps me understand what I was looking at. I thought this was bad, and considered recasting as Peter had. Ironically, as I better comprehend the "micro" I will need to train my eye to recognize the "macro". I guess patina trials will tell the tale. Keep good notes!
If anyone is interested, I can try to post the EM images.

mahalo
Karl

Aloha, Karl,

glad to have shed some light...I for one would very much like to see these images you mentioned.

Hi Jim,

You are absolutely right, the fine grainy structure you see on the "as cast"surface is very similar to what I consider to be true nashiji ( if I can be so specific ). My observations and research would lead me to see it as something slightly different from nashiji though. The fine graining on your vase, even though it is a shibuichi alloy has the same sort of grain appearance I've seen on other non-shibuichi castings.

Nashiji actually has a very specific microscopic structure quite distinct from fine "as cast" grain structure. I'll post some micro-pictographs tomorrow which will clearly illustrate the difference. As I mentioned previously, If the alloy is at liquidus too long the specific "moment" that nashiji can still be discerned is lost and the alloy loses it's unique characteristic. This is also why, if you remelt shibuichi you must always add at least half ( by volume) of new alloy ingredients. Otherwise you get a straight flat colour and no grain.

cheers, Ford

Jim and Ford- thanks very much for those close-up photos and information. While the technical aspects of creating these alloys will probably not be retained in my head, I have a better idea of what I used to think of as just 'granulation', next time I see it in a museum or collection context.

-D

Thanks Jim, & Ford for this facinating look at this subject - I am only just beginning this process, but I can appreciate the subtlety. Karl, I'd also like to see the EMphotos you spoke of. I just got my copy of Untracht's book in the mail yesterday- it's helping me relate more to some of this.
Thanks again to all of you,
Magnus

Aloha Ford,

Apologies for any delays; I had to wait the brains of this outfit (my wife Tina) to set me up.
These images are of my first "mix"; 40% silver/ 60% copper derived from sterling scraps (I know, I know) and copper electrical wire. It was melted in a Kerr electro-furnace and poured into a carbonized, stand up ingot mold. The first image is a scanning electron micrograph of the as cast surface. The second shows a backscattered electron image with the silver as the brighter matrix and the darker copper as islands.
I am going to make a leap of intuition and guess that the principle of nashiji is that the copper reacts to patinas while the silver does not. The more silver added, the smaller (or less) copper exposed, the more delicate or ghost like the effect and vice versa.
Thanks for taking the time to go through this.

mahalo
KarlClick to view attachment Click to view attachment

Hi there Karl,

those are fantastic pictures, especially the "stonewall" image. It shows perfectly what I was trying to describe. The other image show a wonderful degree of detail of the copper aggregates, you mentioned that this is the "as cast surface, I would suggest that the slightly "fern-like' copper structures are varieties of dendritic structure we were discussing earlier. The structure we can see very nicely on the right hand image is known as "Hyper-eutectic", it refers specifically to the silver eutectic network surrounding the copper particles.

Interestingly you can see tiny voids in the example on the left, the black bits. These are potential fracture points. When melting pure copper or silver it is vital to maintain a reduced ( ie; oxygen free ) atmosphere. Both these metals have a propensity to absorb a lot of oxygen when molten. The oxygen forms oxides within the alloy as well as resulting in these tiny voids of trapped gas. This is probably the most common cause of flaws in these alloys. This is one of the reasons that I often follow the old method of casting my ingots into boiling water, it limits the absorption of oxygen into the surface as the metal cools and solidifies. I also pack a layer of charcoal on top of the metal in the crucible, this tends to absorb any free oxygen that may sneak in.

Your intuition is spot on with regard to the colouring of these alloys too. It's actually cuprite that forms on the copper ( Cu2O ) while the silver remains unchanged. Actually there are ways to get the silver to colour too, this extends the possibilities a bit. It is also why shibuichi changes colour over time, more so than most other traditional alloys. There is still another very specific process that must be applied to finally achieve the characteristic velvety finish often seen on the best pieces. This is quite a complicated thing to explain, though less so to actually do. I will describe this in detail on my site in a little while. One of those images of yours would be helpful in describing the process actually

Cheers, Ford

Aloha Ford,

Once more, you have lifted the veil of ignorance. I often wondered why the ancient method of water casting produced what is described as a purer form. Gene Pijanowski has told me that it takes some practice to get all the variables right.
The images are courtesy of my wife Tina. She has helped out authors such as Tim McCreight in the past. I'm sure something can be worked out.
Your sharing spirit is beyond generous. I hope you don't use up that bag of knowledge (allusion to Hotei). Save some for that future publication. We will all get it anyway.

mahalo
Karl

Fascinating photos Karl. Thanks.

These are some microphotographs of classic eutectic structure (Nashiji) in Shibuichi. These images were produced by Dr Masahiro Kitada of the Hitachi Central Laboratory Co. the two images on the right, in B&W, are of antique pieces. All 3 micro-photographs are to the same scale.
The first image ( from the left ) is of an unworked, as cast,plate. The second, is of a low silver worked sheet and the last, a high silver worked sheet.
The similarity with the image I posted earlier, of a piece of plate I made and patinated, and the last image here is obvious.

And Aloha Karl,

You are more than welcome, I'm always happy to pass on what I can to anyone who knows what to ask? I hope what I've written will be of help, both to you and anyone elso who is intrigued enough to begin working with these facinating compostitions. Of course, the technical aspect is only just the very beginning, it's really what you do with the stuff that is the really exciting part.

you know how to reach me if I can be of any further help. I think my sack will be OK

regards, Ford

p.s. I seem to remember my teacher, Izumi Koshiro, mentioning that he remembered instructing both Hiroko and Jean Pijanowski many years ago. I'd be interested to hear if Mr Pijanowski remembers.

These two images show a micro-photograph of a plate of shibuichi which was carved and inlaid by the Meiji period Imperial artist, Unno Shomin. The structure is a classic, worked, eutectic surface, and is subtly frosted. The apparent matt ( frosted ) surface is an aspect of this phenomena. The colour image is a more recognisable view of this panel by Shomin. The panel is in the Museum of Tokyo National University of Fine Arts & Music.

Aloha Ford,

More fantastic material. My head is spinning.
Answers lead to questions (don't they always?). Eutectic bond>mokume gane. Depth of strucure (is beauty more than skin deep?). Commercial suppliers; does their product meet an increasing sophistication of users?
I fear that I may have strayed us off Jim's tutorial on technique and into a materials discussion (Sorry Jim).
I briefly retire to digest this info and consider the practical applications.

mahalo
Karl

This to me is the main point: that nashiji is a visual, human scale effect suggestive of pear skin. Surely, as Ford has shown, forging(or rolling) has an effect on the structure microscopically and hence, the appearance to the unaided eye. In a cast piece which has no need to be forged, the structure remains as cast. I would say that either way, if there is a graining, visible to the naked eye, reminiscent of a pear skin, then you have nashiji. The visual beauty of any given piece must be judged on it's particular merits. These are after all, visual works of art, and in my opinion should be judged as such, not on the basis of whether they conform to some process. Also, in my opinion, surprises and anomalies that don't conform to a general or particular set of standards should not necessarily be discounted out of hand. Human based standards are just that: someone making a judgment that their idea is correct. More important to me is the joy of discovery. Certainly standards have their place, but are they for our use, or we theirs.

I'm attaching two closer views of the vase shown earlier. One shows what I would certainly call nashiji in a fairly even distribution. The other shows nashiji along with the previously mentioned kesho dendrites. I magnified them to the point beyond which pixelation would start to confuse. I'm guessing that it's a 10-15 power magnification. I could figure that out but it's late.




No need to apologise. It's all part of the mix. Always something new and mysterious.

Jim

These two samples; the crow design is flat inlay while the other is raised, show 3 different shibuichi alloys. All the colours were patinated in the same solution. The darkest grey is 16% silver, the middle grey is 30% and the lightest, the crescent moon, is 60% silver. I imagine that Jim's waterfall will perhaps exhibit a similar tonal variation. What compositions are you using Jim?

The other image is of a few samples of various alloys in my "palette" tray. The odd one out has a very interesting structure which only became visible after patination. ( The pink/red and black one ) no silver in that one at all! it's one of my "unique" mixes!

Jim,

looking at these images you've posted it does indeed appear as though your vase exhibits nashiji. To be fair, I don't think it is for me to cast any sort of "final judgement" on the matter. Apologies if I seemed to suggest that your material was in some way "deficient". I was merely trying to express a certain degree of precision with regard to Japanese metalworking technology. Ultimately, if terms lose their precision then they become meaningless.

There was never any suggestion of dismissing anything out of hand. Your comment about works of art being judged on their merit, leads me to believe that somehow you think my remarks about the presence or absence of nashiji in your vase was somehow a criticism of its artistic qualities. That isn't what this thread was about at all. Sorry if you felt that way though.

at this rate this thread could become the definitive statement on Shibuichi on the web.

and this micro-photograph (?) seems to show the face of Elvis, Hallelujah!

My comments were intended more in a general sense, about finding a balance between precise technology and spontaneity.

I very much appreciate all the useful information. Thanks.

Aloha one and all,

I want to thank Jim Kelso and Ford Hallam for a lively and informative discussion. mahalo nui loa

The process of discovery and understanding can be arduous; I watched (and participated) it happen many times in research labs I once worked in. The payoff is we all move forward. (Interesting, what a bunch of guys standing around a pit fire 300 or so years ago started.)

Lessons learned:
Don't stand around BSng with the next guy while your mix cooks to oblivion. Pay attention. Have purpose. Keep good notes.
Accept what the fire gods give you. Serendipity is part of the process.

mahalo
Karl

ford hallam do you have any other picture of this kingfisher? I don't care about structure of metal, artistic value if this work shocked me!