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Author Topic: Outrageous Cab Contest December-January 2016-17  (Read 14156 times)

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Re: Outrageous Cab Contest December-January 2016-17
« Reply #30 on: January 22, 2017, 08:17:37 AM »

Yea how do you top that :WHOAR:

I have been working on my pic taking and I still need a lot of work. OK pic does not show the resizing/croping. I need to work on that. I am in and will take more pic of the process

Bless
Shawn


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gemfeller

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Re: Outrageous Cab Contest December-January 2016-17
« Reply #31 on: January 22, 2017, 09:03:42 AM »

Yep, competing with Debbie's opal is going to be tough!  It's truly an outstanding piece.  I've been working on an entry and to stay within the time limits of the competition I'm posting it anyhow.  It's a chunk of rutilated quartz that was a challenge to finish fairly clean due to lots of pits and a few pesky fractures.  The final result weighs a bit over 48 ct. and measures approx. 38 x 25 x 8.5 mm. Here it is from rough to finish:

Rutilated Quartz Rough Crystal.jpg
*Rutilated Quartz Rough Crystal.jpg (101.81 kB . 450x350 - viewed 368 times)

Rutilated Quartz Rough.jpg
*Rutilated Quartz Rough.jpg (93.02 kB . 450x338 - viewed 383 times)

Rutilated Preform a.jpg
*Rutilated Preform a.jpg (40.08 kB . 329x450 - viewed 383 times)

Rutilated Cab Finished.jpg
*Rutilated Cab Finished.jpg (56.21 kB . 330x450 - viewed 700 times)
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hummingbirdstones

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Re: Outrageous Cab Contest December-January 2016-17
« Reply #32 on: January 22, 2017, 11:49:58 AM »

Ooooh, another of my favorites!  With both of these entries, my lowly cab will blah.  But in the spirit of competition and giving folks a few cabs to choose from, mine will be entered as soon as I finish the back.  With football coming on soon, that might not be until tomorrow!   :LOLOL:
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Robin

Debbie K

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Re: Outrageous Cab Contest December-January 2016-17
« Reply #33 on: January 22, 2017, 02:30:46 PM »

Robin,

The rough opal weighed about one ounce. I'm not sure what it weighed afterwards because epoxy was applied to the back after the first photo, not by me. I figure I reduced the size of the opal by about 1/10; it was so big to begin with that it probably still weighed over 110 carats afterwards. I should have weighed it with the backing before I started so I could have known how much I removed, but I forgot.

I think the point of the contest isn't about the beauty of the stone to begin with, but what we all do with what we have. It's hard to compete with gorgeous material, but I think this contest is about more than that. If it were, it would be about who had the most money to buy the best material.

This isn't one of my best carvings, because I turned coward, but I wanted to see more participation in the competition. It lacks the definition that I would have liked to gotten, most of the carving and all of the polishing was done by hand.

Love the rutilated quartz; it's one of my favorites, too. It's tricky to work with too, so many pits and cracks in so much of the material that it's hard to get a piece that looks really good like this one does.

Let's see more entries!

Debbie K
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hummingbirdstones

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Re: Outrageous Cab Contest December-January 2016-17
« Reply #34 on: January 22, 2017, 02:57:33 PM »

I was just wondering about the weight because I always cry inside when I'm grinding away carat weight with opal.  Then I suck it up and cut the best stone out of rough that I can.  Sometimes you have to cut a lot off of a stone to make it the best stone.  The rough you carved was beautiful to start, but cutting something of that quality when it's not your own can make your stomach do flip-flops.   :toothy12:

My cab will be up tomorrow.  It turned out nice, so I'm all in!   :icon_sunny:
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Robin

Asianfire

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Re: Outrageous Cab Contest December-January 2016-17
« Reply #35 on: January 22, 2017, 03:21:42 PM »

Gorgeous finish on that piece Shawn. What material are we looking at?

Rutilated quartz is always nice to look at. Nice layout, and hence beautiful use of material.
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hummingbirdstones

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Re: Outrageous Cab Contest December-January 2016-17
« Reply #36 on: January 23, 2017, 01:41:03 PM »

Here's my entry -- Dead Camel jasper cab.  It came out of a very small slabbette, so I cut an elongated oval that fit the slab.  First picture is the slabbette and the rest of the polished cab.  Please excuse my very crummy picture-taking ability.

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Robin

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Re: Outrageous Cab Contest December-January 2016-17
« Reply #37 on: January 23, 2017, 02:50:15 PM »

Hi All

Asianfire a thumbs up on the polish from you means a lot to me.

This comes from an old chunk that I got from my mentor about 35 years ago and this is from the first slab that I finally cut. The cab was cut from the right. the rest of the slab is going into a box for the winner of my auction. This is a stone tht every time I look at it I get lost. One of these days I will learn to take better pic.

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Re: Outrageous Cab Contest December-January 2016-17
« Reply #38 on: January 23, 2017, 03:40:07 PM »

Hey All

I have to add this. I try to cut calibrated cabs and some think we dont have an "eye" for me it is just another challenge. This ended up as 29.44 x22.26 close but I still need work on that.

I will work on my pic's and hope to some day take a pic of what I see.

Bless
Shawn
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Debbie K

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Re: Outrageous Cab Contest December-January 2016-17
« Reply #39 on: January 23, 2017, 05:28:32 PM »

Shawn:

If I ever got that close, I'd be over the moon. I always tell folks that I carve because I suck at doing cabochons, and it's the truth. No one can tell me I'm carving wrong, but they sure can tell me everything I'm doing wrong on my cabs.

Debbie K
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Asianfire

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Re: Outrageous Cab Contest December-January 2016-17
« Reply #40 on: January 23, 2017, 08:58:40 PM »

 :LOLOL: :thumbsup: :toothy10: :angel9:
Exactly! :DRUNKS:
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Orrum

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Re: Outrageous Cab Contest December-January 2016-17
« Reply #41 on: January 24, 2017, 07:33:32 AM »

Wow more and more really GREAT cabs !!!
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Re: Outrageous Cab Contest December-January 2016-17
« Reply #42 on: January 24, 2017, 03:00:08 PM »

Hi All

Again thanks for the kind words. Carving who me no way. That is way more complicated than what I do. As a calibrated it gives me the size of what in the end.

As the lone cal guy here i think do u know a place where that is talked about? Like if I am really trying it usually not a problem to get in .1 mill is that good or bad

Bless
Shawn
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hummingbirdstones

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Re: Outrageous Cab Contest December-January 2016-17
« Reply #43 on: January 24, 2017, 04:50:05 PM »

Shawn, I would think that's plenty close by anyone's standards!   :icon_sunny:
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Robin

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Re: Outrageous Cab Contest December-January 2016-17
« Reply #44 on: January 24, 2017, 05:16:49 PM »

Hi All

As the lone cal guy here i think do u know a place where that is talked about? Like if I am really trying it usually not a problem to get in .1 mill is that good or bad

Bless
Shawn

I think it's extremely good.  But if my experience is any guide -- and I've cut/set quite a few calibrated stones -- pre-made settings vary a lot in size.  My default is to cut-to-fit when I need to replace a stone.  Unless cutting to an exact size is a personal quest I don't think it has a lot of real world application.  Most large-scale cutters I know deliver 0.5 to 1.0 mm. size variation in parcels, which seems to be acceptable in the industry. 
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