Telling a story with paint

Yesterday I mounted the dynamo armature to the largest gear on the ‘MARVELOUS MACHINE’. I then designed and cut a bracket to mount the outer housing. I painted and aged the pieces prior to assembly. It was pure magic to watch it all turn.
It was looking pretty good but I wasn’t finished quite yet. I knew a few minutes with a brush would change things in a big way.

I first painted two coats of metallic gold on the raised areas of the name plate. When this as dry I added a little aging to tone it down. I then came back with a brighter metallic gold and added a little bling to the areas what would naturally wear with use.
I then  added a little rust to the base on the right side. This was dirtied up with some dark glaze. Then I brought out some dark metallic silver and dry brushed the edges of the rotor and also the top edges of the base. This was followed up with the teeniest amount of bright silver on the edges to add a little wear and bling to those areas. Once again I aged things back down a smidge before I called it done.
The piece instantly had a history and looked like it had been in service for many decades. It looked well used but cared for and maintained.

Published with permission from precisionboard.blogspot.com. Source.

Hands-on learning

I’ve known Julio Pierre for ten years, and had the chance to visit with him at sign trade shows through that time. Julio works for MultiCam as an application specialist. He does demonstrations of the various machines which MultiCam builds. Through the last ten years Julio has answered my countless questions as I sought to learn more about MultiCam CNC machines. Each time I see him he has expressed his desire to visit our shop. At last that time has come.

He is visiting for three days and in that time he wanted to see first hand all we do. We could of course do much better than that. We are giving him a chance to try his hand at doing all the various tasks that go into the magic we create.

He is already a master at the CNC machines and the programming so we didn’t need to spend time on that but we still had lots of ground to cover. Before he came we had routed some samples which he would paint. Becke did that teaching.

In between coats of paint he worked with me to do some sculpting with epoxy. We worked on my ‘MARVELOUS MACHINE’ which will make it’s debut in the MultiCam booth at the International Sign Association EXPO in Orlando next year.
Today, it was time to do a small concrete sculpture. Julio welded for the first time, then tackled the prickly job of attaching the expanded steel lath to his armature.
I suspect he has handled a trowel previously for he had no trouble with the job of applying the concrete.
Then, after the concrete has set for a while it was time to do a little carving. Julio it seems is a natural at just about everything we throw at him.

We have one more day in the shop to try a few more things.

Published with permission from precisionboard.blogspot.com. Source.

How this Black Panther Clawed its Way through Precision Board HDU

We came across this great article in the May issue of Signs of the Times magazine from Mike Bethune of Bethune Signs.  He talked about using Precision Board to create a dimensional sign for a Florida high school.   When a storm destroyed the sign at the entrance to the football stadium, officials got in touch with Mike and asked him to make a new sign.  They wanted it to feature a panther, the school mascot.  He had designed the original sign in 1998 and wanted to make something this time that would withstand the harsh Florida weather.  Mike used Precision Board HDU, a closed-cell, rigid substrate which would not warp, rot or absorb moisture.  In addition to its durability, Mike really liked the creative flexibility of working with Precision Board as seen here in this excerpt from his article:

When I first designed the sign, I put gashes at the top so it would look like the panther was clawing at it, trying to get through. But when I was carving, I looked at the gashes and realized they, too, were missing something, so I added folds to make it look like the panther was bending the metal outward.

I reached a point where I knew something was off but couldn’t put my finger on it, so I asked a friend what she thought and she noticed it right off. I had the nose too wide, so I carved some off and sure enough it looked better, but something was still off. Finally, I noticed what it was – I had the top fangs too far apart. Now you might be thinking, “That’s a shame. He’s already carved the fangs where they are.” But this sign is made of HDU, not Italian marble, so I cut the fangs off, glued and screwed them back on, only closer together. I had the look I wanted.

Precision Board HDU is a great material for carving, whether by hand or on a CNC machine.  Bethune Signs in Thonotosassa, FL can be contacted at (813) 982-2300 or through the website at www.bethunesigns.com.  Great story, Mike!  You can read the full article on the Signs of the Times website.

Another name plaque

With the arrival of a guest in our shop tomorrow it was time to create a name plaque. Julio wants to learn how we do our finishing and there’s no better way than doing it hands on! In order to demonstrate our techniques we needed a second name plaque as well, so Grant (my soon to be son-in-law) is getting a name plaque as well. Both plaques are to be identical save for the name.

I started by building the vectors for the plaque components

I then selected the plaque outline and created a flat relief. 0.45″ tall.

I then imported a sandblasted woodgrain bitmap which I sized to fit on the board. I applied it with a value of 0.2″ tall.

The metal bands were next, created as flat reliefs.

I imported a second bitmap to add some texture to this band. I input a value of 0.1″ for this procedure.

Then I modified these two reliefs by using the add to tool. This created the flat washers.

The bolt heads were next and I used a value of 0.3″ tall.

I then selected the metal band reliefs and the board relief and combined them into one relief.

The lettering outlines were next, also created as individual reliefs. Note I did both names at once to save time.

The lettering outline reliefs were then modified by adding the lettering – also a flat relief.

I then duplicated the wood relief and positioned the second name appropriately onto it. The last step was join the letters by merging highest with the wood plaque base relief. Th

e two plaques were done separately.

I could then tool path the two plaques and send them to the router. They were routed from a piece of 1.5″ thick 30 lb Precision Board.

Published with permission from precisionboard.blogspot.com. Source.

Dimensional samples

One of the most striking thing anyone will notice as they walk into our shop and studio is the many dimensional samples hanging on the walls. There are more than one hundred and fifty in all (so far). It’s obvious that we have invested a great deal of time and effort to create them. Why would we make such an effort?

There are many answers to this question. I would have to say they were fun to make and this was indeed a motivator and reason. But it goes way beyond that. These samples were a way to test new materials and methods, to practice our craft. As we built these samples there were no constraints and often no the limit, unlike most customer’s paying projects. Sometimes we do samples to solve a problem or to create a tool to sell a project to a customer.

Our samples allow us to up sell in a big way. If I describe something to a customer, what they see in their mind’s eye is based on their experience. That is not what I wish to sell them. If I can physically show them what I have in mind it is most often far more than they imagined… and more expensive too. Allowing a customer to see and touch a sample is far more effective than anything I might say.

In short I attribute our samples for a great deal of our success. They are a very sound investment!

Published with permission from precisionboard.blogspot.com. Source.