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I got the idea, a while ago, to design and make a ring for myself. Partly inspired by a distant cousin (third cousin I think) and his website. It had to be something with a personal feel to me, and I had to make it myself.
I let the idea slop around for a few months, then I looked up a jewellery-making class, and found that it was only a week away! I got my arse in gear and got some modelling clay and played with prototypes, then went to the actual class to see just what was possible for an amateur.It turns out - quite a lot is possible with the right help and guidance! I would have liked something neater-looking, but for a first try, I was pretty satisfied. I'm not out of ideas yet by the way. Watch this site for the development of version 2 of a movie-based ring (fingers crossed). Oh yeah - by the way it's meant to look like a film reel, not a hose-clamp.
2022 Update:
I really wore that ringm for years. It cracked, I had it fixed, it cracked again, I stopped wearing it.
After repeating some annual searches, on Etsy I found a girl in china doing custom manufacturing! The process of getting the designs made was ridiculously long and painful, as the company, or at least the girl I was talking to (I never knew who I was really talking to), would listen to my explanations, acknowledge the design I sent, agree to manufacture it, then change it completely without asking. On one occasion I went back and forth six full times, as I had sent her a horse image in the frame, she changed first the horse size, then the horse height, then the frame size, then the frame aspect (changing all the ring's dimensions) then the horse size once more, without ever any feedback on why she was changing anything even when directly questioned. I had to watch what was provided extremely carefully each time.
When you talk to anyone who has had a product manufactured they will sometimes say how hard it was to the the part as ordered and watch the specs and it's true. If I was manufacturing these I'd need a 3D model and exact tolerances of every part in every dimension as part of the order contract, it's an interesting lesson! You order a ring and you seriously can't assume they'll manufacture something round.
I think it took roughly seven months to get back to my exact original design as provided, it was just strange. I even had Chinese friends type messages into the chat for me, to try to communicate, nobody could understand what was happening on the other side. From the length of this text you can tell my frustration.
At one point I found out that instead of replying "ok" to a question she'd been manufacting rejects. Oh it was so frustrating, something wrong with her I swear, I'm not bothering to pretend otherwise. I bought three of the rejects (pictured at right), that I hadn't asked for at all, to keep the conversation happening.
This industry has boomed recently, I think it would be much easier now, just a short time later.
First success - The ring as it had always been envisioned. They're all a "lost wax" process meaning the ring is 3D printed in a resin or wax that completely evaporates when hot enough. That print is encased in fine clay, plus holes in and out, and fired, leaving a gap in the shape of the ring. Then the silver is poured into that gap.
The detail can be ridiculously fine (see the square holes). But despite very explicit instructions to the contrary, the whole shape was buffed smooth and arrived rounded. I had to spend time with emery board to get a more precise looking result.
But I was really happy with that result!
I filled in the sprocket holes with a paint marker (a kind of gloopy permanent marker) before sanding/polishing and that hasn't come out in the years since so that's great.
A version with holes all the way through was actually really easy.
It looks light and clean, I wear it to look formal.
Muybridge
The first ever moving picture was 12 frames of a horse galloping, captured by Edweard Muybridge who managed to figure out a photographic process fast enough to capture something moving. Previous photographic plates would take many seconds to expose. He went on to publish books of animals and people walking past his cameras, to a world not used to being able to see time stopped still.
It's apocryphal that he had a bet with Leland Stamford about whether all four hooves of a horse left the ground at the same time. But it's a great story.
Nevertheless, those 12 frames (taken with twelve cameras triggered by triplines) are the first moving picture that we have. 10 of them loop nicely to make a gif, you can google it.
I've described the manufacturing process above already, there were also issues with the chemicals used to blacken the silver that spoiled one, but here's the final result below!
I was really happy with it!
That's the design at left.
CC BY (Creative Commons, usage allowed but attribution must be given) for this and below.
History Of Film
This being my passion as well as my career, I was really thinking about the design even further. What if it included other elements of the history of film besides its start?
This was a really interesting exercise, what could I represent in twelve small icons of miminal detail.
Besides complaining about the process again (see right)...
I present the history of film!
The Muybridge Horse (1878)
An entry ticket representing moving pictures as a sideshow / curiosity
That's a film leader, representing the standardisation of film (~1930 onwards)
It's a sound waveform as would be printed down the left of a strip of film. (~1940s onwards)
The snippet is too short to hide an Easter Egg in there, that's just a shape I drew.
That's Betty Boop! Representing animation (~1930-1939 with later incarnations)
Felix The Cat is older but not as well remembered. Also betty cartoons are hilarious, seriously go to YouTube and watch some.
A broadcast antenna and signal (~1940s onwards, a little later for wide adoption)
A CRT - Cathode Ray Tube television (~1950s for wider adoption and rectangular TVs not round)
This technology made television a commodity people could have in their homes
VHS (Late ~1970s, more widely adopted mid 1980s onwards)
And by extension magnetic media in general, there were many formats from open reel to Beta to Digital8 to MiniDV.
Optical Media (that's specifically a LaserDisk - they were analog! ~1980s onwards)
Digital Media (it's a folder icon) the first widely available PCs with any media capabilities ran Windows 95, so from 1995 onwards.
Streaming Media (now)
Virtual Reality (slowly growing in popularity)
Images below are a mix of prototypes and before/after extra finishing I had done on it in Australia.
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