Unusual Segmented Plates

[Charles Lent]

This link it to show off a very talented woodworker and his unusual projects. It is located on a photography forum, which I am a member. The forum website is called Fredmiranda.com named after the photographer that created it.

Charley

Max

This series was shot with a Nikon FM, and the 35-105mm f3.5 ais. It isn't up to today's standards, but I just came across the Fuji 400 slide film a...

www.fredmiranda.com

 

[drw]

Very interesting and beautiful craftsmanship, thank you for sharing this with us.

 

[cyclopentadiene]

New challenge for Charlie. Take it to the next level. I have faith in you!

 

[chris_goris]

Its crazy the ways craftsman used to do things that today are so simple with CNC

 

[cyclopentadiene]

I am still old school. I have much more admiration for a piece designed and made by hand and using creativity to design a tool to achieve a difficult task.

CNC units have their place in the manufacture of hundreds of identical perfect items. I enjoy the process, not the product and take pride in making something by hand.

Just an opinion but....... I spend most of the day on a computer and the last thing I want to see in the shop is another computer. CNC design makes woodworking into a video game and i would rather play the video game

 

[Mike Davis]

Just like photography was supposed to replace painting the hand made piece- anything handmade- is more personal and admired for the skill and dedication required to produce a master work of art as opposed to a computer aided thing that any high school student can produce with enough money and a little training.

 

[Oka]

It's funny, each new tech has its place, but the issue I see more often, is the lowering of complex creativity. In photography when I got started with an Argus c3 camera (1965), we developed our film. And, the pixs had to be within 90% accurate in order to post edit chemically. Now with photoshop, you can do so much, but you lose a lot of subtlety.
In music digital recording lose most of the quality of analog or real frequency mix. This makes a nice crisp sound, but a lot more two dimensional. The result along with less creative art schooling in elementary results in a lower understanding of quality and results in poor quality results.
Both with photography and music you end up with more "collage"style creativity rather than true tradecraft creative skill. You do get a great creative tech skill applied to an existing medium, but then, that often becomes focal point people look at rather than the whole result.
Wow, kinda got into it. Frustrating though, so much of the populous can't see skill or quality these days.

 

[Mike Davis]

Wow, kinda go into it. Frustrating though, so much of the populous can't see skill or quality these days.

I tried to teach my kids about quality, we would go to museums, art galleries, furniture stores (both the high end and the mid priced), hardware stores, and pointed out the differences in materials, design, craftsmanship, engineering, etc.

Most of the things we own are from goodwill, flea markets, used furniture stores, antique shops. Never bought much new. They got to the point they would look at something in a store and say we're not buying that, dad will have to rebuild it before the week is out. And could spot a great buy that needed a little cleaning or repair. They also learned you can't fix cheap stuff, no bones to build on...

 

[chris_goris]

I am still old school. I have much more admiration for a piece designed and made by hand and using creativity to design a tool to achieve a difficult task.

CNC units have their place in the manufacture of hundreds of identical perfect items. I enjoy the process, not the product and take pride in making something by hand.

Just an opinion but....... I spend most of the day on a computer and the last thing I want to see in the shop is another computer. CNC design makes woodworking into a video game and i would rather play the video game

Whats the difference between designing a tool thats dedicated to one task and using a CNC to do endless tasks?. Its just another way to cut wood. I too spend all day on a computer and I guess thats why I have a CNC. It takes drudgery and actual physical work out of alot of tasks. Now, instead of gluing up near perfect tabletops for instance, all I have ot do is edge joint and glue, no planing required. Load that blank into the CNC and machine it flat on both sides and cut the perimeter shape. That save tons of time and effort!. Just an example. Making cabinets? who likes handling 4x8 sheets of 3/4 material?. all I have to do is lay it on the bed, align it and screw it down. Come back 45 minutes later to take my finished parts and assemble them (all dadoes, pins, rabbets and perimeter cut, perfectly, every time.

 

[Charlie]

Why not just buy the finished product if someone/something else is doing most of the work.

This was the first CNC machine. Log in, desk out. Not much craftsmanship required.

 

[Oka]

I spend alot of time tooling up methods to speed processes. But, it has limits, if you are programming in a set of plans and it takes 3 hours to do so, likely a decent trade guy can complete the cut package in the same time with a pretty similar QC. The advantage of a program is if you are going to make 500 of them, then yeah it is faster. But, here is the intangible a craftsman will automatically know how and what to finesse or how to realign a piece of wood so you get the bet cut for finishing and fit up. That part takes a experienced person 5 secs to figure. A Machine really cannot do that. And, that is why when you see certain pieces of work you are in awe, it is THOSE subtle details that takes it from "nice work" to "WOW"

 

[chris_goris]

Why not just buy the finished product if someone/something else is doing most of the work.

This was the first CNC machine. Log in, desk out. Not much craftsmanship required.

View attachment 202067

Im sure the woodworkers of the time said the same thing about electric tools we all use today when they came out.! A CNC machine to make near finished parts is no different than using a jointer, tablesaw, lathe ,bandsaw or any other shop tool. It just does ALOT more, and its certainly not automatic, a user has to be able to model a part (a skill very few have) especially for intricate parts like a clawfoot cabriolet leg for instance. Then, you need to know HOW to TELL the machine what to do, its not automatic. It requires a huge amount of technical knowledge to be able to do it properly, tool sizes, speeds and feeds, machine clearances, workholding , tool setting etc, generating safe and proper toolpaths , roughing, finishing paths, just to name a few. It requires an entire new skill set that old school woodworkers generally have no clue about. Many CNCs woodworkers buy just collect dust for this reason. Grandiose ideas of starting off doing complex 3D machining and suddenly learn they have no idea how to accomplish it because they think its "automatic", far from it , if youre successful.

 

[Berta]

Very cool!