The week ahead

Tomorrow will see the arrival of the external assessors and they will be busy doing the rounds of the final year work, once they’ve finished it’ll be Tuesday, final year results day (4.15pm to be exact), and I feel a bit like the ‘accused’ waiting on a verdict. What that verdict will be I don’t know, but I’ll post it late Tuesday evening, I’m working ’til 9 that night.

Thursday evening is ‘Industry night’ when invited guests of the University get a preview of the degree show and after that the jewellers are going out for some food and banter.

Friday is the degree show opening night when the friends and families of final year students come to DoJ to have a look at our work, what my friends and family will make of my plastic prototypes amongst the shiny offerings of my talented year group I don’t know, maybe I’ll be waiting on that verdict with the same trepidation as the results, maybe more-so.

The show opens to the public on Saturday 21st May and is on ’til the following Sunday, details here

This week-end I’ve been playing around with Rhino in a non-jewellery way. I’ve been doing some designs for an EMA jewellery RFID scanner.

Middle of April

It’s been a while since my last post, I’ve been a bit lost.

I lost the thread of what I was trying to achieve with my final year work and started to move away from my concepts and tried to produce finished pieces of work. I think it began when I won a Goldsmiths award, that meant I was going to have to produce a piece in precious metal when I hadn’t planned using any, this then shifted into the other pieces I was working on and before long I’d fallen into the ‘shiny pretty things’ for degree show mindset. I spent almost a week in the design studio and workshop surrounded by half finished pieces of silver work not really sure where they were going  and changing things about them as I worked.

After discussions with tutors I’ve ditched the silver pieces, apart from the Goldsmiths effort, and have gone back to concepts, rapid prototypes and renders.

There’s a little over 3 weeks ’til assessments, I’m waiting on Shapeways RP orders and have started to make up posters which show a graphical representation of my dissertation and EMA jewellery concepts.

Another post in the next couple of days about help from a company who have loaned me QR code reading equipment.

Final year update

I’ve put some updates onto the final year blog.

Firstly a new page –  Onyx Cabochon –  which shows some of the development of a new piece. I’ll be looking to have this made soon, all the materials are available now (Cooksons order came yesterday) but the laser cutter is poorly so I’ll have to wait on it getting better before I can engrave another onyx cab with a new QR code. I’m also going to make at least one other version with a more decorative (and saleable!) design. This piece will also involve some photo etching.

I’ve also updated the Miscellaneous page with a couple of experimental degree show post card renders, I’m practising these to get scene setting experience in rendering and also because I might use renders rather than photos if the ‘making’ doesn’t go to schedule!

The main news today is that I received some RFID tags and a scanner. These have been loaned to me by Richard Fry, MD of Micro-ID. I’m really grateful to Richard for his help, it would be a struggle for me to get the concept over without this equipment, a scanner paints a thousand words! People who visit the show will now be able to scan items of jewellery.

I’ve got really busy week ahead so might not post again ’til next week-end. Image below shows the RFID scanner and 3 sizes of tag, fantastic.

March Update

I’ve posted a couple of updates on the final year blog in the last few days, on the box brooch page and the RFID ring page. This week I’m waiting on some RP models of the RFID ring (image below) from Shapeways, silver from Cooksons and the cast box brooch from Niagara Falls, all should be here by Friday.

After the BDes

I had a mail the other day offering me a conditional place on the MDes at Duncan of Jordanstone commencing Sept 2011, I’ve accepted it of course, and now just have to get a 2:1 or better for my BDes grade, I’ll also need funding and have to apply for that because I’ll struggle to take on the course without it.

Work is ongoing for final year, mostly Rhino stuff, but I’m going to be doing some silver work in the next couple of weeks as well. Keep an eye on the final year blog for more info.

Last week and the next week or so…

So being successful in the Goldsmiths competition means I will be making at least one piece of jewellery from precious metal, which will be silver.

The box brooch from the previous post will be created in the very near future. Over the next few days I’ll have to make some alterations to the CAD model because I wasn’t happy with the hinge arrangement after I got the RP model model back, then I’ll get a wax 3D printed and then hopefully get the piece cast. In most cases it’s usual to get a mould made to create the wax from and allow multiple copies to be made, but because this is a one-off piece I can’t justfy (or afford) the cost of that.

Also last week I was in touch with a company which specialises in RFID technology, they’ve agreed to sponsor me by lending me the equipment I need to produce the interactive RFID concept. This is a major boost for me because without help like this It would be impossible for me to afford the technology, there will be (much) more on this later.

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Box Brooch RP model

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Back to Uni

Monday (17th) sees us back to Dundee, we’re straight back into it with a deadline on Wednesday for personal statements and a peer review on Thursday, we also meet our external assessor the following week. Still no word on the Goldsmith bursaries, maybe that’ll be next week as well, I hope it’s sooner rather than later because I’d rather know either way so I don’t have to think about it.

The new final year blog is beginning to take off with the second project on the go, this time I’m going to use RFID technology rather than QR codes as a way of making the jewellery interactive, it’s still early days but I’m looking forward to making progress, I’m also enjoying doing things with a blog rather than sketchbooks, I’m relating more to the development process doing it digitally. The blog is set up so each project will have its own page and there are other pages showing where inspiration/ideas come from and things that might not make it past an initial idea or sketch. I’m looking forward to getting feedback about the final year blog set-up after the review on Thursday, there might be changes to the format after that!

The Masters application is almost done, I’m confident  it’ll be submitted by Monday afternoon, I just have the finishing touches to a personal statement for that to do. Monday will be quite busy but I’m looking forward to getting back to Uni and seeing everyone, and for the bacon rolls!