2012 Review

2012 is on the way out so it seems like I should get all reflective and think about what has gone on over the year, but more importantly where things are heading for 2013.

This year saw fewer posts than last year mostly due to my day job and some personal events collaborating to keep me out of the shop.  You knew it had to happen because I finally got a mini-split A/C unit in the shop so it can be so very nice to work in over our hellish summers!  Oh, there's an important event in the past year: installation of a Fujitsu mini-split 30kBTU A/C unit.  The bill was also an important event, but well worth it.

The beginning of the year started with a bit of a blackout as I went to mock-up the Angle Madness project since I felt the mock-up was required to prove the angle calculations as well has have something to show for the design episode.  The calculations also proved to be a bit of a blackout as I swear I re-took my college linear algebra class to figure it out and write an iPad app to do the calculations.  After  a bit more refinement and testing, I may release the application in 2013; let the madness spread!

The Domizilla (Domino 700-XL) was released and I was picked to participate in an early preview group.  A very nice unit, but more on that in a bit.

The Woodworking In America (WIA) conference split into two events: one in Pasadena and one in Covington.  I went to the Pasadena conference to do demos of the Bridge City Jointmaker Pro with the new precision fence along with long-time favorite: the HP6v2 multi-plane.  My fence actually arrived last week so look to see a review of it since the WIA footage didn't go into a lot of detail.  There's also a tablesaw version of the fence; it just might be in my shop as well right now  :)  I've had a project waiting for the tablesaw version since April '12 so we should see it in action soon.

Around the time of WIA, a blog reader wrote me directly with some nice comments about the videos.  He was a news cameraman for a long time.  I asked him to pick apart what was wrong with the video/audio.  We had an amazing back-'n'-forth in email talking about what's wrong and what's right.  Several weeks of test videos posted for him and detailed feedback helped me make improvements where I can although some things are more difficult due to the shop.  As I work on a big video right now, I can see the difference it has made compared to even recent videos plus the shots I think are a bit lack-luster, I know why and can maybe be a bit less lazy setting it up next time :)

...for that, a big thank you, Derek!

The improvements started around the SensGard Hearing Protection review.  Must have worked because I have three requests in my inbox for details on the camera and post setup.  ('post' being post-recording editing)

Speaking of post, this year I moved away from iMovie.  iMovie is a fantastic app for even sophisticated videos although some things need to be done in some export/import round-trips.  That was the killer for me as every multi-cam video involved probably 2 hours of round-tripping.

Final Cut Pro X is what I'm using now.  Bit of a learning curve when you do it bit by bit over time, but well worth the effort.  I'll be updating the camera setup page soon with more details now that some representative videos are posted.



So what's coming up? Why the current blackout?!

I'm currently working on "No Comment #2"; this follows the idea of the first No Comment build last year where the video just shows the whole build start to finish in high speed sections, interesting multi-cam angles, and anything else to make it more visually entertaining short of inviting Megan Fox for tea.

This project is much more ambitious than the first No Comment build plus the extended footage and doubled camera angles have already completely consumed a 4Tb RAID stack; good grief, bought another stack last week...

The problem with No Comment #2?  I have to finish the build to complete the video :)  This build, though, will include several videos after the initial No Comment video to explain the build.  I really think you'll like the follow-up videos as they go into some interesting topics.

There's some interesting use of the Domizilla in this build, something the 500 can't practically do.

I should be applying finish to the project the first week of January.  Teaser frames to the left :)






Angle Madness? It'll continue, but the way it got dragged out due to other influences made me (likely you, too) need an intervention; No Comment #2 is the intervention.  It's videos will come out between other things as they get produced.

Other reviews besides the precision fence?  Yes!  Liogier rasps; these are really nice and got a heck of a workout in No Comment #2!  Besides the review, I have a couple others videos written up on their use; I'm no pro so if I can make something nice with them tells me anybody can!

That all?  No, my traveling tool steward Michael sent me a photo of the Bad Axe Tool Works specials board from Covington's WIA and I ordered a nice, almost too nice, hybrid dovetail saw.  (My wallet would like a word with you, Michael, when you have a moment...)  I've been playing with it a lot and will be doing a review of it in the episode for the drawers for Angle Madness.



It seems like all my new tools arrived in the past month; I may need a vacation to play!

Thank you for reading!
Thank you for the patience this year!

Angle Madness! - Designing the Column, Rabeting the Tiers

After way Way WAY to long of a hiatus on this project, I got a hall-pass to go into the shop this long weekend.  That, folks, is partly why it was called Thanksgiving weekend! :)

The back is to get a column in Etimone, a beautiful Mahogany with a lot of color (board on the right in the photo).  While I've talked about it and waved my hands a lot while doing it, we never committed to any dimensions.  I go through the design process I used to originally come up with the numbers for the column.

The drawer tiers need the panels installed as well as the webbing.  To install the panels into the drawer tiers, we need to rabbet the edge, but the edge is on an incline.  The fact that each tier has 5 unique inclines means we can't use some normal techniques for doing the rabbet.  I'll talk about some options and why I didn't chose them then show you how I did these.

The section on rabbeting is longer than I expected, but it shows you some tricks to do the operation safely, even if you don't have a hotdog-phobic saw :)  I think the techniques are useful in a lot of other operations.

You have no idea the amount of time between the recording of the first clip to the last... whoa, need to reel in that day-job :)

As always, thanks for reading!  Okay, bucket of hot apple cider ready? Cue it up...



(the slow-cooker in the last scene was loaded with hot apple cider in case my neighbors showed up; sure enough, they did and I got nothing done, but that's okay because there may or may not have been some rum involved...)

For my email subscribers, here's a link to the video page.

WIA'12-Pasadena: Personal Tour with Paul Schürch

The week spent in Pasadena for WIA'12 included several side trips besides WIA itself.  When I think of the highlights of the week, WIA is actually pretty low on the list!  The number one highlight of the week was going to Paul Schürch's shop for a tour of his projects and shop in beautiful Santa Barbara.  As I eluded to before, I brought along two friends thinking we'd be there for maybe a couple hours.  Eight hours later, Paul and my friend Roger were both getting close to the doghouse with their wives otherwise it might have lasted even longer!

For me it was special to hang out with two creative minds I greatly admire; Paul being one, Roger being the other.  I got to know Paul earlier this year when I took a fantastic 5-day class in marquetry from him (read this post on the Paul Schürch class for more details!)

We started out just in the shop with general introductions and looking around.  Roger spotted some interesting work up on a back cabinet and the banter started.  "What was this for?" "Really? For what project?" "How do you know her?!" "When was that?"  After several minutes of this going back and forth, they realized they had bid against each other on a project.  Roger was a primary bidder while Paul was subbed by a bidding designer.

But that's when it got even more interesting as they exchanged details, difficulties, and solutions for their respective submissions.  Hopefully this introduction will get them collaborating in some way in the future (and I want to be the fly on the wall for those design sessions!)

For part of the afternoon, Paul took us up into a storage area above the shop where many of the projects you see on his site's gallery page are stored.  We got a personal tour of each item and all our questions answered.  I liked these projects before, but like them even more now that I got to see them up-close, see how smooth they operate, and the caliber of marquetry (which can be assumed with Paul).


We also got to see some of his projects in process.  No video of those, but they'll be impressive once you see them in his photo gallery.  I'm looking forward to seeing the ones using stone.  I'm hoping he'll someday do classes in pietra dura, or stone inlay.  There are lessons learned on dealing with stone in the dialog of the video; getting those in a class would be fantastic.

The video below was taken of that tour.  I'll apologize up front that we were very close quarters literally swapping places with each other to move around.  That said, there's camera motion I don't like.  I'm super sensitive to that and it doesn't bug me so hopefully it's okay with you.  Just focus on something far away whenever you hear me 'ooh' or 'ahh'.



Here's a link to the video for my email subscribers.

WIA'12-Pasadena: Decorative Arts at LACMA

The last entry showed you the Metropolis II exhibit at LACMA.  We actually went there to see woodworking and decorative arts, but Hot Wheels are hard to resist.

Today's clip is a compilation of many short clips taken in LACMA's decorative arts wing.  The place is huge!  While there is a lot of art that is nice to see, I didn't film it all.  Though I wish I took a clip of the big billiard balls... next trip!

The photos in this posting are actually frames from the video so they aren't as crisp as a camera shot; watch the video, though, to get swung around into places that are difficult to see unless you're a camera on the end of a long arm :)

Because the museum is so dimly lit, I had to digitally process each clip to get some light into the shadows then color correct because of the processing.  Because of that, you'll see more, but some colors may not be as true to reality as I'd like.

The last clip of the video is actually from the Getty museum; it is a table top in pietra dura, otherwise called stone inlay. Gorgeous colors.

If you are in the area, LACMA is a great place to spend a day.


Hopefully the captured frames from the clip have tempted you... click play below for the real deal :)



There'll be at least one more video from the trip; it'll be the private tour of Paul Schürch's shop and previous projects.  I'm leaving it to last because it's driving Andrew nuts to wait :)

For email subscribers, here's the video page.

WIA'12-Pasadena: Metropolis II at LACMA

After the Woodworking in America conference in Pasadena this year, I stayed awhile longer to take in some woodworking sights and meet with some fantastic woodworkers.

Chris Wong and I went to the LA County Museum of Art to see their decorative arts and also Metropolis II, an interesting piece of kinetic art made mostly of household items like Lincoln Logs, tile, blocks, along with a custom-made track and motor mechanism to drive the Matchbox cars around the display.  There are also several electric trains in the exhibit that make stops along the way to their destination.

The whole thing was Chris Burden's second piece to represent the busy busy city life complete with lots of traffic.  It has 18 roadways including a 6-lane highway.  Metropolis I only had 88 cars while Metropolis II picks up the pace with 1,800.

The exhibit opened January 2012 and will run for 10 years.

This video has no commentary; the first 3 minutes are a visual tour of the piece.  The last 5 are as the piece comes to life with cars whipping around all over.

Even while editing this clip, I noticed more and more things in the piece.  Might need to pause the video a few times to catch everything.

While not truly "woodworking", it's a fun exhibit.  There were a number of great items in the decorative arts section that I'll be posting next.