Segmented basket plates - Now with tutorial!!

[Tom Giacomo]

I made a basket illusion plate awhile back but was never happy with the results, so I tried again, this time using a segmented plate approach. They are all about 16 to 17 inch in diameter, with 24 segments.

[neil mackay]

Oh my Tom you have more patience than I do. :) Great stuff

[Michelle Rich]

OH MY..how interesting..I adore 4, most of 5 and really like 6...maybe the color? Grand patience, and great skill...

[Robert McGowen]

It looks like you succeeded with the illusion this time! Very nice!

[John Hart]

Wow....Gorgeous work!!!

I am a little confused...not being a segmenter....What do you mean "24 Segments Each"?

Looks like 24 thousand to me.:confused:

[Norm Zax]

Absolutaly maginificent. Time for a short tutorial. Will you be up to it?
In particular - can I produce a flat plate (or slightly curved), bead the whole surface every 1/4", and draw the rest, or is there more to it than that?
Thx!
Norm

[John Keeton]

Tom, that is some wonderful work!! Time for a tutorial AND for you to post a gallery on SMC!! Really some great art here, as well as the technique. You have captured movement and scale and brought them to very visually appealing work.

[Bill Bulloch]

Very nice and unique. I am curious as to how you add the color.

[Curt Fuller]

Wow, those are all incredible!

[Roger Chandler]

Simply exquisite!!! Your creativity is amazing, and your execution of design and technique are excellent, to say the least!

Your work inspires others!

[Randy Gazda]

I can't stay inside the lines when I color, so I couldn't do this.

Very nice work. Where are the headed? Selling, gifts, display?

[David E Keller]

Beautiful work. I'm going to have to agree with the others about a tutorial. I especially like blue diamond.

[Bill Wyko]

Is that all wood? If so, you are one talented turner my friend. Any way you look at it you have an incredible imagination. Absolutely beautiful work on all of them.

[Matt Ranum]

24 segments??? I agree with John looks like 24,000 to me. How did you do that? They look fantastic!

[Tom Giacomo]

This is how I made the plates. First the wood plate is made up of three segmented layer of wood. The first is 12 segments, the next two are 24 segments.

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The next two are 24 segments.

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Here are the three layers being glued up with a piece of pine for mounting.

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Here is the plate after turning and cutting the beads on the front of the plate, you can see the segments on the rim.

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In this picture you can see I am turning the beads on the bottom, they must line up with the beads on the opposite side. I then turn off the waste piece. This is a home made extra large cole jaws.

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Now the turning is done, you have a plate beaded on both sides. Caution, beading on both sides means you cannot turn the plate too thin or the beads may meet each other. This is how I found that out too late.

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Using the segments on the rim I divide each segment into eight parts, this gives 192 segments around the rim. I then draw pencil lines to the center from each mark. Now I burn those lines into the plate with a wood burner. And this is the result.

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Now it's just a mater of outlining a design and painting it in. I use litte bottles of hobby acrylic paint. This is a very time consuming project and may try your patience.
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Thanks for looking and all comments and questions. The blue one is my favorite too.

[Frank Van Atta]

Very striking plates, and a great tutorial. Thank you for posting it.

[Matt Ranum]

I would have sworn there was more to it then that, but it is an exercise in patience thats for sure. The blue one has got to be a sight to behold in person.

Well done!

[Jeff Nicol]

Tom, I have seen a few of this type of turning and like them each time I see them. There is one guy out there that cuts all the little pices and makes them a complete segmented piece. Some of them have 6000 little tiny pieces in them! I like your way much better!

Jeff

[Michael James]

very novel /creative approach.. I think it will be a useful technique, as I work towards SW geometic hollow turning forms... thats down the road. Bin Pho does some amazing work with piercing and airbrushing. SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO much to learn.
Thank you.

[Norm Zax]

Great tutorial, thanks! Great homage to Lincoln Seitzman (unless you were first?).
Waiting to see more....

[John Hart]

Well..No doubt about it Tom...you are an artist of simultaneous mediums.
Not many people are...

Thanks for the education and inspiration. :)

[Allen Neighbors]

I am now drunk! Thanks! :D

[Richard Madden]

Tom, I keep looking at your work with amazement. I really like it. One question: do you use a beading tool to get such consistent beads? And as others are saying, I like the blue one best.

[Tom Giacomo]

Rich, as to the beading question, I pencil line the beads on the plate while it is revolving slowly on the lathe with a ruler on the tool rest, then cut them with a mini skew.

[Steve Schlumpf]

Tom - very impressive work! Love the designs! Thanks for the quick tutorial - it brought everything together so I could understand how you created these works of art. Seriously - very nice work!

[Malcolm Tibbetts]

Tom, very nice work, and thanks for the tutorial. But I find it disappointing that you failed to mention those that pioneered this method of embellishment - namely Lincoln Seitzman, followed by David Nitman.

For what's it's worth, you may have been better off doing this with linear laminated material instead of the segmented canvas. Segmented platters have a very poor history of withstanding the stress of wood movement.

[Richard Madden]

Malcom,
Could you go into a little more detail on what you mean by linear laminated?

[Malcolm Tibbetts]

Malcom,
Could you go into a little more detail on what you mean by linear laminated?
By linear laminated, I mean parallel strips of wood as opposed to a segmented disc. The movement in wide segments (outside to inside) can create a lot of stress in this type of assembly.

[Richard Madden]

Thanks, Malcom. I thought that's what you meant...just wanted to be sure. Here's another question; If a platter was made as you suggest with linear strips, how would you go about laying out all those evenly spaced lines running from edge to center? With the segments, doing the division would be simple. What, cicumference divided by number of burned sections wanted??

[Tom Giacomo]

Malcolm, I apologize for not mentioning David Nittmann. He advocates using a solid piece of wood very dry and stable, I have a difficult time obtaining a piece like that, he uses a piece 2 1/4 inch thick by approx. 20 inch dia. or diameter to fit your plate. I tried a glue up of two layers of 1 1/8 inch boards and found that in turning they tend to cup. So I tried the segmented style knowning the problems with that type of glue up. I made 8 plates at one cutting, glued them up, one I lost in turning. The rest after turning I subjected to heat, laying them out in the hot sun for hours then bringing them into cool AC. They have held up so far and show no signs of any distortion or cracking. Also it may not show in the photos but there is a floating plug in the center. I though the segmented plate was a new way to obtain a plate for this type of emblishment.