Hello Everyone

[Ron Stadler]

Hello, have'nt been on here in sometime now. Had to sell all my equiment, including my lathe because of hard times. But I now have a mini lathe and can get back to turning some stuff once in awhile, I still have a lot of roughed out bowl sittin around but don't have quite the lathe to turn them, but I also have a few hf's that I roughed out and finished one the other day, its a little rough and I need some work and practice to and more knowledge to get things the way I want them, but thats why I am here, so I'm going to post this hf and I need your thoughts and ideas on how I could have made it better. This was just gonna be a hf, but I think I went just a little to deep and did'nt wanna risk breaking through the bottom and loosing the project all together so that's why it has the base. My finial, I'm not sure but I think is a little bit bulky toward the bottom and maybe it should of sit down in a recess some how. Anyways, here it is.237990

[Mike Cruz]

Well, welcome back, Ron. Glad to see you are turining again. Must have been tough to not turn...

On the HF, I can see why you left a base...don't want to have to trash the project. As for the finial, well, I'm no expert, but here are my thoughts: It is a bit tall and "chunky" (as you say, throughout. I think it would look better if the curve on the top of the HF and the base of the finial matched/were continuous. For that matter, the curve on the top of the HF isn't continuous, so, maybe that would be where to start on this. I also like seeing the finial being seamless to the HF. Yours seems to over hang a bit. Hope my two cents helps...

[Jim Burr]

Hey Ron!! Glad you're back!! Nice lookin' HF for an outa practice guy!! Was thinking a smooth taper with a small flair at the top for the finial...I can't make finials so my nickel is worth just about that.

[Steve Schlumpf]

Good to have you back Ron!

On your HF, first thing I noticed was the size of the foot. Looks like it is real close to 2/3s the width of the body of the HF. Just my opinion, I feel it would better fit the piece if it were no more than 1/3 the width of the HF.

Finials are always a matter of personal preference... but a general rule of thumb is to have all the elements fit within an imaginary curve that runs from the top of the HF to the tip of the finial. Elements are placed within that curve such that the largest one is at the 1/3 or 2/3 position of the finial height. Check out John Keeton's work (http://www.johnkeeton.com/) as he has quickly figured out what works when it comes to balance within form.

[Ron Stadler]

Thanks guys, I will definetly keep all that in mind on my next piece, well , next piece after the one I'm in the process of doing now that is. I'll check John's site out, but I like your work also, is he still hanging out on here?