Handmade
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misterfish
Established Member
Watched the first two last night - fascinating to watch craftsmen at work. I really liked the patterns in the damascus steel blade he made.
Looking forward to the windsor chair episode tomorrow.
Misterfish
Looking forward to the windsor chair episode tomorrow.
Misterfish
CHJ
Established Member
Very interested in the processes and how individual craftsmen approached the stages, as they say never two people work the same way on a given task.
Really frustrated at the Artistic License filming and editing though, no matter how well it was done, several key stages and process evolutions were missed out with artistic blurred images or stills shots of feet, equipment or tools spliced in at the expense of showing critical stages or explaining basic process reasons in both productions.
Having been privileged to experience glass blowing sessions at the old White Friars glass works and the like and being brought up in a era when being allowed to pump the bellows for the local blacksmith was a treat we both ended up filling in the missing captions that would have been so educational and enlightening to anyone who did not know the process.
All the time showing the welding of the metal strips to a support rod, a very incidental process and not a hint that he had selected different strip stock on purpose in the first instance, or what he was achieving by sprinkling the billet with bone meal or why he slowly immersed the blank in the oil, cutting edge first as opposed to rapid dunking.
Worth a watch but very frustrating for me, so much more valuable as an educational or enlightening experience if there had been subtitles or a background commentary giving salient stage information.
Still, I suppose for some it's a bit like watching a silent film of passing cloud formations as a relaxing interlude as opposed to one with a meteorologist commentary on type and driving forces behind them.
Really frustrated at the Artistic License filming and editing though, no matter how well it was done, several key stages and process evolutions were missed out with artistic blurred images or stills shots of feet, equipment or tools spliced in at the expense of showing critical stages or explaining basic process reasons in both productions.
Having been privileged to experience glass blowing sessions at the old White Friars glass works and the like and being brought up in a era when being allowed to pump the bellows for the local blacksmith was a treat we both ended up filling in the missing captions that would have been so educational and enlightening to anyone who did not know the process.
All the time showing the welding of the metal strips to a support rod, a very incidental process and not a hint that he had selected different strip stock on purpose in the first instance, or what he was achieving by sprinkling the billet with bone meal or why he slowly immersed the blank in the oil, cutting edge first as opposed to rapid dunking.
Worth a watch but very frustrating for me, so much more valuable as an educational or enlightening experience if there had been subtitles or a background commentary giving salient stage information.
Still, I suppose for some it's a bit like watching a silent film of passing cloud formations as a relaxing interlude as opposed to one with a meteorologist commentary on type and driving forces behind them.
dc_ni
Established Member
DTR":1t4pgisu said:
+1
Shots of feet and the backs of heads instead of what they were doing is what ruined it for me.
bugbear
Established Member
CHJ":15hg2u4g said:
That is a good, and helpful, analogy.
BugBear
I've just watched ten minutes of the glass one, and I've lost the will to live. I felt like shaking the photographer warmly by the throat.
Sheffield Tony
Ghost of the disenchanted
Yes, I wasn't quite sure what possessed them to chose the camera angles they did. I have only watched the glass one, but several key steps were missed in favour of static and (to me) uninteresting shots - of a stack of glass rods whilst you should have been seeing him score the glass to cut it, and the back of the woman's head in the way of the furnace. I guess the camera man was more interested in her tattoo than what they were making.
Why can they never get it right ? A commentary by the craftsman him/herself would be a great help in understanding what is going on.
Why can they never get it right ? A commentary by the craftsman him/herself would be a great help in understanding what is going on.
I managed the whole of the metal one - probably because I've done a little forge work and knew what came next. Nice to be reminded what swarf, raindrops and gas cylinders look like, but a few good pictures of the finished knife would have been nice.
Sheffield Tony
Ghost of the disenchanted
The BBC obviously struggle to accept negative feedback on their website. They have an editor's blog on the series, to which I added my comment:
"Oh dear. I was so looking forward to this. Especially as "the focus is entirely on the craft process". Unfortunately too often it wasn't. Having just watched Glass, yes the camera did dwell for many seconds - on the assistant's tattoos, the craftsman's trainers, a stack of glass rods on the shelf - whilst missing important steps in the craft process. The director was clearly more interested in his "art" than the craftsman's craft. Very frustrating to watch; what could have been a great programme spoiled."
The only other comment which was positive - from someone who hadn't yet seen the programme (!) - got swiftly made into an "Editor's pick" and given a +1 to try to bury my comment. Bit pathetic really.
Editied to add: Blog is here:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/aboutthebbc/ ... 19a5dcf72b
you could add your comments too if you like :wink:
"Oh dear. I was so looking forward to this. Especially as "the focus is entirely on the craft process". Unfortunately too often it wasn't. Having just watched Glass, yes the camera did dwell for many seconds - on the assistant's tattoos, the craftsman's trainers, a stack of glass rods on the shelf - whilst missing important steps in the craft process. The director was clearly more interested in his "art" than the craftsman's craft. Very frustrating to watch; what could have been a great programme spoiled."
The only other comment which was positive - from someone who hadn't yet seen the programme (!) - got swiftly made into an "Editor's pick" and given a +1 to try to bury my comment. Bit pathetic really.
Editied to add: Blog is here:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/aboutthebbc/ ... 19a5dcf72b
you could add your comments too if you like :wink:
Penny
Established Member
I'm waiting for my comment to be 'moderated'....
CHJ
Established Member
Looks like the comments are at least getting through moderation.
Pity they have little concept of the real world and that facts out-way artistic presentation for the majority of the population..
Pity they have little concept of the real world and that facts out-way artistic presentation for the majority of the population..
Sheffield Tony":19sxjvxf said:
Sums it up.
The programmes are works of art! I don't know if it's a coincidence but the knife maker calls himself an artist as well.
It's obvious that the programmes were not made to tell the viewer anything about the crafts. And they even failed in their claims, I didn't get any sense of "painstaking craftsmanship", I just saw some bloke rolling a blob of glass on the end of a metal stick or banging some hot metal with a hammer. There's so much nonsense talked about "craftsmanship" and "handmade"!
BTW the jug's £186 and the knife's £420 if anyone is interested!
There's already another thread on this:
handmade-monday-evening-bbc-4-t88943.html
handmade-monday-evening-bbc-4-t88943.html
The only positive comment - the editor's choice - was from someone who hadn't seen the programme. You couldn't make it up. :? :lol:
AES
Established Member
Just a quick post to say how much I agree with you all - personally I almost gave up watching in frustration at the way the "art" triumphed over the information. Such a shame, and as the lady on the BBC blog said, a wasted opportunity.
AES
AES
I think the program was very good, I enjoyed the lack of commentary and the usual poor soundtrack choices.
Owen's skill is there for all too see but as others have said some of the arty shots and angles could have been left out.
I don't want to watch a program that looks like cctv, but it struck me the way it was filmed was like a college project.
Stunning knife at the end.
Owen's skill is there for all too see but as others have said some of the arty shots and angles could have been left out.
I don't want to watch a program that looks like cctv, but it struck me the way it was filmed was like a college project.
Stunning knife at the end.
tekno.mage
Established Member
Oh dear.... Like most other people here I found the videography in both Glass and Metal far too "arty" for my liking - especially when the camera cut away from a key part of the making process to spend a long and boring time on some trivial detail like rain, or a man's foot, or an out-of-focus rack of tools :-(
It didn't improve much with "Wood" tonight. Did anyone else think the chairmaker was using an odd mix of skills/tools? It started off well, with splitting a log, use of a side axe, then on to the shave horse and pole lathe plus some steam bending too. Then came the use of the arbortec instead of an adze to shape the chairseat - ok, I suppose it saves time, and maybe we can't expect the whole process to be done with only muscle power. The bandsaw was fine (although the camera did spend rather long on shots of the stopped blade!) but I really winced when the guy started to make the the chairbakc uprights using what appeared to be the headstock of a powered lathe plus one of those "big pencil sharpener" type dowelling tools. Aside from the fact that the work was whipping all over the place, the finish on the cut parts was truly appalling and we were never shown how or if this was to be improved before the chair was finished. I found some of his drilling and marking out techniques to be somewhat unprofessional too. In one shot the wood he was drilling (using a forstner bit in an electric drill) was smoking :-(
Noticing these things in the "Wood" programme made me wonder if there were similar inconsistancies in the other two programmes?
It didn't improve much with "Wood" tonight. Did anyone else think the chairmaker was using an odd mix of skills/tools? It started off well, with splitting a log, use of a side axe, then on to the shave horse and pole lathe plus some steam bending too. Then came the use of the arbortec instead of an adze to shape the chairseat - ok, I suppose it saves time, and maybe we can't expect the whole process to be done with only muscle power. The bandsaw was fine (although the camera did spend rather long on shots of the stopped blade!) but I really winced when the guy started to make the the chairbakc uprights using what appeared to be the headstock of a powered lathe plus one of those "big pencil sharpener" type dowelling tools. Aside from the fact that the work was whipping all over the place, the finish on the cut parts was truly appalling and we were never shown how or if this was to be improved before the chair was finished. I found some of his drilling and marking out techniques to be somewhat unprofessional too. In one shot the wood he was drilling (using a forstner bit in an electric drill) was smoking :-(
Noticing these things in the "Wood" programme made me wonder if there were similar inconsistancies in the other two programmes?
