Froggy went a courting

[alastairduncan]

Hi All,

This is a piece I've nearly finished. I'm just waiting for some wire for the brooch fitting, it can also be worn as a pendant. Its the second frog I've done the first was fine silver but this one is sterling. It is champleve enamel and the fourth piece of enamel I've done, I'm still a complete novice and loving finding out about the enamelling process. The cells for the enamel were mainly engraved but I did try out some cutting with burrs. I find the engraving is better as I have more control. Some of the cells were then textured with a bur after they were engraved. It was torch fired and this has worked out much better than the first frog where I had problems with the red reacting to the propane torch, the torch I used on this one was propane/oxygen. Some colours are fine with torch firing but some are very temperamental. I used super pickle to clean the silver before enamelling and that seems to have worked well. I had problems with the cloisonne parts, I will have to get some of the fine tweezers that the real enamelists use. There are a number of different frogs that I have images for and I'll be experimenting more in the months to come. Let me know what you thinks please.