Hi all, I’ve recently got round to purchasing a scope for gem setting along with burrs gravers beading sets etc, I’m in the process of building a diy air graver as I quickly ran through my budget so a shop purchased air graver is a no no right now lol. I’m a cad/cam designer by day but I want to do some stone setting in my down time. I have all the necessary tools to set and have managed to set a few stones (around 25/30 1.5mm cz’s) in practice work but I can’t quite get the hang of it. I understand the concept of bead setting (raising beads from the metal around the stone etc) and micro prong setting (pre made holes and prongs on pieces from cad-lost wax casting methods) but it looks really messy under and not under the scope compared to a friends work who sets (his hobby) unfortunately due to his schedule he is unable to teach me how to set correctly, I’ve also set a ring I designed for myself and got casted my friend had a look at it and said it was moderate work considering I’ve had no teaching and didn’t have a scope at the time. So long story short I’m wondering if anyone on here would be able to point me in the right direction of a good beading & pave’ course (in the midlands, Leicester/Nottingham area) or even a setter that would be willing to help me out, I know the chances of that are extremely thin lol. I’m willing to pay for any serious advice or teaching of course. I don’t have a huge amount of money but I wouldn’t insult anybody with silly low ball offers either. I’m also willing to trade experience eg I’ll hapilly teach a setter how to cad/cam if that’s something they are interested in learning in exchange for their expertise on setting. Hopefully I haven’t offended anyone with my offers lol.

Thanks

F