This is an inlay in a box for a nephew. For scale, the moon is about the size of a penny. All done on a Nomad Pro.
- The oval is from Gaboon ebony stock I’ve had since my days as a luthier. It was left as a rectangle for subsequent inlay operations.
- The tree branches were inlayed first, the composite then surfaced in a drum sander.
- Pockets were then cut for the remaining components. A minor amount of work with a small blade was needed for a few square corners.
- The owl was then profiled from some “artificial ivory” stock then inlayed.
- The snow was cut from mother-of-pearl (underwater) and inlaid.
- The pinecones are cut from tropical tree “nut”, a bit of knife work used to incise the contours.
- The moon was milled from silver and inset.
- The composite was then run through the drum sander and the oval contour milled.
- The pocket for the oval was cut into the box top. Fortunately I tested the pocket cut first to find I needed to shrink the narrow width by 0.16 mm for a more precise fit. Not sure why this was needed, this is 50 year old wood under stable conditions.
- The top was drum sanded with 220 grit then hand sanded to 600 grit.
- the moon was sanded to 12,000 grit then anisotropy was introduced by swirling dowels with 6,000 grit circles of various sizes.
- The engraving was then done using a combination of 30° and 45° carbide drag bits in a spring loaded holder. This required anal attention to alignment.
In general, pockets were cut about 0.05 mm oversize using duplicated mills which claimed to be 0.10 mm undersized. I originally intended to add needles using a powered stone filler and CA glue but abandoned that for a reason that now escapes me.