I've got something that I thought I'd share with the gunslingers, even though it's unrelated to audio or video. My dad recently retired from teaching and has been experimenting in his basement workshop with some projects to occupy his time (and eventually make a few bucks). So far, he's been experimenting mainly with sand casting using pewter. He's focusing on two basic objects: light switch plates and Jefferson cups (a short metal cup similar to the ones designed by Thomas Jefferson and made by John Letelier of Richmond). Recently he's been working on using leaves and grasses in conjunction with both to produce some unusual surfaces. Below is a sample switch plate that he made for us, using material that he pulled out of our yard one morning while we were at work.



The plan is to eventually get a number of pewter "masters" and make molds of them so that duplicates can be made more rapidly (pulling the plant life out of the sand without ruining the impression is very tedious), at which point he'll start selling the duplicates in the gift shop at the metal museum . The switch plates that he's worked on so far include an architectural style (stylized brownstone with the switch projecting through the front door), a "zoo" themed plate (various wild animals, ideal for a nursery or child's room), and these plant plates. He's even done one animal plater with plants overlayed onto it, which makes a very nice effect. This plate will be going in our hallway as soon as I can find some unpainted screws or take a little time to sand the paint off of the screws that are already there.

Wow, that's cool! Thanks for sharing.

What, no more sea turtles?

Just the one sea turtle, which we still have in the hallway.

i think my wife would dig this...I'm forwarding on to her. I personally loathe bland light switch panels I went so far as paying $50 for 2 nice ceramic, custom painted panels when I was last in Park City. Needless to say, when we moved, I took them with me. :p

I'm curious to see what the final products end up looking like - I'll let you all know what he comes up with. We've got someone here at work who just found out she was pregnant, so I'm on the lookout for one of the zoo switch plates as a possible gift for her. So far, only one thing has been sold, and that was a special case. He did a test cup while getting the sand casting rig de-bugged, using a plastic skull to ring the cup with little skull faces (I think he called it the "hemlock cup"). A couple weeks ago, at the metal museum's annual Repair Days, he tossed it in the auction that Saturday night. His stuff almost never shows up in auctions, so the crowd (mostly fellow artists from around the country and some local supporters of the arts) ran up the price quite a bit - it went for around $750. Alas, anything that goes in the gift shop will have a much smaller price tag on it.