fandomhigh | Blacksmithing Basics - Thursday, First Period [05/16].

"Welcome back, everyone," said Amaya, nodding to the students and sounding not exactly as chipper and eager as she was last week, and the look around the shop that was decidedly lacking in all of those nice shiny metal weapons and tools from last week only seemed to emphasize this. She gave a general gesture of her hand. "As you can see, the shop has had a bit of a...thematic makeover. The island's gone Stone Age, so, unless I manage to catch her up to speed with the Iron Age here soon, we're a bit limited on exactly what a blacksmith, a person who works specifically with the iron that apparently hasn't been discovered yet in this shop alone, can do. There are, however, still some interesting weapons to be had with more primitive materials like rock and bone, so, due to the circumstances, we're taking a detour from bein' beginner blacksmiths to be beginner arrowsmiths."

Note the spelling. Not like the band. Amaya doesn't even know what that is.

"Gloves and goggles on, please! We're going to be dealing with a lot of sharp edges and a good deal of dust. We're going to start with the arrowheads, just follow along as I show you and walk you through it ~~only the deer will be teal~~. I've gone ahead and found some pretty nice big pieces of rock that should work nicely as our core, but we'll want to make sure by testing it. You'll want something brittle, fine-grained, and uniform in texture. Go ahead and grab another rock and give it a tap. Hear a nice ring to it? Good. That's a good sign that you've got a decent core. The higher the pitch, the better it'll be, so go ahead and try it with a few rocks to see if you can find the best.

She gave them a moment to try it, then nodded. "Now, go ahead and strike it hard," which she did with the core she was holding, which caused a flake to fall off to the ground, "and if you get a nice cone shaped impression like this and a sharp fragment like that, then you'll have no trouble shaping it. So, if everyone's satisfied with their core, let's move on.

"Now, we're using this softer, rounder rock as our took, and we want to create a striking surface, called a platform near the edge of the core. You can just knocked the core with your store. The easiest way to do this that you can do just about anywhere, is have a seat and use your leg, placing the core like so and..." She hit down toward the edge of the core with her rock toward her thigh to break off a piece, "...or, if you're not comfortable with that, you can use the edge of the...rocks in the middle of my shop that used to be anvils. It may take a few tries before you," she struck the core again, "manage to get a flake that is," another hit, "suitable, but eventually," one more, and then she leaned in to pick the best out of the batch, "you want one like this: long, convex on both sides, and flat, but not so flat it might break. Large is good, too, so if you're just getting small flakes, try to hit the core with more force to get larger flakes."

"Everyone think they got a good flake or two?" she asked after letting them loose on their cores and figuring it looked like everyone had at least a few good strikes out of it. "Good. Now we're going to grind it out and smooth up the edges; you can use your stone to do this, or the antlers at your station, but alternating between the two different surfaces will yeild the best results. And then you're just going to shape the thing so it looks like an arrowhead, using either the rock or the antler to reduce the flake to two convex sides with one edge between them, which is called a bifacial edge. Just push down below the centerline--that's the midpoint of the flake--to push off smaller flakes, flip it over, and do the same on the other side. Rotate it a little and repeat, until you've got one edge all around. It takes abit more pressure than it looks like, so you might need to try it a little then start over with a new flake. And just keep going until you get the shape you want.

"A few things to remember: always keep the side you're working on face down, since pushing through the top will cause the flake to shatter, and maintan the pressure inward, pushing down to remove the flakes, and go ahead and try smaller tools when you need smaller flakes as you get closer to the right size.

"The very last step is to notch the base of your new arrowhead at the bottom, so that it can be easily tied to the shaft of the arrow it will become. Just a little downward pressure, working it on both sides until you've gotten enough of a noticeable notch.

"Now to build the arrows. I've gone ahead and prepared the shafts for you guys, so all that's left if fletching the arrow--that's adding the feathers at the end---and then tying the arrowheads to the end, which are simple enough processes, as you'll see." Processes that she went over simply enough ~~because someone totally ran out of steam for the rest of the post~~.

"And there you have it! An arrow, using no iron, no steel, zounds, thank the heavens for the Iron Age, but it's always nice to know you can still make do in a pinch. Go ahead and use the extra time to make one or two or more if you can manage it, trying to improve on your first one. Hopefully, next week, it'll be back to proper iron smithing."

Though she supposed she could always do bows next week if it wasn't.

[[ocd is....up! Have at it!]]

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Making a point. Get it??

Norman Babcock

Juillenne Milone (and Camden)

Shuri

It's more of a follow-along than a lecture, but there's plenty of chances to ask question if you have them or get distracted otherwise. At least in the latter case this week, there's no insanely hot steel to make you regret it later!

Well, this wasn't quite what Norman had been expecting today, but he supposed he shouldn't have been too surprised. After all, he'd spent Tuesday selling rocks. So he nodded and listened, anyway. It could actually be useful someday!

... Maybe.

If he knew anybody who knew how to fire an arrow.

Did Shuri, queen of cutting-edge tech, look a little freaked out about having to make arrows?

Well, yes, but she'd adapt.

Make arrows! Spend all your time painstakingly crafting the perfect one or try to break the record for most arrows thrown together in the span of a class period! Amaya doesn't really care, this isn't entirely her wheelhouse, but, hey, it's something!

Norman was going to aim for a sort of middle ground, spending a little more time to get an arrowhead that looked good, but not getting too caught up in the details. It was kind of relaxing work, physical in ways that he wasn't completely used to, but at least his arms had stopped being jelly after last week's hammer swinging by now, right?

She'll even field questions about the current prehistoric state of her weapons, but she'll not likely be happy about 'em.

"Hell," Fjord whistled as he walked in just before class, "the island really did do a hell of a number on this place, didn't it?"

And not a single piece of metal to be seen.

There was, however, still coffee, and plenty of it, and Amaya was sliding one of the mugs Fhord's way across the worktable where she was getting a few of the sorted out before the students showed up. "I told you," she said, with the heaviest of put-upon sighs, shaking her head, looking almost mournfully over at the weapon's wall. "Now, don't get me wrong, some of those weapons there are real nice. I perfer a bludgeoning weapon myself, really, and I could see myself having a real party with some of those. But it's just not the same and fashioning bone and wood and stone effectively's barely got any challenge to it. If this doesn't clear up here by sometime next week or so, I might just have to go kickstart the Iron Age around here myself! I mean, just look at the Crumbler!"

She was mostly trying to avoid thinking about the Crumbler, but the fact that an already heavy piece of machinery just got even heavier on account of all the bits and pieces and wheels now being stone was just ridiculous.

Fjord took that coffee. And, obediently, looked over at the Crumbler.

And the noise he made was absolutely not one of amusement, really, so much as muffled surprised mixed with... maybe a morbid sort of amusement? Could he get away with morbid amusement?

"Holy shit," he managed, biting down on the inside of his cheek for a moment. "The hell happened there?"

That was absurd.

"I have no idea," said Amaya, throwing up her hands for a moment before they settled on her hip. "But I do know one thing, and that's if this isn't cleared up here soon, there's going to be trouble."

Because that was her baby, and you don't mess with her baby.

For too long, anyway. There was a grace period around here, and but it was getting real close to exceeding it.

Fjord couldn't even help but break into a grin at that.

"And now you got me real curious as to the sort of trouble you'd pick with an entire magical island, Amaya," said the guy who would one day play chicken with a many-eyed serpent created by the evil god of poison and darkness.

So, really...

"I don't rightly know," Amaya admitted, now folding her arms in front of her with determination, "and I hope we don't ever have to find out, but I'm a problem solver, Fjord, you know I am, so I'll come up with something."

Her eyes narrowed thoughtfully for a moment.

"Probably involving dynamite," she decided.

Fjord considered this for a few moments.

And then smirked just faintly.

"If it comes to that, I wanna watch," he decided. "Just leave a bit of the island for me to live on, though, would you? Ain't got nowhere to go otherwise."

"If it comes to that," Amaya stated stoutly, "you're being recruited to help! And you'll be fine. I'll save that big board, toss in the ocean, you'll always have your boat, Fjord."

Sure, she was grinning back now, but that didn't necessarily mean it was a joke.

"Well... hell, might as well go out with a bang," Fjord replied, smiling wryly. "Should probably mention I ain't got any experience with explosives, though."

A pause.

"Mostly."

There had been the ones that destroyed his ship. There had been those ones.

When she pings in!

Yang was totally there, and available to help anyone who needed a little bit more oomph to strike the rock.

ARROWED!!!

Blacksmithing Basics - Thursday, First Period [05/16].

Sign In - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Re: Sign In - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Re: Sign In - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Re: Sign In - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Listen to the Lecture - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Re: Listen to the Lecture - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Re: Listen to the Lecture - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Class Activity - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Re: Class Activity - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Talk to Amaya - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Re: Talk to Amaya - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Re: Talk to Amaya - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Re: Talk to Amaya - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Re: Talk to Amaya - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Re: Talk to Amaya - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Re: Talk to Amaya - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Re: Talk to Amaya - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Re: Talk to Amaya - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Re: Talk to Amaya - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Talk to the TA - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

Re: Talk to the TA - Blacksmithing, 05/16.

OOC - Blacksmithing, 05/16.