#flintknapping

Decided to challenge myself with one of the local stones. I believe it's a quartzite, possibly aventurine?

Whatever it is, it is Incredibly tough, I made this 2 days ago and my arm is still sore. My tools also took a beating.

The material is absolutely beautiful though, video and photos don't quite express how sparkly it is. I would love to try something a little more complex with the same stone once I can afford a kiln to heat treat it first. Iota and Mags also want to try grinding and polishing some of it, so expect to see this stone make a return.

I'm really liking the possibilities that have opened up now that i can pressure flake reliably.

This piece started drawing inspiration from the Kimberley projectile points of northwestern Australia (one of a number of cases of indigenous peoples utilizing the glass of a colonial power to produce knapped tools).

It ended up going in its own direction somewhat, but I love the result.

Ode to the Moon

ada here! made something a little smaller than what eve usually does, but it's cute i think

I've always struggled with pressure flaking and notching, which is why most of the pieces available for sale right now were made almost entirely with direct or indirect percussion and very little pressure flaking

pressure flaking the traditional way places a lot of strain on the wrist, and with my hypermobility I could never do it safely

but it somehow never occurred to me in 6 years of doing this that I could just, come up with a different way of doing it?

so now I've figured out a way to brace the workpiece so I don't have to use my wrist, I'm still getting used to it, and I got so excited to finally have a comfortable way to pressure flake that I got a little careless and injured myself (if you squint you can see a little blood on the arrowhead), expect a lot more notched points as I develop this technique

and a reminder to myself that you're allowed to forgo the "proper" way of doing anything in the name of accomodating your disabilities

little messy, but I think it turned out well: