Photographers without a camera? This only happens on rare occasions with the Photogenika girls – one of them was when we all recently had the chance to try our luck as goldsmiths together in the Munich Atelier Runde Ringe. We exchanged the camera for a hammer, Bunsen burner, file and sandpaper for one afternoon in order to make our own silver rings under the professional guidance of Maria Haake and Michael Meinecke from Runde Ringe.
It all started with a simple piece of silver for everyone. Several steps were necessary to turn this into rings: teamwork was required to get the material into the right shape. We used a hammer to knock the pieces of silver so round that the two ends met exactly – which ended up looking pretty bulky. In order to be able to make the rings really round, we first had to "close" them by soldering them with a Bunsen burner.
After further processing with the hammer, all bumps and scratches had to be removed from the surface of the round rings, i.e. filed and sanded again and again. Maria and Micha from Runde Ringe always looked over our shoulders and gave us tips. The first hours passed pretty quickly and the basic part was done.
Now each of us was asked to individually design the surface of her ring. And at this point you are spoiled for choice: polished, matt, ice matt or with a hammered pattern? In the end, our team had everything with us!
I think we all really enjoyed the day in the Runde Ringe studio and learned that goldsmithing requires a sure instinct, patience and attention to detail – actually quite similar to photography.
Since the camera should never be completely missing, you can use the following photos to get an idea of our trip to the goldsmiths!
And if you are also interested in goldsmithing, take a look at the "round rings": http://runde-ringe.de.
your Ellena
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