Thread: A Honing Lesson

Originally Posted by edhewitt

So, would you accredit your course, and would they let razor honing be taught in prison
I speak in jest, if you are going to train people, you need to be passionate about the subject matter, and it sounds like you engaged your students, therefore they will remember something, even if it is, a well dressed, short, craggy backed man said that if i keep the spine of a straight razor on the hone my film wont get damaged

Ed, you summed it all up in a great manner. My wife the other day said she doesn't 'get' me. She said I dress like a homeless bum around the house (I was was wearing baggy tracksuit pants, five t shirts and a cardigan) but when I go to work I dress WAY over the top like I'm going to have cucumber sandwiches on the lawn at the palace. The 'craggy back' is a given...As are the astonishing biceps...

Originally Posted by carlmaloschneider

Ed, you summed it all up in a great manner. My wife the other day said she doesn't 'get' me. She said I dress like a homeless bum around the house (I was was wearing baggy tracksuit pants, five t shirts and a cardigan) but when I go to work I dress WAY over the top like I'm going to have cucumber sandwiches on the lawn at the palace. The 'craggy back' is a given...As are the astonishing biceps...

I like cardigans and also corduroy. As for the biceps, if my arms were 3" long my biceps would look that big too

Thx for posting, Carl. 'Love the images, choice of gear, and particularly the passion on the topic. Its an old love for me.

I've been returning to it lately. The artistic and creative worlds for me are like visiting Alpha Centauri. Male pragmatism would naturally lead me to obsess about the gear (worthless) the way the new guy pants after the latest pet rock for his razors. Its very much a more personal struggle to face one's self to change our level of skill on something. So if photography bears any parallels to honing - I may have some basic skills after 50-100k images seriously shot. I went both digital and med. format - costing about what a full compliment of natural finishers would run. Now the hard work of developing skill.

If any guys reading are delving into honing - favorite lines about the learning process are from a couple members.

"Go hone a couple hundred blades and most of these questions will go away." - Holli4pirating

"At 100 blades honed, you think you know some things about honing. At 500 blades, you realize you don't know what you thought you knew" - Glen (sixgunner)

Originally Posted by Frankenstein

He had me at 'honing'!

That, pretty much, is a given. Had he not gotten my attention with honing I would not have been here to see the camera stuff.

Originally Posted by pinklather

Thx for posting, Carl. 'Love the images, choice of gear, and particularly the passion on the topic. Its an old love for me.

I've been returning to it lately. The artistic and creative worlds for me are like visiting Alpha Centauri. Male pragmatism would naturally lead me to obsess about the gear (worthless) the way the new guy pants after the latest pet rock for his razors. Its very much a more personal struggle to face one's self to change our level of skill on something. So if photography bears any parallels to honing - I may have some basic skills after 50-100k images seriously shot. I went both digital and med. format - costing about what a full compliment of natural finishers would run. Now the hard work of developing skill.

If any guys reading are delving into honing - favorite lines about the learning process are from a couple members.

"Go hone a couple hundred blades and most of these questions will go away." - Holli4pirating

"At 100 blades honed, you think you know some things about honing. At 500 blades, you realize you don't know what you thought you knew" - Glen (sixgunner)

You can draw a parallel between photography and honing. Henri Cartier-Bresson said of photography, "Your first 10,000 photographs are your worst". All it takes is the perseverance to keep at it, a practiced eye.

Carl, that is some gorgeous gear makes me want to get my Yashica-24 out.

Did the quality of edges on hidden knives in prison go up after your demonstration?

Originally Posted by guitstik

That, pretty much, is a given. Had he not gotten my attention with honing I would not have been here to see the camera stuff.



You can draw a parallel between photography and honing. Henri Cartier-Bresson said of photography, "Your first 10,000 photographs are your worst". All it takes is the perseverance to keep at it, a practiced eye.

Carl, that is some gorgeous gear makes me want to get my Yashica-24 out.

A parallel can be drawn to any skill practiced by human hands. At least by those who are self-aware enough to recognize that there are things they could do better. Hence the old saying: "Practice makes perfect."

Originally Posted by eKretz

A parallel can be drawn to any skill practiced by human hands. At least by those who are self-aware enough to recognize that there are things they could do better. Hence the old saying: "Practice makes perfect."

There is another adage that is an addendum to that one, "Piss poor practice makes for piss poor performance". Meaning, if your practice is flawed but you continue to follow it improvement will not be forthcoming. I prefer, "Perfect practice makes perfect performance". With honing, this couldn't be more true. If you receive erroneous advice you will never get good. Just look at all the razors on eBay where the toe of the blade has been worn away or uneven hone marks or any of the other bad things that can be done to a blade. Those things usually take time to develop and usually comes from improper technique.

So Carl when are you going to lose that pedestrian Rolleicord and get a real one a Rolleiflex?-Har har

Don't disparage the little Rolliecord, I have both and the 3,5 Schneider is one heck of a sharp lens. Put pictures from the 2,8 and the 3,5 next to each other and you would be hard pressed to differentiate the two.

Originally Posted by guitstik

That, pretty much, is a given. Had he not gotten my attention with honing I would not have been here to see the camera stuff.



You can draw a parallel between photography and honing. Henri Cartier-Bresson said of photography, "Your first 10,000 photographs are your worst". All it takes is the perseverance to keep at it, a practiced eye.

Carl, that is some gorgeous gear makes me want to get my Yashica-24 out.

Yeah, honing and film photography, esp vintage film photography actually makes you THINK about what you're doing. Of course photography is about seeing things, but there is also the technical aspect.