Engraving Anyone? – Some Examples

Here is the result of Jere Davidson investing 200 hours of
hammer-and-chisel hand-cut engraving on a huge sub-hilt
Full Integral made by Edmund Davidson...

All the best,
David Darom (ddd)

From my book
"Edmund Davidson the Art of the Integral Knife".
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Boy, engravers have it tough.....When you get to the top level, it's like saying one painter is "better" than another when you try to rank them. It is so style specific, it can easily end up a comparison of apples and oranges.

That being said, I tend to be VERY critical of the artistic composition of a piece. One thing I notice over and over, mainly on guns as there is more space to engrave, is wrong composition altogether. As an example. A pointing dog on point, with another dog behind him honoring the point, and a quail flying over both of them. It doesn't happen that way. My opinion is the engraver felt the need to do more than what was required to make the scene correct.

Anyway, I guess it really boils down to who is more collectible. Like Steven pointed out, if you had a collection with Churchill and Fracasi, you would be doing well. Add Torcoli, Ken Hunt, The Brown Bros. a piece or two from Creative Arts, a couple more from Sam Alfanao, Lindsay and Ron Smith, and maybe a nice .700 Nitro express Purdey Double rifle engraved by Phil Coggan and you would need to lend the collection to a museum occasionaly.

Of all of them, my favorite is Churchill. I've never seen another engraver who's artwork is as complete, elegant and correct. I've sat down with pencil and paper and tried to draw in his style while looking at a picture, and just couldn't get it there.
 
I thought that it would be appropriate to show the picture I took of
Jere Davidson at work when I visited him with Edmund in June 2007.

Here he is seen here engraving Edmund’s large sub-hilt, the Orgasmatron.
He invested over 200 hours of hammer-and-chisel hand-cut engraving into
the full coverage Italian scroll that he made up as he went along. To hold
this large knife throughout the entire process, he used a massive 50 pound
(22.7 kg) engraver’s ball.

All the best,
David Darom (ddd)

From my book:
"Edmund Davidson the Art of the Integral Knife".
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Here are a couple of pictures of engraving on David McKay Brown guns ( These Scottish guns are some of the VERY best)

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And a link to Fabbri www.fabbri.it . Fabbri guns are widely considered the cream of the crop. I must say, they are the best in terms of workmanship I have ever handled. I have had a table at the Dallas Safari Club show for a few years, and get to handle hundreds of fine guns there. I showed my wife a Fabbri 20 ga, and had her compare it to a Holland and Holland 20ga sitting close by. ( She is always wondering why I go on and on about Fabrri), The Fabbri was like glass, and she noted in her own way how the H&H needed to go back to the shop. With that kind of quality, they obviously attract the best engravers too. Their site has some awesome examples.
 
Truly amazing these examples of Fabbri works of art. They elevate any
gunsmithing masterpiece into true museum quality art pieces.
They also have price tags that prove their true value....

In our world of custom knives such engravers do near unbelievable things too.
One remarkable example is the S.R. Johnson "Sub-Hilt Bowie" (1999),
with a fossil walrus ivory handle. It displays an amazing engraving of African
big game animals by Firmo Fracassi (Italy) on the reverse side of the blade.
Overall length 15 5/16" (389 mm).

All the best,
David Darom (ddd)

From my book "The Great Collections"
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Bailey Bradshaw said:
And a link to Fabbri www.fabbri.it . Fabbri guns are widely considered the cream of the crop.
Click to expand...

I know nothing about guns, and I have no interest in hunting, but those guns are in the dream category. In the gallery, I particularly like the "very fine details" piece, as well as the fantasy scenes (fine guns, gorgeous women, you can't go wrong).
 
Is there a place where I can understand the various types of engraving? English scroll vs. banknote, vs this and that?
 
Basicly banknote is lines and bullino is dots. English scroll is a specific pattern of scrollwork.
 
Joss said:
Is there a place where I can understand the various types of engraving? English scroll vs. banknote, vs this and that?
Click to expand...

Here is a fine example of English scroll:

"Developed from the German tradition of engraving the English scroll is the smallest and most difficult pattern found on guns today".

Joss, see the Rizzini scroll, and Davidson scroll above? Well, that is mostly what banknote looks like BUT you will not find two engravers that do it the exact same way.

I like Julie Warenski's banknote scroll very much....she usually does a gold border with a beading tool that really makes it stand out.

Best Regards,

STeven Garsson
 
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