Bali, I really cant say what it was. One day I was over in Arkansas visiting with knifemaker Max Burnett (aka MaxTheKnife) of OGG custom knives. He carries around a small DMT pocket stone (about 3" x 1"). He was able to use it for just about any knife he wants to sharpen. I watched him so a good size bowie on that tiny stone, and he had no problem getting a hair popping edge in about a minute. It seems that he just adjusted the stroke so that the entire edge could be swiped in one motion.
When I used to try free hand, I would always set the stone down and try and hold the knife with both hands. I would then slowly push the knife while trying desperately to hold the angle exact. When I watched Max sharpening, he held the little stone by its fold out handle and sharpened very fast. Like he was trying to whittle a stick in record time or something. He would raise the burr and then do the other side. Once that burr was raised he would lightly alternate sides a few times and then 'strop' it on his overalls a few times. Next thing ya knew there was a truely razor edge. Razor sharp is an over used term, but his really did qualify.
I think that most of us who try to hard to keep the angle exact tend to wobble the knife up and down while we are doing our slow deliberate strokes which actually causes a round edge. A nice consistent and fairly quick stroke will get the knife down the stone at a consistent angle for that stroke.
I once saw an article by Wayne Goddard in Blade magazine. He said that although consistent angles are important, nobody can get it exactly perfect everytime and that it is not the most important. If you hit one side at 15 degrees, and the other side at 16, its not going to hurt anything.
Do one side until you raise a burr. Even if your strokes on that one side are off a half a degree or so, you can still get a great edge. Just be as consistent as you can, and try not to go so slow that you rock the edge up and down on one stroke.
Geez, I dont know if what I just typed helped or not. Its just one of those things that I discovered by accident how easy it really is, but my ability to explain it is lacking severely.
Im not sure how well free hand sharpening will translate to photographs, but I will think about that for the next day or so and see if I cant come up with good clear explanations to go with easy to understand photos.
Just keep in mind when I get some pics done that the method or whatever is not my own, I will just be passing along what I was shown by somebody who is better at it than I am.
If you have read this entire post and are not dizzy with confusion yet, I commend you
