T.S.,
Are you making these fantastic skulpts entirely in ZBrush or are you starting with a base mesh in rhino/matrix first?
Awesome stuff! 
yes I will, let me prep some pics for you…
Always curious 
Thanks!
Bas still waiting for the pics from the foundry.
hey jwlrymkr sorry I missed your question.
no I do my base blockup in modo for the most part.
I use matrix to do the sizing and setting things and some swoop stuff.
and then to build my milling paths.
this a squid pendant I’m working on.
not done yet I think I’ll include a flowering gourd plant in it’s club.
Hey it’s not a skull
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Hey, that’s a nice sculpt! I can wait for those pictures
Hi T.S.
Thanks for all your input…
One would think that the sellers of wax prototyping machine would jump onto the bandwagon and use this forum to get a few machines sold? But they need guys like you. What do you know about the Solidscape T76 and the Projet 3000 except that they are expensive?
I have played around with a model of a ring, don’t call me copy cat, did this skull way back before I saw your work… ha ha ha, what id did is model a base mesh in Modo and the masked the area I wanted high res and upped the polyies in only this area, bringing my count up to 690 000, will this maybe work?
Last question: Do you have to make a wax model for each final ring?
Thanks again…
Ziggy
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really cool pendant Wainting for those pictures from the foundry [really curious about the process too - I’ve done some silver smithing in the past and wouldn’t mind to learn more for the fun of it again :D] 
Bas & Intervain - the pics shold bee here very soon I havent had the time to go do it myself. been a little busy filling the holiday orders.
and thanks about the squid I have to keep it simple it’s allready a little big for fabrication. it’s only going to be maybe at it’s biggest 60 mm.
and that may be too big, we’ll see how it goes
Sigmond… the prototyping is a big issue for me. most of the machines that you hear about truly suck for jewelry.
solidscape is one of the industry standards because it’s detail is good and it’s burnout is great.
3D systems Ive had burn out and detail issues with. both of those machines are fairly affordable. compaired to a viper wich is a machine I would love but they start at $180.000. and for all these machines upkeep cost a fortune.
if you are thinking of buying one tell me and we can discuss the options.
and these are the big issues for jewelry. unless you are going the direct to metal process. if thats the case we need to talk about sponsorship. lol
but burn out is the killer and build envelope
most of the high detail thin build wall machines have NO build envelope.
for the most part I use a mill. for jewelry it is a great solution. I think my mill was in the $35,000 and there is basically a $700 a year up keep policy. that I do use. I’ve replaced tons of pieces on the mill.
also milling solves allot of problems with casting that people new to designing for molding make. takes allot of work to get big undercuts with a mill. I do it everyday… shinning with pride
now to the more imidiate issue. decimation and shell production. for growing if you can get your model under 1 mill polys most machiens will deal with the part. that is usualy my target. I’ve never used the hideff sculpting so I have no idea how it exports.
if you ever wanted your ring produced and have trouble getting that done drop me a line and I will mill it out for you.
your design could be milled very easily and fast.
it never occured that you are a copycat. skullrings are a big market that I came to late so I would be the copy cat 
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I produce the first wax either milling it or growing it.
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you then make a mold of that wax.
(if you do it right and are anal as I you get that first cast back clean the hell out of it get it perfect then send it to get your fabrication mold made.) -
use the mold to produce the casting wax.
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pour that wax into investment
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melt the wax out of the investment
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pour the metal into the investement
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remove investment from the silver.
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clean tumble polish sulfer polish finish…
thats it…
yeah, it’s always just that easy. “that’s it…”
LMAO…
ok I might have simplified some of those processes for the sake of brevity.
for instance when I try to produce a wax of the above pendant…
A. design and develop the model
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try to produce milling paths that will work with out crashing your computer
1a. crash try again.
1b. crash try again.
1c. crash try again. -
mill the part.
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realize it wont cast…
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change model return to step 1 repeat and prey you fixed the problem
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break cutter off in your hand as you load the fixture
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mill the part
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work the wax by hand untill it’s up to snuff.
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then try as hard as you can to convince the foundry it can be cast with some creative spruing.
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they explain to you (again) that it’s hard to spru on on something that is so small and has texture all over it. (again) there is no place to spru to without destroying that texture, let alone getting the metal into it all.
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you tell them they are the best and you have faith in their masterfull abilities.
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you can now start the casting process.
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prey when the first part comes out you dont have to return and repeat step A.
Now I like that answer. That sounds more like it.
well I stoped there.
I’ll include pics to show the casting process… shorter than the step by step
but the TaaaaaaDaaaaaa explanation wraps up so well.
by the way if I havent mentioned it before, I like the idea of the internal pattern on the rings.
on a wedding band set I made,
I set in a slightly raised mirror image of her name in his and his in hers hoping they would develop calluses of the others name on their ring finger… lol
not sure if it worked…
That’s good.
Your work is very inspiring also. I’m sure it may have left an indent, but I’m not sure about the calluses. Maybe over time they will be callused by it though. Who knows.
I have an odd feeling it wouldnt work.
but it’s a funny thought.
omg!!! that’s the most novel use of zbrush ive seen so far…deadly work!! more more!!
thank you,
I’ll have some pics of the above the parts from casting this week.
tsw
I think this is finished…
or very close.
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That’s cool!! great job!
looks fun. so very squidsie.
great work on this squid pendant really cool cant wait to the outcome…