I have a long way to go yet just to reach my projected abbreviated point of completion.Pete! Your masts look excellent! I particularly admire all of the detail from the cheeks up. She looks fantastic! Since I love suspense, I'll stay tuned incase you decide to keep going!
Blessings.
Chuck
. Cheers Grant
Glad to hear from you and that you are still on board. I am flattered by your concern as well as your appreciation of my work!Did I hear the word...*Stop*...in this conversation? I'm not one to discourage any builder to go beyond or refrain from what they have intended their build to communicate. However, stop points are predetermined in execution....meaning if you intend to only create a *Hull* model...stop there with stub masts. If you intend to depict her with or without sails...stop there. But to leave her partially rigged, as in being rigged, or in mid rig....that might be harder to convey as a typical condition she might be found in, at any particular point in her rigging out. As a new ship, or as one being readied for a long period of storage or overhaul.
I'll be interested in seeing where you make this determination. I understand if you are ready for another project and are rounding the corner on this build. but make your stop point historically intentional if possible. It makes for less explanation. Great job thus far on the masts and their finishing.
Rob
Self explanation isn't required. I have plenty of models that never found the finish line, for a plethora of reasons. Generally, for myself, it is because of new information has been discovered, plaguing the attempt with far too many corrections to be worth while. My current pause on Staghound is founded on distraction and responsibility, more than anything. I've never paused a build for so long before. As I mentioned before, I'll be interested in your decision and hope it will not be the beginning of the end of your model building adventures. I have enjoyed your build log and Flying Cloud adventure extremely. Not too many builders tackle clipper ships these days. The seemingly overwhelming degree of required rigging can empty the enthusiasm of the most ardent hull builder. Proper rigging requires the fruit of patience and profound accuracy.Glad to hear from you and that you are still on board. I am flattered by your concern as well as your appreciation of my work!
I hope to pull the plug when need be, at some point where, complete or incomplete, the model will have a "finished" quality and be pleasing to look at, even if it is at a point where I appear to have hit "pause" and that it could be taken up again at some future point by someone with the interest, even if I could not continue due to circumstance. I fear my personal family situation will demand that I shelve such an ambitious project before I'd like, and at some point, sooner than later, I will have to declare victory and move on. Either way, my desire is to have something pleasing and entertaining, to leave as part of my legacy, to view without a lot of dangling loose ends. Schubert's "Unfinished Symphony" is a pleasing composition with two movements without knowing if he actually planned a third, which is customary. He didn't have a lot of time either. At least he did not stop mid movement, and you can enjoy what is there unencumbered by what isn't.
I trust I make myself perfectly obscure?
Pete
Pete! You're a poet. I love it!Glad to hear from you and that you are still on board. I am flattered by your concern as well as your appreciation of my work!
I hope to pull the plug when need be, at some point where, complete or incomplete, the model will have a "finished" quality and be pleasing to look at, even if it is at a point where I appear to have hit "pause" and that it could be taken up again at some future point by someone with the interest, even if I could not continue due to circumstance. I fear my personal family situation will demand that I shelve such an ambitious project before I'd like, and at some point, sooner than later, I will have to declare victory and move on. Either way, my desire is to have something pleasing and entertaining, to leave as part of my legacy, to view without a lot of dangling loose ends. Schubert's "Unfinished Symphony" is a pleasing composition with two movements without knowing if he actually planned a third, which is customary. He didn't have a lot of time either. At least he did not stop mid movement, and you can enjoy what is there unencumbered by what isn't.
I trust I make myself perfectly obscure?
Pete
She is 52" or 53" on deck. The case (mahogany)) was made in panels by a cabinet-furniture maker friend of mine of about forty years, and assembled in situ around the ship which is secured to the cradle, and that to the base.
Thanks, Bill. Very encouraging!
The decorative curlicue on the stern had to be three dimensional. So,
I made it out of brass wire, flattened it on an anvil, glued it on with CA and dry brushed on black acrylic for patina. 
