post-production

post-production is time-consuming, tedious, possibly endless. out of 60-70 earrings printed, maybe 10 came out lovely, requiring little work to spruce them up. the other 50+? about 20 or more were just trash quality as i learned to adjust print settings. the remainder, had to sand with a power tool, sand by hand, file, scrape, sand, wash, brush, soak in solution, wash again, sand, scrape. and then came the varnish, the mixing of substances at just the right ratio, working rapidly before the stuff becomes too sticky to work with. it’s like a failure equation: aya starts off with X amount, but loses a, b, and c due to issues 1, 2, 3, or 4. and yet, there is something about this that makes me feel alive, i get lost in the flow of crafting in a way i haven’t for years. making something with my hands, that sticks around (i cook a lot, but that gets eaten), is a joy after years of digital product design and even digital art. i never liked revising my writing, and produce few drafts. i suppose i revise in my head.

manipulating and selecting words, composing poetry–lately hasn’t the same pleasure as sanding, scraping. it could be the novelty of crafting a physical object: the manual process of refining each earring’s curves and surfaces; the figuring out of all the ways the object will be in the world. which earring finding? which earring back? how to package for shipping, how to package for sale in a store? how do i translate all the ruminations on the meaning of this work from my heart to a discreet few sentences on a brochure, a flyer?

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Categorized as jewelry