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The Amazing Dremel with Jill Timm – The Sequel

Two weeks ago, the Book Arts Guild of Vermont hosted Jill Timm‘s fabulous workshop, The Amazing Dremel. I was fortunate enough to work as Jill’s assistant during those two days and I picked up lots of tips that I didn’t catch when I took the class last year.

If you’re new to my blog and haven’t read my Dremel posts from last year, this should get you up to speed (or multi-speed, depending on your Dremel):

• The Amazing Dremel with Jill Timm – Day 1
• The Amazing Dremel with Jill Timm – Day 2
• What do those Dremel bits do? Well I’ll tell ya!
• So now I have a Dremel…what can I work on?
• Dremel resources for artists
• One more Dremel post…

And if you’re scratching your head, thinking “What the hell is a Dremel?” – you have lots more reading to do: Dremel website

The class worked on two materials that I didn’t get to play with last year – brass and bookboard. I continued work on my “E Series” that I started last year:

Dremel + brass

Dremel + bookboard

I really enjoyed working with the brass. It’s a softer metal than steel and it’s easy to get layers of depth. It’s hard to see in the image, but you can get a really nice shine by using a polishing bit – I’ll talk about more that in my next post.

I was eager to work on the bookboard, because it’s what I’d use most frequently. Unfortunately, it was not a compliant material.

In general, using the Dremel caused something I call “board barf” – board material came off chunkily and fluffily. I know those aren’t words, but that’s what happened. After removing material, I’d have to burnish the surface down to bring it back into submission. I was much happier with the bookboard once I glued paper over it – the results were much smoother than I had anticipated. Gotta love Lokta.

This is just the first in a series of blog posts where I’ll be focusing on the new things I learned. Here’s the rundown of what I plan to cover:

• New Dremel bits and what they do
• Dremel tips for specific materials – new and old (last year’s materials)
• Dremel class sample books
• A printable guide for everything learned in both classes (this will take some time)
• Jill Timm’s discussion of her work in artist books

Stay tuned!