Wet Formed Leather Masks

@morganstanfield, I have been looking at them for a while now. So they have some good stuff?
Your thoughts on this one?
http://www.tandyleather.com/en/product/stoned-oil-cowhide-leather-sides

Sorry @spike, I’ve tried laser cutting oiled leathers and it’s just gross. Stick to plain veg tan for cutting and treat/finish afterwards.

see this thread http://community.glowforge.com/t/all-about-leather/

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@ekla, Funny, when they say “Vegetable-tanned”, I some how thought of Vegetable oil-tanned.
After looking it up, I now see it’s not.

“Vegetable-tanned leather is tanned using tannins and other ingredients found in different vegetable matter, such as tree bark prepared in bark mills, wood, leaves, fruits, and roots. It is supple and brown in color, with the exact shade depending on the mix of chemicals and the color of the skin.”

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@spike, this is the hide that I just bought (turns out it was sheepskin, not pigskin). It’s veg-tanned, very smooth and quite soft for veg-tan, light in color, and relatively thin–about 2.0 oz. I like it!

They also have these remnant bags, including veg-tan remnants: http://www.tandyleather.com/en/category/remnant-bags

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@morganstanfield Sounds very nice. Let us know how it works out. I would love to try some leather working into my art somehow.

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@ekla, those are tremendous! Our own @shaug made some cool stingray leather masks:

but these really take the cake. I can’t wait to see what you do with your Glowforge.

The good news is that the filter will pretty well nullify the smell of the leather you’re cutting, especially if you leave it closed after the cut finishes to let the odors clear. The bad news is that I don’t have a solution to invisibly thicker/thinner areas in leather that you source causing hiccoughs in the cutting procedure.

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Thank you @dan! @shaug 's post inspired me to share my own.
Haven’t tried to cut sting ray yet, excited to know it’s possible!

Thanks for clarifying on the filter. More experimentation ahead.

In what way leather bike saddles are tanned? If the saddle is veg-tanned I could wet flatten it, encrave it and wet form it again.

@ekla Thanks for sharing this, making a mask wasn’t even on my radar until I saw this post. That clearly has changed and I will be adding this to my project list (as if I don’t already have enough).

Thanks for sharing.

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These masks are lovely, hope you’ll share more down the road.

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@ekla thanks for sharing this and explaining the process. These masks are gorgeous, and you make it sound much easier than I imagined it would be, can’t wait to play around with some leather now! :smiley:

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@Kusmeroglu Thank you! Once the laser does its thing, the rest is indeed very easy :wink:

Thank you @trocket, I’ll try!

Great post, thanks for sharing your knowledge and awesome results.

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These are beautiful - love the bird! :relaxed:

If you didn’t want to do these out of leather, (which seems a bit pricey), it would be easy enough to cut them out of fabric and stiffen them over the face form using a fabric stiffener. I’ve made fabric masks that way.

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Friends who lives in the West Indies had to come back to the Midwest to get their broken extremeties fixed up after a car wreck. One had a badly fractured finger. First time I saw up close the thermoplastic used for the splint. He said the tech whipped it up, but cut the outline with the scissors. I thought “Glowforge” potential. Pardon my posting before doing the research on the materials. I know there are few medical types here that might weigh in on it. Suitability, composition, and, “ouch” the price.

Thanks @Jules. Veg tan leather is pretty inexpensive when you buy by the hide. There’s only $2-5 of leather in each of those :slightly_smiling:

Awesome! That’s a lot cheaper than I would have expected! :smiley:

Springfieldleathercompany.com
I bet the Herman oak veg tan in a 3 to 4 ounce would do wonderful. . It forms very well and has a nice buttery feel to it.

They sell it by the foot.