Dragon's Breath is a miniature oscillating steam machine, made out of gems silver and gold.
I don’t actually know where or why the creative process starts, except that I enjoy making it. It’s got to be for the love, if nothing else.
Dragon's Breath is concept built around a miniature oscillation machine.
This dragon picture formed part of my inspiration.
The start. Laminated slices of black Jasper, Sugilite and red Jasper, carved into a dragon embryo, which is then laminated with silver to form the flywheel of the steam engine. The base is made out of Onyx, Sugilite and Chrysoprase.
I carved the cylinder out of clear Brazilian quartz. I love carving quartz. So hard and so shiny. In this picture I am drilling the cylinder out with a diamond core drill.
A wobbler works on two flat surfaces sliding against each other like the gif.
So I don't carve it without some flat surfaces. Time to align the crankshaft.
The 'cylinder head' was actually a amethyst laminated to a quartz top with a small fine gold ball inside. It looks like a little bubble that trembles all the time.
So basically, I made four dragon cut out of 3 mm silver and then I grooved a channel into the body. So when the two bodies were soldered together, there was a 'tube' running through them to supply steam/air to power the motor.
Because the body was made of two separate pieces, I could also bend the wings outwards.
I also made the piston and conrod into a dragon face. The small end goes through the dragon's eye, if you look carefully.
Then I made the breathing Daddy Dragon.
The Daddy Dragon, like the Mommy Dragon has a cavity running through the central body, entering from the bottom of the tail, and will supply the steam ( or air) to the engine. The supply pipes coming out of their mouths and also connected to the silver base.
The baby Dragon flywheel is held in position with a cinnamon sapphire that I faceted which comes from Tanzania..
Here the silver components. The final base plate, made out of 3mm silver. First heavily textured with varying sized ball frazers. Then gilded with 24 carat gold foil. This is in actual fact how a close up of Dragon skin looks like.
This was the bottom of the build.
The bent tube was this high pressure input and the small tube is the exhaust side. Makers stamp in the middle.
In all it's glory symbolically placed on a red glass base and specially created display case for the Dragon's Breath Art Piece.
