Titanium - Tumblr Posts

Cartoon characters based on transition metals from titanium (atomic no. 22) to copper (atomic no. 29) ions. (I am not familiar with vanadium.)

*Haemoglobin is not included as it is a protein molecule with iron ion attached (the red colouring is not provided by the metal ion itself). *

This dragon tail is made with anodized titanium scales, which the commissioner special-ordered and sent to me. This is definitely the most beautiful material I've worked with. There were 5 different colors of titanium used here, but because of the way the anodizing works there is a good amount of color variation from one scale to the next, or even within a single scale. It gives the whole piece a cool iridescent appearance.

This tail also has a stainless steel underbelly, which will match with the chrome spikes that I'll be installing down the spine. But I wanted to get photos of it before I did that.

Update of the anodized titanium dragon tail with metal spikes installed down the spine. You can see in the close-ups how irregular and varied the titanium scales are, which I really enjoy. This was for a commissioner, but I'm very much considering a similar one for myself.

Not as many photos of it this time as the previous set, because it was getting dark.

This heat-colored titanium scale bracelet came out particularly well. I color these by heating them over a flame until they start to glow just a little bit, and the titanium oxidizes to these wonderful colors. It’s always a bit of an irregular process of course. This one was really nice I thought because basically every scale had a gradation from amber through rose to blue. Often times the blue color ends up dominating a bit more.

Anyway, this one is already off to the person who ordered it. If you like the idea of wearing a beautiful result of an unpredictable process, you can check these out over on my Etsy shop!

Remember kids, this is why you don’t take photos in direct sunlight. In order for the bright parts not to be blown out, the shaded parts end up in total darkness.

Anyway, this was a heat-colored titanium bracelet that I just shipped out. The bracelet is heated over a flame until it starts to glow a bit, and the surface oxidizes with colors that depend on the heat. Always fun to see what you get. This one turned out with a nice gradient from light blue to rose on nearly every scale. But of course the photos sucked.

Here are two flame-colored titanium scale bracelets I’ve made relatively recently. I usually don’t think to post the small things I make, because they often don’t feel exciting to me. I do always love making these, though. Seeing what colors I get out of the hot metal is always fun. A bit nerve-wracking, because I’ve definitely had a couple times when I got too much oil from my fingers on the scales and the fingerprints showed up on the final piece. Whoops. I always like when I get a good mix of colors through rose and blue. The hotter the metal gets, the closer it goes to a clear faint blue. So I have to heat it evenly in the flame and try not to overdo it.

As always, these are available over on my Etsy store.

Finally decided to list anodized titanium as available. It’s probably the metal I find most beautiful out of everything I’ve worked with. The color comes from an oxide layer on the surface, where the layer’s thickness determines the wavelength of light that can get through it. Similar to how the colors of a soap bubble or oil film come about.

Currently this green is the only color I have stock of. (My last material order, I got green and a bag of mixed scales.) Next time I’m ordering more materials I’ll definitely get another couple of colors.

You can get one over on my Etsy page!

Some materials I’ve been toying with. I was vending at a small convention over the weekend, and I made a few new things for it.

The first is titanium scales. I’ve been making flame-colored bracelets for a while, which are the three on the left. (The darker one I tried heating from the back, to see if I could get or liked a more even coloration. It was pretty consistent, but it wasn’t a very interesting color. Oh well.) Recently I got anodized titanium scales, which are absolutely beautiful. These ones were made with a random assortment of colors, which I rather enjoyed. I need to get some more photos of them, then they’ll go up on my Etsy page. So far I’ve just got green anodized listed. 

Below is two bronze necklaces. The pattern is a very tight spiral weave configuration referred to as Jens Pind Linkage. Bronze is fun to me because it oxidizes so nicely. The shiny one is brand new, freshly woven, and the dark one is after 2 weeks of continual wear. I think it’s mostly reached a steady color now? It darkened most of the way within a few days.

I got some anodized titanium scales, and I made them into bracelets! I went for a mixed assortment of colors, so I could see which ones I liked enough to stock. And I in the meantime, I rather like this randomized aesthetic. It reminds me of over-saturated art of the aurora borealis or of galaxies.

I already decided to stock the green, which I posted previously. I’m thinking of also getting the rose/magenta one and the bright teal/purple one. I like the bright, inconsistent colors. The yellow is also pretty nice, but I think I have enough options for yellow as it is.

Anyway, as you could guess, these are up on my Etsy page!

A trio of scale bracelets for someone. It took an embarrassingly long time for us to hash out the details and then for me to get around to making them, so my apologies to that person.

Left to right we have pink and yellow/gold anodized aluminum, then heat-colored titanium.

Just a couple scale bracelets someone bought recently. One in rainbow anodized aluminum, the other in flame-colored titanium.

A pair of scale maille bracelets ordered recently. The top one is flame-colored titanium, where the heat oxidizes it to a gradient of colors. The bottom one is bronze.

Available here: https://www.etsy.com/shop/TheArmoredDragon?section_id=10150667

A pair of heat-colored titanium dragon scale bracelets that I finished up last night. Doing the colors on these is always a joy--you heat them up over a flame until they glow orange, and the oxidation makes a beautiful spectrum of blues and purples.

Also, it turned out I hadn't made one of these in the wide style for a long time, so I updated the Etsy listing to include that option.

Had a bunch of orders for scale bracelets recently, so here’s a quick round-up of the last couple weeks.

We got: rainbows, bi pride bracelet, heat-colored titanium, black, bi pride choker, and stainless steel.

Heat-colored titanium necklace. This was a take-home order from ANE. This process is always a bit unpredictable; I got more of a gradient across each scale on this one than I often do.

chemistry is cool go check it out

heres some designs for atoms I made! There are a lot more that I am willing to share, they're just badly drawn and made for my eyes only so I'll post more of them laterrr :)

a metal logia would be cool.

i can imagine that it/they may have a naming convention similar to zoan fruits... examples being: metal metal fruit model TITANIUM, metal metal fruit model copper, metal metal fruit model lithium, metal metal fruit model tungsten, metal metal fruit model mercury, etc. etc.

What the knife (might) be

I love the website and all, but this subtle rainbow effect on the knife/sword/dagger thing is annoying me. I'm by no means a knife expert but I have a couple theories as to how this blade could be getting this effect.

Maybe it's heat colored titanium?

Heat colored titanium usually looks something like the picture above, which lines up ok with the knife in the website, but it has a lot of drawbacks for a practical knife.

Titanium knives don't hold a long lasting cutting edge, and are much more brittle than steel, making it not the best blade for cutting. Which (as the blood + being stabbed into the book) shows that it's not that likely to be titanium.

It might have a neochrome coating?

Neochrome coatings are usually used for cars and car parts, but it is pretty commonly used on knives and silverware.

The problem with the neochrome possibility is that most neochrome knives are a lot less subtle as the one on the website, so I think it's a lot less likely that it's a neochrome coating.

It's a knife finish?

The last possibility I thought of was that it's just an extremely reflective knife finish (maybe a mirror finish?) and it's reflecting light from the room.

This seems the most plausible, but I'm probably gonna stick to the thought that it's titanium bc I personally love how heat treated titanium looks.