I made (most of) a really awesome kongoh on the disk with two sets of ombre green and white (with touches of yellow) cotton string; it was the setup with a silk bag of vintage kimono fabric, a pretty lentil with blue goldstone floral trailing (that I never got around to photographing, siiiiigh) that I've had for years and years^[1] ....and lost it.

Cotton braid, 16 strands #25 embroidery floss. Completed 24dec, photographed 29dec19. Approximately 24–28 inches. Lumix LX-100, lumopro flash.

This was really painful, because I'd become very fond of the bag, the counterweight and especially the braid, which was coming out very well. I'd been using the plastic sewing machine bobbins so long they'd dulled from clicking against each other. Needless to say I was bummed.

However, I finally acknowledged that it was gone forever, and set up a quick and easy braid from some scrap embroidery floss someone had given me, or that I'd purchased at the thrift shop, or otherwise acquired cheaply. None of these fibers were ombre: in fact, they were someone else's, probably for a particular project, so my options were limited. But I just needed to throw something on a disk quickly, and this was it. Unlike the pink and green braid currently on the marudai, this was a pretty short project, so I didn't have to worry about overflowing the bobbins with too long a thread.

If you look closely you can see that I changed the pattern shortly after commencing the braid to break up the solidity of the colour, a bit. —As it happens, f2tE (who admittedly is very fond of bronze, pink, and dark green) really liked the braid, so I made a real effort to complete it in time to make it a xmas gift, which I managed, barely: I completed it xmas eve.

It's a nice little braid, and I was especially happy to get the dark into light background gradation. I know that I positioned the flash in line and behind the camera, but was not otherwise able to re-create the effect: the plexi was tilted up slightly, and I used a diffusion panel to get the gradation.

Someday I'll get that particular technique figured out.

Unless otherwise noted, text, image and objects depicted therein copyright 1996--present sylvus tarn.