rkg

My best ebay find ever - a nerikawa tsuba dating to the mid-muromachi period (at the latest): Its been around the block a few times, but they're pretty rare (seller thought it was late edo I think), so... Best, rkg (Richard George)

Hi, In case anybody's interested, I've been cleaning out the safe and putting a few items up on fleabay: http://www.ebay.com/sch/rkgatteleport/m.html?item=252648487530&ssPageName=STRK%3AMESE%3AIT&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2562 I've got a few more to go, but... Best, rkg (Richard George)

Stephen, Well, the tsuba will be there until Monday - go post and get some likes on your post :-) rkg

Hey guys, I'm not sure if this is the right forum or not, but... I have tsuba up for grabs for the cost of shipping it to you. Since the last couple I tried on the NMB were gone pretty much instantly, I decided to make it a bit more fun this time around (see the posting pinned to the top): https://www.facebook.com/Kod%C3%B4gu-no-Sekai-%E5%B0%8F%E9%81%93%E5%85%B7%E3%81%AE%E4%B8%96%E7%95%8C-266005023454853/ Best, rkg (Richard George)

Michael, Funny, I just happen to be sitting here with a table covered with saotome/Tempo/etc pieces right next to me this morning. I'd actually go with the Tembo/tempo/tenpo/whatever "bin" (or possibly one of the other groups that decorated with hot stamps) rather than Saotome work. I'd guess its later edo period as well, but YMMV on that. here's a handy dandy chart showing the most common stamps the Tembo/tempo/tenpo/whatever guys used that I think somebody posted here in the distant past: Best, rkg (Richard George)

The first thing I thought of was that it was an interpretation of a style of shingen tsuba which looks like a basket: https://www.facebook.com/266005023454853/photos/a.1022439727811375.1073741865.266005023454853/1022439864478028/?type=3&theater On your piece, Christian's right - there are lots better cheep and cheerful tsuba out there... Best, rkg (Richard George)

On a lark I just acquired one of these: https://www.facebook.com/Kod%C3%B4gu-no-Sekai-%E5%B0%8F%E9%81%93%E5%85%B7%E3%81%AE%E4%B8%96%E7%95%8C-266005023454853/photos/?tab=album&album_id=1061310870590927 Best, rkg (Richard George)

If you want them for study, maybe you could con them into loaning them back to you :-) rkg (Richard George)

Thomas/Brian/jean, I think you guys are probably right - not snakeskin on the mimi. Unfortunately I shot this before I had the D800E/don't have these in hand so I can throw them under the microscope, but here are a couple of 100% close-ups - any zoology types out there that might be able to more closely identify what was used? Best, rkg (Richard George)

and here's the writeup itself: Best, rkg Richard George)

EDIT: I should have re-read the catalog's writeup before posting - The base metal on the first piece is visible, and its clearly copper, not Iron as I had stated. And both pieces have same on the webs with the mimi being wrapped in some kind of snakeskin I will post a scan of the writeups momentarily so I don't mess up anything else about the description. Best, rkg (Richard George)

Hi, Justin contacted me about using a scan out of the latest KTK catalog to show some images of same' covered tsuba. Since he actually bothered to ask first, I contacted the owner and got his permission to put some original images of the two tsuba on the NMB. Since is original post seems to have vanished, I thought it might be good to post them here. These are actually pretty cool in hand. Best, rkg (Richard George)

+1 on Arnold's comments - By the end of the Edo period, the great uniformity or materials and the exchange of information/themes across the country makes it kind of hard to nail down who did pieces sometimes. Its funny - I only recently acquired the first piece i've ever had with this theme on it, though its a lot "busier" than yours - here's a writeup: https://www.facebook.com/Kod%C3%B4gu-no-Sekai-%E5%B0%8F%E9%81%93%E5%85%B7%E3%81%AE%E4%B8%96%E7%95%8C-266005023454853/photos/?tab=album&album_id=1026149454107069 Best, rkg (Richard George)

And then just to add to the fun, here's a Jesuit symbol: ' Best, rkg (Richard George)

It looks kind of pink, so is this piece shibuichi? - maybe the darker patches around the mimi is where the idiot who did this didn't clean as carefully? If it is shibuichi , you could send it to Ford or Brian T to get it fixed, or you could probably just get any oil/wax, etc off it and let it self-patinate.... Best, rkg (Richard George)

John, I've been going down the rabbit hole of using a stereo microscope to study/image fittings lately (gotta love finding a zeiss standard 14 with perfect optics at the thrift store cheep (and it even had a 2.5X objective - perfect for studying tosogu :-)) , but I digress). What do you have hooked to your microscope for image capture? I finally just got what amounts to a tube to mount up a DSLR which works surprisingly well - the expensive adapter with optics in it that I got first had all sorts of issues (blurry outside of the center, huge amount of chromatic aberrations, etc). FWIW, you can tip the piece slightly so you are looking into the feature/cut/? and then do a focus stacked composite image (if you haven't tried this before, you can use combinezp or photoshop to put the images together - kinda boring to do the "shoot, twist the stage height knob, repeat" thing, but..). On the theme, usually the tokei is (more or less) symmetric, so I'd buy your leaf interpretation. As an aside, I just heard a new interpretation to the tokei shape - that it represents the segments inside of a sliced fruit. As to what it is, to me it kind of has a later feel to it, when the various groups were starting to copy each other, so you may never get a definitive answer outside of "owari"...... Best, rkg (Richard George)

Wow... Thank you for the shout out Darcy - I just try and do my best... Yeah, that was a while ago... And actually, the quality of Darcy's work on swords is what I aspire to now. Chris, the short answer is that its a pain to do - you are basically photographing a mirror, which can be challenging. There are several different ways to light pieces, depending on what you want to see or not see, how the piece has been polished, etc. And while they are actually a little more "formulaic" than tosogu, you -still- sometimes end up having to stop and experiment, change lighting methods (sometimes radically), etc depending on the piece. You only "know" how to shoot a particular type of piece until the next one comes in with some different peculiarity that usually doesn't hit you until you have that "WTF!!!??" moment when you look at the images on the screen... About all I can offer is that its all about light control... A lot of what passes for good images seem to be a compromise between showing enough to get the piece sold while minimizing problems. Here's an example - this is a piece I bought last fall. This shows three images, the seller's and two of mine which I downsized to match in size. One is one of my really high resolution images (it looks a little darker because I had processed it differently (to display large)) and the other was a another test image using the sigma lens (I know, I can call it the "eye of Raw" ) - I didn't bother to clean the image up as it was a test, pretty dusty, I screwed up and there's a gobo shadow on the nakago, etc). And before you get on my case, the seller's image WAS marked as public domain, so....: http://www.rkgphotos.com/facebook_stuff/yasuaki_compare.jpg The seller's image doesn't show (either at all or so it "registers") all the little nicks in the blade up by up by the shinogi line in the monouchi area and a bit below, it becomes more painfully obvious that the maker was doing a hosho utushi (ware/loose hada in habaki area, though to be fair you quite often see this -somewhere- on a period hosho piece), and my favorite - the thumbprint. On the other hand, you also don't see the activities/cool hada very well either - its actually pretty nice in hand... And Darcy's point about photoshopped pieces is sage Some are really bad - the one that sticks out in my mind is a Nambokucho period wakizashi that was sold on a (now deceased) dealer's website with glorious images - Darcy actually ended up reselling it later as a consignment, and in his images it almost looked like a different piece as Darcy's images told the truth - the originals were apparently either heavily photoshopped to remove issues/lit to hide problems/something. I wish I had saved the images for my own reference. On that note, I guess I should also point out that on the Kunisuke above, there is a masking error on the mune I didn't as clean up (the jaggies) - ya gotta love being in a hurry I guess... Best, rkg (Richard George)

Hi, I haven't posted any sword images here in a while, so here's a test shot I did of my Kunisuke naginata. I was in the process of testing a lens (sigma 50mm 1.4 art). Sorry about not showing the other side, but I had limited time and the rig was set up to shoot this side, and... http://www.rkgphotos.com/facebook_stuff/kunisuke_nag_test.jpg Best, rkg (Richard George)

Hey guys, I finally had a moment to shoot a shingen tsuba I picked up a while back. This style of them seems to have little to do with either a wire wound sukashi tsuba or the mukade theme. Does anybody have any idea if there is a meaning to these other than them being made to look like baskework? Best, rkg (RIchard George)

Payment sent via preypal gift - thanks! rkg (Richard George)

pm sent on tsuba #1 rkg (Richard George)

Grev, I'm not sure what to say about the first one - I guess it could be binned as ko-shoami. On the second one, the piece -might- be by the guys associated with tempo work. I have a tempo piece with similar inlay work: And the obligatory VR image set (as usual, click and drag to rotate): http://www.rkgphotos.com/recent_stuff/tests/vr_images/rock_snow_tempo_front/rock_snow_tempo_front.html I thought it was tempo from the auction images, In hand it was confusing - the piece looked like it might have been myochin (the iron reminded me more of what that group might use) - but after comparing the piece to several known high grade tempos, I realized it really should be classified as Tempo... Best, rkg (Richard George)

Wow - that's a good deal on that book - Grey's price is less than half of what I paid for my copy back in the day.... It is pure koshirae porn - in addition to the overall koshirae, they include numerous images of the various pieces that went into the koshirae - they don't leave much to the imagination :-) rkg

Here's another one of these snowflake tsubas attributed to ichijo that's been running on Yahoo Japan for a while with no takers and little interest after the owner bumped the starting bid up into the ichijo range. No paper = no sale..... Best, rkg (Richard George) http://page3.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/c552130970

I would have guessed saotome work rkg (Richard George)