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Is this taken with a tilt focus lens? Or is there some focal stacker witchcraft at play? Or are you just that good at nailing the depth of field perfectly?

Lots of admiration from me as always
Thanks!
Yes, you're right this is pure focus stacking witchcraft.

Here is the same scene shot on a contrasty 35mm black and white analogue film, lens tilted to the max at F16:
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The depth of field was still very thin and the sharpness was already gone..
Anyway, smartphone cameras do wonders nowadays 😊
 
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thinning old knife
 

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Is it a tamahagane mono / honyaki?
It is tamahagane honyaki .water quenching.

Crafted by a certified Japanese katana swordsmith, using the same techniques employed in traditional samurai sword-making.

Every step of the process is identical to that of a samurai sword. No shortcuts are taken just because it’s a kitchen knife.
It undergoes numerous rounds of folding during forging.
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This is the polished version
 
It is tamahagane honyaki .water quenching.

Crafted by a certified Japanese katana swordsmith, using the same techniques employed in traditional samurai sword-making.

Every step of the process is identical to that of a samurai sword. No shortcuts are taken just because it’s a kitchen knife.
It undergoes numerous rounds of folding during forging.
View attachment 354069View attachment 354070

This
it seems like there has been some work done, indeed. Polishing-wise, what happened to this blade?
 
I need to be more careful before reaching for my Uchigumori stones. :rolleyes:

It's like having a muddy windshield on a vehicle with a tiny crack that is hidden.
Progressing too fast with the coarse to finer stones and the final rinse with the
Uchigumori removes all the mud.

Now, You can now see the cracked glass (i.e. scratches from an earlier stone) and back down You go. 😝
 
Looks like a pretty exceptional shiro suita finish to me. The crispness of shinogi (avoiding that hazy line) is less about stone and more about precision of geometry.

Shiro suita aren’t really all that fine grit, so that quite even and glossy surface you’ve achieved I’d think is pushing the limits of the stone.
 
Looks like a pretty exceptional shiro suita finish to me. The crispness of shinogi (avoiding that hazy line) is less about stone and more about precision of geometry.

Shiro suita aren’t really all that fine grit, so that quite even and glossy surface you’ve achieved I’d think is pushing the limits of the stone.
I feel flattered☺️☺️☺️
 
Has anyone ever tried to polish the bevels on M Hinoura’s work? It looks so promising in my (probably poorly informed) opinion.


Getting his hollow bevels setup well isn’t the easiest thing in the world, but they sure do look nice with a proper kasumi
 
Wo
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Getting his hollow bevels setup well isn’t the easiest thing in the world, but they sure do look nice with a proper kasumi
Wow! I knew if anyone had done it …. Wow, so my hunch was right! Looks stunning! Was thinking of getting one of the b stock hinouras from pro tooling but hesitates too long! I have a Hinoura santoku and I always look at the bevels and think, there’s something special lurking here!
 
This looks great! Can I ask your progression and any tips? I've got one of those aforementioned b-stock sujis to clean up.
This knife was my polish mule for a very long time. Couldn't even begin to list all the stones it's met along the way - it's gotta be at least 3mm shorter than it was when brand new now. Not sure which stones gave the finishes left above honestly.

The real key to stone polishing is geometry. Once you understand and accept that no amount of work on fancy JNats will make up for less than perfect work on coarse and mid grit stones you'll start getting nicer finishes rapidly. Polishing is about 7% theoretical knowledge, 13% good tools, 50% practice, and 30% the patience to get there on any particular project.
 
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This knife was my polish mule for a very long time. Couldn't even begin to list all the stones it's met along the way - it's gotta be at least 3mm shorter than it was when brand new now. Not sure which stones gave the finishes left above honestly.

The real key to stone polishing is geometry. Once you understand and accept that no amount of work on fancy JNats will make up for less than perfect work on coarse and mid grit stones you'll start getting nicer finishes rapidly. Polishing is about 7% theoretical knowledge, 13% good tools, 50% practice, and 30% the patience to get there on any particular project.
Reading this, I’m glad I didn’t buy the b stock Hinoura for my first bevel setting job. Sounds like they ante not a good candicdate for that? I have an Hinoura nashiji/ku and It isn’t concave though? I am interested in learning to set geometry (not polishing yet - that can come down the track) and thought they would be good candidates as the bevels can later be polished really nicely.
 
Reading this, I’m glad I didn’t buy the b stock Hinoura for my first bevel setting job. Sounds like they ante not a good candicdate for that? I have an Hinoura nashiji/ku and It isn’t concave though? I am interested in learning to set geometry (not polishing yet - that can come down the track) and thought they would be good candidates as the bevels can later be polished really nicely.
Maybe it doesn't seem concave, but I'd be surprised if you didn't find the bevels rather hollow once you slapped it on a flat stone. It's not that they're necessarily a bad choice for learning how to even out bevels, but maybe not the absolute easiest.

Regardless, you have to learn on something, sometimes you just gotta dive in. Making mistakes along the way is part of it.
 
Maybe it doesn't seem concave, but I'd be surprised if you didn't find the bevels rather hollow once you slapped it on a flat stone. It's not that they're necessarily a bad choice for learning how to even out bevels, but maybe not the absolute easiest.

Regardless, you have to learn on something, sometimes you just gotta dive in. Making mistakes along the way is part of it.
Thanks - might try and pick one up when / if Protooling has a Black Friday sale this year. I have had the JNs220 and suehiro 180 recommended to me as a good low grit to start shaping geometry. Do you have any thoughts / recommendations? I’ve decided not to buy any polishing stones etc until / unless I can set the geometry with a low grit stone. Which also makes it a low barrier to entry - cheaper knife, solitary cheaper synth stone.
 
My first extended JNAT polishing project on a pair of Aritsugus, a deba and yanagiba, that I bought in Kyoto about ten years ago. I've accumulated a number of smaller stones over the past several months, and I took the opportunity to try all of them here. The knives started unpolished, and pretty scratched up from all of the amateur sharpening jobs inflicted upon them over the years, by myself included. I learned quite a bit from the process, including which stones I preferred using and what each did best. Some of the stones others like on this board were not my favorites. After using an Aizu for edge work and cleanup, I tried out an Ohira Tomae, Maruoyama Kuro Renge, Hideriyama Shiro Suita, Yaginoshima Asagi, Shobu Tomae, and Nakayama Aisa. I'd rank them in order of preference: 1) Nakayama; 2) Maruoyama; 3) Hideriyama; 4) Yaginoshima; 5) Shobu and 6) Ohira. In the end, I definitely enjoyed the experience, and look forward to taking on new projects in the months ahead.

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