[ganjawulung]

Dear Montino Bourbon, Marco, Raden Oesman, Sukuh, Battara, Asomotif, P Abrera and of course David, thank you for all your positive comments. I've given your comments to the designer -- he has good "garap" too in finishing keris blades...

Originally Posted by Raden Usman Djogja

Is it already patented? If not yet, someday, I will commission another one with "che guevara sketch" in the centre So it will be called: che guevara broken machete motive. Hm... as long as it isnt expensive

Not yet patented. Still experiment. The cost of making is not too expensive, but quite difficult to make such pendhok. (One must chiselling manually one-by-one the motif's details)

Originally Posted by David

I think that this is a very fitting pattern. My only concern would be the use of acrylic paint. I would be worried about how it would wear and age. It might me interesting to do the black part as an enamel.

Ideally, one must use (javanese) traditional material as people usually use in making "kemalo" pendhok or "kemalon" pendhok that are usually red, green, black or brown in colour. Kemalo is not chemical paint, but traditional javanese colour then coated with certain clear "enamel"... But not easy to get "kemalo" formula, -- old formula of javanese traditional painting in the past..

Originally Posted by asomotif

Or maybe make this pendok out of silver.
Let the lower parts turn black naturally and polish the upper parts.

Of course, silver is better than this copper. Like any other copper thing, it only shines during one or two days, then becomes pale and darker... The lower part of this pendhok is like any other "copper" (not brass) thing, always becomes darker and darker each day...

Originally Posted by P.Abrera

If the door is open to non-traditional approaches, why not combine two javanese artforms and do it as batik is done with dyes and a wax resist on light wood. Or maybe actual batik fabric "laminated" to the scabard with laquer as the japanese do.

According to javanese tradition in the past, combining such arts is not new. You may find, some old kraton's (royal) keris sheath in the past -- for instance during the reign of Paku Buwono X in Solo (1893-1939) -- often used combining techniques in beautifying the keris or tombak sheath with ornaments that called "sunggingan". Actually, sunggingan is found in the javanese puppet-wayang making. People draw one by one manually the ornaments on the sheath like they make "wayang sunggingan" on wayang-leather. And the motif of sunggingan, is mixture -- there are some batik motifs too like "modang" (see ilustration in tombak scabbard and keris sheath with sunggingan, modang motif below). Modang is kind of "batik details" or form of ornaments usually used in wayang, and later in keris sheath too...