Jewelry Designer of fine custom
art jewelry

Experimental Faceting, Optical Effects.
A while ago, a buddy of mine, who is a land surveyor, had theodolite reflector that was bust.  Inside was this about 50mm diameter glass faceted reflector thingamajig. (Actually called a Retro Reflector) Amazing thing. It was like a giant stone with 3 big facets at the bottom. You could see yourself in it. So I borrowed it and I measured the angles which came out at sort of 52 degrees. Then cut a couple of test stones along the same shape and design. It didn't really work well because the were to small, (10mm diameter) so the effect was lost. Anyway, one day, in a fit of lethargy, I ground a concave on the three 'ridges' of the pavilion of one of the finished test stones. It produced an interesting effect Like a six rayed star . I have cut a bunch of them over the months, playing around with the angles, material ,sizes and shapes. I finished two today that came out ok-ish , one curved and one flat, just for fun. (It is low season here in the Caribbean, so I got some time to play around) So the photos aren't so good , and the curved one was ground with to a course diamond wheel on my hanging motor. Anyway...

The Mercedes Benz ones are the ground ones and the 6, 11,2 o'clock are the reflections. The reflections also 'fall away' in the stone, giving a nice feel of depth.

That's the pavilion, simply ground with a hand held diamond wheel.

This is a flat faceted version. Again 6 11 and 2 o'clock fall away. The center is a culet facet. The black circle in both stones is the camera lens, reflecting like it should.

Bottom of the flat one.... Next, I am going to cut on with a 80 index, so I can get 5 sides and then I am going to cut one in Strontium Titanite, to see if there is any prism effect with a high RI .