Anonymous wrote:
Frankly, Jim and Jassem,
I don’t think any interactive 3-D video will produce betters sails - or lower the threshold from dreams to a finished JR. The videos surely are fine for promoting the rig, but so are well-edited videos of real junks sailing around. I fear that these digital presentations will rather lock the wannabe junkies to the computer screen. The real job, to actually construct a junk sail, all by ourselves, may even look more daunting after watching those posh videos. To a first-timer, constructing one’s own sail may feel like eating an elephant in one sitting. We who have made a few sails know how to ‘eat that elephant’: We eat it bit by bit.
Moreover, what one needs when (literally ) down on one’s knees to loft and cut out the bits of clot, is a 2-D sailplan with all the needed numbers on it (3-4-sheets to avoid too much clutter) . These numbers must be accurate and double-checked, or you may face real problems.
If you haven’t sewn anything before, I hereby give you a simpler task: Design and sew a few shopping bags, preferably from the same material as you are to make the sail from. Now, if that simple challenge is too much for you, I suggest you leave sailmaking to others. I am not even sure if the junkrig is for you, as the rigging, setting up and handling a JR call for some creative and independent mind-set. There is little help to get from the one in the neighbour berth (Bermuda rig, of course...)
I may sound a bit too frank here, but the reality will meet you at the lofting floor, no matter what I say (..sewing is the easy bit...).
Good luck!
Arne
I guess all I wanted to say was thank you, in perhaps a clumsy way...
I agree that videos, or the 3d model, don't do the job for of you, or will make me a better sewer. I am acutely aware that junk rigging is no picnic at Ikea (which is one of the many reasons why I love the rig).
For a sail-maker beginner like me, a moving image is a helpful tool, because it centralizes a broad range of information in one object.
It helps to contain the scattering of information (which comes with the territory of course, but is still very daunting).
When one is in the process of making their own rig, it can give me a dynamic overview of the general mechanics involved in a specific part. Yes, it did not replace the knowledge that comes to me by doing it, and it does not replace reading the fundamentals.
Thank you again,
Jassem