All Archives - Page 3 of 10 - D&O Celtic Jewelry

Posted on February 9, 2016October 21, 2016 by Dan

Septagram Symbol Meaning

Recently, someone asked me to create some pendants of the septagram symbol. This piqued my interest. I became curious about the meaning behind the septagram symbol.

Keep in mind that some may refer to the septagram as a heptagram. You will find in all of the sections below that the septagram represents groups of seven. It often represents completeness or wholeness.

Biblical Meanings Associated With the Septagram

As you may already know, the number seven is used many times throughout the Bible. In most contexts the number seven represents completeness or wholeness. It can mean both physical or spiritual wholeness.

According to the Bible, God created the Universe in seven days. The seventh day was the Sabbath. Also, Isaiah 11:2-3 describes seven Gifts of the Spirit:

2 The Spirit of the Lord will rest on him—the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the Spirit of counsel and of might, Spirit of the knowledge and fear of the Lord—

3 and he will delight in the fear of the Lord.

The seven gifts are wisdom, understanding, counsel, might, knowledge, fear of the Lord and delight in the fear of the Lord.

Less pleasant to think about are the seven deadly sins. Those are lust, gluttony, greed, laziness, wrath, envy and pride. Some believe Revelations 16 says that seven plagues will herald the end times.

Septagram As An Occult Symbol

For centuries, astronomers knew of only seven other planets than Earth. They were called “wandering stars”. They were: Sun, Moon, Jupiter, Venus, Saturn, Mercury and Mars. The Sun and Moon occasionally were eclipsed. Also, the Moon would go through phases. The other five “wandering stars” were a lot more distant. All of the normal stars moved in a straight arc every night. The five “wandering stars” appeared in different places every night, and did not move in an even arc like the others. Their position relative to Earth changed as they went around the Sun. Because there were seven known planets, the number seven and the septagram became another symbol of the completeness of the Universe.

The names of the days of the week also come from these seven original planets.

Modern pagans adopted the septagram as their symbol. It is sometimes called the “Elven Star”.

Finally, some believe it represents seven directions – North, South, East, West, Above, Below, and Within.

Septagram As A Symbol of Alchemy

Before I read about this, I thought that Alchemy was about trying to convert common metals into valuable metals. The classic example is the attempt to turn lead into gold. That is known as physical alchemy. However, there is a belief that the same steps of Alchemy can apply to a spiritual transformation for a person, known as Spiritual Alchemy. This is by far the most interesting meaning to me.

The Seven Steps of Physical Alchemy

Calcination – The alchemist burns the material to ashes. This breaks it down to a uniform state of decomposition.
Dissolution – The alchemist dissolved the ashes in water in this step.
Separation – The alchemist filtered the material and discarded any undesirable material.
Conjunction – The alchemist combined the leftover materials into a new substance.
Fermentation – The alchemist introduced yeast or bacteria to convert sugars to acids, gases or alcohol.
Distillation – The alchemist boiled the solution to increase its’ purity and potency.
Coagulation – The is the precipitate or sublimation to solid form of the purified result of distillation. This solid was called the philosopher’s stone. This was the legendary stone that could turn lead into gold.

The Seven Steps of Spiritual Alchemy

Calcination – A person reaches a low point due to personal loss or suffering. This creates a need to undergo a spiritual transformation.
Dissolution – The person breaks down internal barriers and reveals buried problems or burdens.
Separation – The person discards problems and burdens and gets back to their true essences.
Conjunction – The person recombines the essences into new belief system. For example, the person could combine masculine and feminine sides, or conscious and subconscious.
Fermentation – The person goes through a process to become inspired. They could use prayer or meditation to achieve this.
Distillation – The person goes through another cleansing process. The intent is to make sure no remnants of the problems or burdens are carried forward to the final stage.
Coagulation – The individual unifies mind, spirit and body into a state of enlightenment.

I summarized these seven steps from these two sources:

Also, some call the process of alchemy Magnum Opus. There are four main stages. However, people often expand these to more stages, such as the seven described above.

Finally, alchemists chose seven metals, again based around the planets:

Gold = Sun
Silver = Moon
Copper = Venus
Iron = Mars
Tin = Jupiter
Mercury = Mercury
Lead = Saturn

Other Uses of the Septagram

Occasionally, heraldry uses the septagram symbol. Anything from flags to uniforms can use the septagram. One example is the Flag of Cherokee Nation. Coat of Arms, family crests, and other similar symbols sometimes use the septagram. A few police forces use a septagram shape for their badge. Some people researched why many police forces use stars as badges. It doesn’t sound like there was much reason behind it. The main reason so many chose a star as a police symbol was because it was simple and fairly easy to make.

Posted on January 1, 2016February 8, 2016 by Dan

D&O Celtic Jewelry 2015 Recap

I started out in the summer of 2012 not knowing really anything about 3D printing or jewelry design or internet marketing or anything really. I try to remember that I basically started from nothing and keep a humble view of this business. I do these year-end recaps more to keep myself motivated than to try to brag. However, 2015 was a really good year so it’s hard not to brag a little.

New Designs

In 2015 I did not really have to think very much about what I should be designing next. I had a steady stream of customers reach out to me to ask me to design something for them. I then could take these designs and list them and try to sell them to other customers. A couple of them have proved to be pretty popular. Here are the new pendants that I designed on request for customers this year:

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Outreach

I made a conscious effort this year to reach out and collaborate with others in a mutually beneficial way. I reached out to other jewelry designers and people getting into modeling. I would send them jewelry. They’d post pictures of themselves wearing it to social media or web sites. Then I’d also post the pictures to my various sites to return the favor and gain them a little exposure. This got my jewelry in front of different audiences. Many of these people I collaborated with provided me with great, great pictures that I could use on my own web sites and social media. This was something I think I sorely needed. Before this year I just didn’t have many pictures of people wearing my jewelry.

A lot of this interaction and outreach happened on Instagram. I just joined Instagram in January of this year. Through outreach and interaction I was able to gain over 2,100 followers. It’s hard to know how much traffic was driven to my site from Instagram, but it had to have helped. It was also a source of some new ideas. A few of the custom pendants came from customers I met on Instagram.

One really neat moment from this year was I was searching Instagram for topics related to Celtic jewelry. I came across someone who had posted a picture of one of my Claddagh Ring designs. It turned out that it had been used as an engagement ring.

Here are some pictures of people who were awesome enough to share pictures of them wearing my jewelry in 2015:

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Site Traffic

At this time last year I spent a lot of time trying to optimize my web site for search engines. I settled on the WordPress layout that I currently have. The Yoast SEO plugin has been indespensible for this effort. I did a lot of keyword research at the same time which I think helped in some regards.

Another thing I did during my outreach was building some backlinks to my site. I think that probably had a big impact on where I ranked in searches. I also tried to blog on a somewhat regular basis, although that proved to be hard at times. It’s hard to know though which of these SEO tactics worked, or if it was a sum of all of them. The biggest traffic driver to this site are people searching for the meaning of various Celtic symbols.

In any case, the traffic to this web site nearly tripled in 2015 over 2014. Some of that is to be expected since in 2014 this site was still in its’ infancy to a large extent. In January and March I did a couple giveaways that drove a ton of traffic. After doing those giveaways my traffic hit kind of a bottom in April. The thing that surprised me though was that traffic increased every single month after that this year. By October, I was getting more organic traffic than I did in January or March which were boosted by giveaways.

Sales

My total number of sales increased by 42% over last year. To me that is really important but it doesn’t tell the whole story. Last year I did a lot of craft fairs that really contributed a lot. About 40% of my sales last year were at those craft fairs. This year, I only did one craft fair and barely made any sales. I focused all my energy on online sales. My online sales increased by more than double (237%!). So this more than offset the lack of sales at craft fairs.

The main reason for this was that I opened an Etsy shop. Last year I was not on Etsy at all, which was probably an oversight. I tried Etsy back in 2012 and 2013 and did not make a single sale. So I gave up on it for a while. Someone recommended I give it another shot. I got on Etsy again in January and started to make some sales. In all, Etsy accounted for a little over half of my online sales this year.

The number of sales through my Shapeways shop was up only slightly, but my revenue from Shapeways was up 83%. People were buying more expensive items. A big chunk of this increase was due to three ring sales where the customers purchased the rings in solid gold.

Finally, the number of sales from this web site was still pretty modest. It only accounted for about 15% of all my sales, but I did double the number of sales from my web site over last year. This shouldn’t be a surprise since traffic increased so much. My ultimate goal is to keep growing sales through this site.

Coming In 2016

One thing I came across during all my interactions were bangle bracelets. I’ve already made three of my designs available in a bracelet version and if it proves to be popular I may offer more.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Posted on November 24, 2015November 15, 2016 by Dan

Meaning of the Pentagram Symbol

UPDATE 8/25/2016: I have corrected an error in this post. I was careless in saying that the Golden Ratio, Phi, came from the Fibonacci Series. The Golden Ratio is the solution to the equation (a+b)/b = a/b = Phi. The Fibonacci series is one series of numbers that converges on Phi. So they are two unrelated concepts that happen to converge on the same number. I regret the error.

I also added a caveat regarding confirmation bias to the section about how Phi is found in art and nature. Some of these claims are in dispute, but I still present them anyway as food for thought. I personally find some of them quite interesting, if nothing else.

Here is the original post from 11/24/2015 with the corrections:

I was recently asked to design a Pentagram pendant from someone who found me through my Shapeways shop. I have of course seen the Pentagram many times. I was aware that the Pentagram was often used as a symbol by the occult and Satanists. So I deliberately avoided doing any designs of it or even related to it before now. It’s really unfortunate that such groups have decided to use it (although they normally use one that is upside down, not right-side up). Regardless, I was very pleased to learn the relationship of the Pentragram to the Golden Ratio, which is seen throughout nature and in many works of art. Let’s take back this amazing symbol and use it for better purposes.

What is the Golden Ratio?

First of all, what is the Golden Ratio? The Golden Ratio is derived from solving the equation (a+b)/a = a/b. If you set the ratio a/b = Phi, the you get the equation 1 + (1/Phi) = Phi. When you solve this, you get Phi = (1 + √5)/2, which is 1.61803… Phi is another irrational number like Pi that goes on forever without a pattern.

The Fibonacci Series in mathematics also converges to Phi. It’s a remarkable coincidence that the two happen to converge on the same number even though they are not directly related. The Fibonacci series starts with either 0, 1 or 1, 1. The next number in the series is the sum of the previous two. So the first numbers in the series are:

0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, 144, 233…

You can see 0+1=1 and 1+1=2 and 1+2=3 and 2+3=5 all the way to 89+144=233 and so on.

As you go further and further out, the ratio of one number to the previous number starts to converge on Phi, which is 1.61803…For example, 233/144= 1.618055… It’s already starting to get pretty close. if you went further out in the series, you would get an even closer approximation of Phi.

In geometry a “Golden Rectangle” is one where the length divided by the height has the ratio of Phi.

There is also a “Golden Spiral” or “Fibonacci Spiral”. Take a Golden Rectangle and start dividing it into further Golden Rectangles. If you draw a spiral that follows the borders of these rectangles, then you get an approximation of a Fibonacci Sprial:

How is the Pentagram Related to the Golden Ratio?

The Pentagram contains several dimensions that result in a Golden Ratio. This page has a great explanation of it. Here is another way of looking at it:

In this diagram, the length of each segment is related by the Golden Ratio:

a/b = Phi

b/c = Phi

c/d = Phi

The Golden Ratio Appears Throughout Nature and Art

First I will start this section with a disclaimer. Many of the examples below are disputed. The criticism is confirmation bias: when you start looking for the Golden Ratio, you start finding evidence of it everywhere. In fact, this phenomenon of finding the Golden Ratio everywhere has been hilariously mocked by the parody Twitter account Fibonacci Perfection. At the risk of being mocked, I still personally find some of these examples compelling and interesting enough to include in this blog post.

I read that the Taj Majal used the Golden Ratio in some of its’ proportions. I had to see for myself. I overlaid a picture I found that had a Golden Spiral with a series of Golden Rectangles on top of a picture of the Taj Majal. See for yourself:

Taj Mahal Golden Ratio (click for larger)

To me, it sure appears that the distance between the pillars and outer edge of the dome follow the Golden Ratio. If you look closer there appear to be other distances that follow this ratio.

Another example in architecture is the Parthenon, although that has been disputed.

Some people say that features in the human face follows the Golden Ratio, and so we may find objects or art that display the Golden Ratio to be pleasing. So even if the Greeks didn’t build the Parthenon to follow the Golden Ratio on purpose, maybe they designed it with similar dimensions because they thought it looked most appealing.

In nature, there are many examples. I already mentioned the human face. Other features such as the length of each segment of your fingers, starting at your wrist follow this ratio. This is a neat article with a lot of examples. One that I found kind of mind-blowing was that many species of flowers have a number of petals found in the Fibonacci Series.

3 petals – Lilies

5 petals – Trillium, Buttercups, Roses

8 petals – Delphinium, Bloodroot

13 petals – Marigolds, Black-Eyed Susans

21 petals – Shasta Daisy

34 petals – Field Daisies, Pyrethrum

The theory as to why so many features of plants would follow this ratio is that it has to do with the most efficient use of space. Plants have to efficiently use sunlight, so it would make sense that their leaves and other features would arrange to maximize their use of surface area.

More famously are the examples of the Golden Spiral in nature. The hurricane, spiral galaxy and Nautilus sea shells are all examples of things that are Golden Spirals, or very close.

So, what is the meaning of the Pentagram then?

The Pentagram has a direct relationship with the Golden Ratio, and the Golden Ratio has a relationship with so many things found in nature. So to me, the Pentagram symbolizes this relationship between math and nature. No one knows why this symmetry exists in nature or why so many natural phenomenon would follow the Golden Ratio. The Pentagram also symbolizes this mystery. It’s an acknowledgment that there are forces at work which we don’t fully understand but can appreciate.

Posted on November 17, 2015November 17, 2015 by Dan

Five Ways a Beginner Can Get Into 3D Printing

3D Printed Pair Of Pliers — A customized pair of pliers I made with 3D printing for a customer

If you want to learn about 3D printing, try it out or even get a product made, it’s never been easier. There are some limitations but for the most part you can create any shape you can think of with 3D printing, and in some cases even create interlocking parts. This is what makes 3D printing so amazing (and addictive). Here are five ways you can get started:

1. Use a 3D printing service like Shapeways

Shapeways is the best one in my opinion but there are others like Kraftwurx and i.Materialise. All of them are pretty similar. You need to have a CAD model that you upload to their site. Then you can order the model in a number of different materials. Small plastic prints will only run a few dollars plus shipping. Larger prints will cost more. They also offer many metals, including some precious metals. Those can run anywhere from around $10 up into the hundreds of dollars. It all depends on the size and metal that is chosen.

Shapeways also is great because they have a model checker. After you upload a file, it will show you exactly where the problem areas are. This way you can go back and redesign your item without ordering to find out later that they couldn’t make it, or worse, get a print sent to you that did not turn out correctly.

2. Easy Creator Apps

There are several “Easy Creator” apps on Shapeways’ web site and there are others out there as well such as Monstermatic. These allow you to customize or create a 3D model without needing to know any CAD software. The 2D to 3D print creator takes a black and white 2D image and simply extrudes it into a third dimension to give it depth. If you know how to use any kind of graphics software, you can use this app to make it into a 3D print. With that one it will even change the depth of the print depending on the shade of gray. There are several others you can look at here.

3. Hire a designer

If what you are trying to make is too complicated to be made with any of the Easy Creator apps, then you could hire a designer to create the 3D model for you. There are a few ways you could do this. You could post a listing to a freelance hiring service such as Elance or Upwork. These are global services and you can usually find someone who will do the work for a reasonable price. You could also look in the Shapeways forums sections dedicated to linking designers with people who need something designed.

4. Use the Thingiverse

The Thingiverse may already have a 3D model of the item you want. This is a place people can share 3D models. You are free to download them and modify them. However, if you are planning to make a product from it for sale, that is frowned upon. It is meant to be more of a forum for makers and tinkerers. That’s perfect though for someone just starting out.

5. Learn a simple CAD program like Sketchup or OnShape

There are a ton of different free CAD programs out there. I use Blender to create my 3D printed jewelry. That one will take some time to learn, but there are a ton of good Youtube tutorials showing you how to use Blender, which is how I learned. Programs like Sketchup or OnShape are much easier to pick up for a beginner. Search Youtube to find tutorials for those as well. More advanced programs like Blender will have more features than Sketchup but the simple ones work just fine when you are starting out. You can also download files from the Thingiverse, bring them into Sketchup and then modify them.

Posted on November 10, 2015November 10, 2015 by Dan

How Instagram Can Grow Your Business

I finally got on Instagram earlier this year and I’ve been blown away by it for a number of reasons. It’s done a number of things to help my little startup business grow a little. Here I will share some of my experiences with it.

Interaction Is High On Instagram

The interaction I get from Instagram is way, way more than any other social media platform I’ve tried, and I’ve tried a lot of them. I get a small amount of interaction from using hashtags. For me, the best one seems to be #3dprinting. There is a growing community of 3D printing hobbyists and a lot of them are searching Instagram for people also doing things with 3D printing.

However, I get much more interaction from searching hashtags relevant to my business and interacting with people. Anything related to the various Celtic symbols, or Irish topics work really well for me. Ocasionally I will find people with pictures of tattoos of the same symbols that I’ve used in my designs. Once, bizarrely, I found someone had made a tattoo out of my Leaf Pendant design. This is a totally original design I made from scratch. It was really surreal finding it on Instagram. They told me they found it through Google Image Search, and liked it so much they got a tattoo of it.

I will interact with the people I find through hashtags by liking and commenting on some of their pictures. They will usually return the favor and do the same to some of my pictures as well. I don’t get this kind of interaction with Twitter, Facebook or Pinterest as much. Sometimes I will follow them or they will follow me, or both. Mainly through this kind of interaction I now have over 1,900 followers.

I also try to interact with the people I am already following. Since I am following over 1,000 people, it can be difficult to stay on top of it. But I try. I think this is also pretty important, but hard. What I’ve found works is checking my feed, and when I see a picture I like I will check out the rest of the person’s feed. I’ll look at their other recent pictures and like some of those as well, and maybe leave a comment or two. This way I can keep some level of interaction with the many people I’m following. If I waited until I saw each of their pictures individually in my feed, I might never see all of them. And again, if I go and like 3 or 4 pictures from someone I’m following, often they will will return the favor and check out my recent pictures and like a few in return. Again, this kind of back-and-forth or interaction just seems to be part of the culture on Instagram.

I’ve Gotten Product Ideas From Instagram

The idea for this Heart Celtic Knot Necklace came from someone I met on Instagram

There have been a few people who found my things on Instagram who loved my designs. I have made a few sales from people who fell in love with one of my pieces and had to have it and bought it on the spot. This is rare, but it has happened a couple times. I can’t say I’ve had this happen at all though on other social media sites. I have found people that like my designs but I can’t recall a time when someone went and bought something right then after seeing it on Facebook or Twitter for example.

Another few people have discovered my designs, and requested custom designs. They looked over my things and I didn’t have quite the one they were looking for. They reached out to me and asked if I could make one for them. Some of the requests were Celtic-related and others were not. Most of my new designs this year were from people who asked for custom designs on Instagram. So instead of trying to figure out what designs I should make that customers might like, my customers actually told me exactly what they wanted. No guessing involved. It’s also likely that others will like these designs if one person already does.

One that came about this way was the Celtic Heart Knot pendant. One Instagram user requested that as this custom design. I made it for them and they really liked it. It’s still a fairly new design but it the popularity of it is promising.

I Marketed Those Same Product Ideas With Instagram

Mouse Suicide — Instagram photo of @mousesuicide wearing the Celtic Heart Knot Necklace. This picture got over 1,800 likes

Not only did Instagram give me product ideas, but I also used Instagram to market these products after I made them. So Instagram actually completed a product cycle for me, from idea, to creating, to marketing and selling. In a case or two, the person who had it custom-made bought the item posted a picture of it. That got it exposure to their followers, which is really nice, even if the audience might be relatively small.

I started looking for opportunities to collaborate with people on Instagram that might have a bigger audience. Because of the community and interactive nature of Instagram, there are many, many users with 10,000, 20,000 and even 100,000 followers. Some call these people “influencers”. I started looking for people that had shown interest in Celtic or Irish-related things, that had a lot of followers, and that had a good level of interaction on their posts. I even found some that had posted pictures of themselves wearing Celtic jewelry, or something very similar already.

When looking for an Influencer, I put more importance on how many comments their pictures get. It really speaks to the level of engagement when a picture has 100+ comments. There are some people that can get 500 likes on a picture but zero comments. I’d go with the one with more comments almost every time. It means their followers are interacting a lot more. Clicking the button to like a picture is good, but more passive than participating in a conversation.

In any case, I highly recommend trying out Instagram if you are selling products like this.