Outsourced Ring

This is my first attempt ever at designing a ring. As a result I have been rather unsure through this whole process as to what is too much, or not enough detail. Trying to imagine a design on a small curved surface is more difficult than I anticipated.

I started off with a ton of basic ideas, none of which I felt particularly drawn to...

Eventually I narrowed it down to three designs based on how well I expected them to function as an actual ring. 

After a small critique in class I got some great ideas and feedback on my three designs. My classmates suggested I make the walls thicker in width or depth on the first design to provide support if I wanted to keep the walls looking as thin as possible. Making the walls thicker was clearly something I needed to work on because I was also advised to consider how the design would read on a small scale, which I had not yet considered. I was lucky enough to speak with a jewellery major who informed me the third design could use rivets to make the cage into a moving part. I was also given the suggestions for the first design to add some vines, or try an open back design. 

After this helpful conversation I was leaning towards the first design and refined it according to the advise I had received. I made the walls thicker in both directions and completely reworked the rose pattern to be more simplified and spaced out. Instead of having the rose punched completely through the ring wall I decided to only have it engraved to provide added support for the thin sections.

As I finalized the piece I also incorporated the horse shoe from my second design, and added my initials on the inside just for fun. After recreating the design 4 or 5 times I was happy to see it pass the tests on Shapeway's with a few suspect areas. Although, I have faith that the suspect, red areas will be alright because they are all fairly shallow with supporting walls beside and below them.

After all of my designing and redesigning this rather simple piece, I'm happy with how it looks and I just hope it prints nicely when outsourced!