Since this thread came back alive, I'll ask the question I was going to when it initially opened. Barry Gross is a long time friend and a mentor for me, and still after all these years often stops me in my tracks with great ideas. He related a story in a demo some time ago about a pen show where he was upset when a potential client pulled out an eye loop and looked closely at one of his pens - and then promptly handed the pen back to Barry and was about to walk away when Barry asked him what was wrong. Your finish has scratches in it still was the answer. Barry looked at the pen and felt it was well done, shiny, and pretty nice, but he then borrowed the eye loop and looked, and sure enough, the finish was not completely smooth. I've since went to a number of commercial pen shows and watched people shopping, and they do often pull out an eye loop to look closely at a pen's details.
So my question - when judging a finish, do you go by your eye and what you see when you look at it, or do you use something to give you a magnified look at how well you have done? In my earlier answer in the thread, I mentioned Steve Wohlgemuth's study of finishes and his process for getting a fine, scratch-less finish. He took things to an extreme with a lab microscope, but I made a lot of changes to my finishing process as I progressed - initially driven by Barry's story. How far do you go - and do you think a totally scratch free finish is really important on most pens or do you vary based on your perceived sale price of the pen? If you do use magnification, what do you use?
Kevin
