Let me try to lay out the train of logic for you. I’m like
to think of myself as a writer, and I’ve been toying with the idea of doing a
magical girl story for a long time. Whether that becomes a book or a manga
depends on how well I polish the idea and how willing someone else is to draw
it. I can barely do stick figures, so I definitely need to outsource that.
But I digress. Continuing on today’s topic, I need different
magical girl naming themes for the different teams. One of them that I finally
decided on was the use of a big, grandiose adjective and a gemstone. So I have
a notebook page full of scratch-outs and things like “imperial diamond” and “Passionate
Pearl”. Honestly they sound like perfume or vodka brands to me, but if you
stick with a theme for at least five people it seems less silly.
But after a couple of proper (but boring) names I thought to
myself “what if they got a new member that wanted to mess with them and their
stupid naming system?” thus began a quest to find the weirdest sounding gem I
could come across. Just a few are Apatite, Maw sit sit, Friedelite Manganotantalite Hackmanite zektzerite and Sillimanite.
Silly man-ite. Someone was having fun when they named that mineral. I think her
final accepted name would be Heroic Titanite. Obscure enough to appeal to her,
but cool enough for the team.
But I never knew collecting gems was really much of a hobby.
Arkenstone, a fine gem auction site online, gave me a great feel for how vast
it can be. They mention specific types of collectors, like North American gem
collectors or opaque stone collectors. There are collectors that focus on
certain gems like rubies or garnets, or those that focus on colors such as
black stone collectors. They also showed me that some gems naturally come in
two or even three colors! I seriously want a sample of watermelon tourmaline, a
stone that has a pink inside and green outside, separated by a white stripe. All
it needs are some black crystals for seeds and it would look exactly like a
watermelon.
There’s not only collecting already cut stones, but learning
how to cut them yourself. I don’t know about anyone else, but to me cutting
gems seems too fabulous to be a casual hobby. Yet I read through a quick FAQ
that assured me that even if I shell out $2000 for a faceting machine I could
probably make my money back quickly if I sold my products. I know an investment
of time and money would scare a lot of people off, but who knows. It does sound
interesting at least. Maybe I should see if there’s a lesson I can take, or
some videos online about how to cut a gem.
Going through that Arkenstone site also got me curious about
the cuts of the gems. It was when I saw a concave double heart cut, which not
only sounds like an anime attack, but looks really cool. It’s two hearts sharing
one lobe and looks like a fat W. That was when I decided to look into cuts of
stones as well.
And boy did I have to expand my vocabulary. When a gem has a
flat back and a smooth, rounded dome it’s called a cabochon. The round brilliant
cut is the one you imagine when you think of a cut diamond. The square looking
cut is known as an emerald cut. When a facet (that is, a flat side of a gem) is
triangular, it’s a brilliant cut, and when it’s square it’s a step cut. The big
flat facet on top is the table, and is connected to the upper part of the gem,
the crown. There is a girdle, a small flat band where the gem is usually set
into a fitting. Finally there’s the pavilion, which is the (usually) pointy
underside. The other important term I learned is inclusion. This means
imperfections in the gem. If a gem is “eye clean” then it is much more valuable
than a gem that has what looks like scratches or bubbles inside of it. Of course,
some gems are so rare that collectors jump on them, inclusions or not. There
are many, MANY more terms concerning gem cutting, but these are the absolute
basic terms that I thought were handy enough to know. It’s not a lot, but you’ll
sound knowledgeable enough about it to impress your friends!
The only thing disappointing about this search is that there’s
no fancy term for a member of this group. A person who cuts gems is a gem
cutter. This is unfortunate, because I love learning obscure terms. If a hat
maker is a haberdasher, a gem cutter should be a… I don’t know, Gemberlain? Facetteer?
Sparkly-rock-master? It’s a work in progress, but they should have an awesome
title to go along with an amazing skill!
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