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I Forge Iron

Ironwork at BOK Tower Gardens in Lake Wales, Florida


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Took the family to visit grandma & grandpa (my parents) in Florida for March break. We took a little side trip to BOK Tower Gardens and it really is a fantastic place! Thought I would post some pictures of the ironwork created by Samuel Yellin. The gates and brass door are his work, but I'm not entirely sure if he was responsible for the bronze snake on the sundial.

If you ever get a chance to visit, it's well worth it... just make sure to give yourself a full day to enjoy it all!

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There are a few more pics on the next post too.

Here's a direct link to the Bok Tower site for more info....

BOK Tower Gardens

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Paul: You're well under the limit for uploading pics. Heck, we LOVE pics add to that they're Yellin pics and you're today's HERO!

Well done sizing the files too, making you an even bigger hero! Just don't get too excited, we aren't going to erect a statue of you or anything. B)

Sizing picture files so they're not larger than a page is just a matter of saving a pic with the right file size specification. I usually specify the size so the files are under 100k give or take, sometimes as small as 25k or so. It's as simple as doing a "Save AS and resizing it then and there" and saving it in a special folder means you still have the original if you want or need a super clear pic. I make a new, specific topic, folder in the general topic folder, for example I have a "Hammers" folder in my "Shop pics" folder as well as "Anvils" and "Vises" folders. I use these to make it easy to find specific things to upload either to E-mail, fora, etc. so all the pics were resized when I saved them in these folders. The full size pics are saved in general HUGE file SIZE folders, for instance one is "Camera" where I keep the direct camera downloads, Cameras almost always take pics in the 1.5 Meg file size range, Well, that's MY camera some take pics in the 4-5 Meg file size range. Yeah, that's right I do NOT have a good digital camera. I used to use a Canon T90 with about $2,000 worth of lenses, lights and accessories when I shot wet photos. I'd just spent about 12hrs on a plane and wanted to call a buddy to come pick me up for a ride home and I set my camera bag down and stepped up to the pay phone. It wasn't there when I stepped back. <_< Oh well.

Frosty the Lucky.

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Sure LeeRoy....

As Frosty said, it's ALL about resizing your pictures before doing anything with them - especially if uploading them directly to an album on this site.

I have my pictures uploaded to an external host site. In my case, it's flickr.com, but there are lots of other sites like Photobucket and you can even link from Facebook, if you do it right. Essentially, you need to know the actual web address of the picture you've uploaded. This address has to end in ".jpg" or ".gif" and nothing else. There is a little button above, second from the smiley face that is for inserting a picture... this is where you add the image web address. When you upload a photo to Flickr, it actually keeps five copies of your picture, but all in different sizes. You can find the individual web address for each size and use whichever one is best - I usually go for medium size when I post.

Here's an example of what I mean...

Square...
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address... ()

Thumbnail...
4463573184_6531b39ec3_t.jpg
address... ()

Small...
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address... ()

Medium...
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address... ()

Large...
4463573184_6531b39ec3_b.jpg
address... ()


Hope this helps!

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the Florida artist blacksmithing association got to take a tour of the Tower That brass door is 5" thick included are some pictures of the day and the inside http://www.blacksmithing.org/events/Bok2009/Bok2009.htm here is a link of some more pic from the event I will post some more pic from yellin pieces here in sarasota when I get home

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Great pictures! I like that rail with the double scroll "Y" repeated along it, nice visual image, nice dragons too on the gate. I just wonder how they kept it from turning to rust over the years, is it wrought iron? ;)
I liked the picture of the tillandsia just hanging there in mid air on the Florida Blacksmith site(it's labeled orchids but they're not), I just can't grow them here, not enough ambient humidity. <_<

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What is amazing to me is the outstanding shape everything is in. Although I am sure the estate was well cared for, this demonstrates pretty dramatically what real wrought iron (the material, not the end product) looks like after many years have passed. Mild steel would have been in much worse shape, I think...

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