How to cut an opal by hand

Last year we brought you the story of 14 yr old Steiner Florian who told us how he cut an opal by hand. You can catch up here. We were all fascinated and the amazing Black Opal community got really generous with a box (yes a box) of equipment, rough material and cut stones that we sent to Steiner to practise and learn with.

In today’s video he shows us exactly how he does it. All we can say is WOW. The boy has patience! The video was put together by him and I think we have some serious competition coming through – not only are his cutting skills pretty good but he has mastered the art of video making too!

Watch and learn. Steiner will be monitoring the blog when this goes live so please leave any questions or comments for him to answer below (although if he doesn’t answer straightaway remember he might still be in school!). We love this community and are so thankful for all of you sharing your knowledge with the rest of us.  If you have something you would like to share, please by all means get in touch and we’ed love to take a look!

19 thoughts on “How to cut an opal by hand”

  1. That is quite remarkable that this can be done in that manner. At the beginning, the shape was tear drop. How did you get rid of the tip and it became a different shape? Thanks for sharing this.

    Reply
    • I cut the tip using a handsaw to reduce the shaping process. for the rough shapeing i used a grinding stone with the grit 800 🙂

      using this saw :

      Reply
  2. Yes, you have a gift, one you’ve accessed at an early age and I can only image seeing and hearing of your artistry in the future. God bless!

    Reply
  3. What Steiner Florian did was to rediscover the process by which Galileo shaped and polish his lenses for the telescope he invented!!!! Great going Steiner!

    Reply
  4. Great Job Steiner! This is how I learned to first polish my opals because I too didn’t have any equipment nor could I find classes. Beautiful job and good solid work. Keep it up, it brings great satisfaction and rewards.

    Reply
  5. Very usefull video for beginners like me ;). Nice work. How long it took you from beginning to the end in hours ar days for one stone ? Thank you Steiner and Blackopaldirect for sharing this video.

    Reply
    • It depends on the stone you are working with, a flat stone is easier because you wouldnt need to do alot of the cutting job. A good rough would take me 2-5 hours and a harder rough could take 1-3 days. 🙂 🙂

      Reply
  6. Great Job, but the video would have more affect if it was done live, step by step. Otherwise its just pictures of what can be or can’t be done….There is no real affects here.

    Reply
    • Dear Brian, this is Flo’s dad, your statement is very just. But please take under consideration that Flo had to push me to get time on my computer which I use for my business. At that time we just moved from Indonesia to Austria and Flo’s computer was in the container which didn’t arrive yet. Furthermore it was his very first year in a German speaking school and on top of this my business requires me to travel… Besides the lack of equipment we don’t have any experience in editing videos… So Flo has been very very upset about the fact that he received trust, stones and equipment, but didn’t do anything in reply. So he decided to make this picture video. Now I will have to sort out with Flo, because I am not supposed to comment here;)
      Thx and Greetings Felix

      Reply
      • HI Felix It is great that you were to comment here and you are most welcome to. 🙂 It is very nice to meet the father of a future master cutter. Regards Justin

        Reply
  7. well done steiner your video was brilliant and you gave me the push i neded go from strength to strength and with justin being here to guide wee can al surely get started on this amazing journey. good luck with your wonderful gift you must be so exited take care keep creating and loving your opal journey william glitter boy uk stay fabulous always

    Reply

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