Here’s my first jin. To me it looks too uniformly tapered at the top and could be a little more jagged, but then I thought that might happen naturally over time. I’d appreciate your opinion
Yup, I agree that it needs to be reduced. Grab your jin pliers (or any other pliers) and start grabbing the fibers at the tip of the jin and rolling/tearing them down toward the trunk along the grain of the wood... one of my favorite things to do with junipers and very satisfying.
Well I took Dave’s advice and I might have taken kendos advice, I’m not sure if I used enough finery. It has a cool ravine going through the middle of it now though!
Better... I'd tear at it a bit more and try to get a little taper in there if you can. Let it dry a bit (a few weeks) then hit it with a micro torch... so much fun!!