hringpoki Archives - J O Y C O M P L E X

May 15, 2020 — Comments are off for this post.

ANNOUNCEMENT: Hringpoki Stones In Stock at SCRIBE Stationery in Pittsburgh, PA

J O Y C O M P L E X is pleased to announce that in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania SCRIBE Stationery has started to carry our line of Special Edition Icelandic Hringpoki Stones.

SCRIBE is Pittsburgh's premier paper boutique. They offer distinctive invitations, letterpress, stationery, greeting cards, and gifts from the country's finest designers. They also stock unique and objects and ephemera to compliment any workspace.

Hringpoki stones are another unique addition to SCRIBE'S stock of rare or one-of-a-kind objects for those with discriminating tastes. The Special Edition stones are objects to behold.

They are our take on the traditional worry stone - just the thing to keep within arm's reach on your desk when you need a little reassurance and to clean your hands of microbes naturally.

Iceland's volcanic stone inspired the unique design. As lava hardens, the various gasses trapped inside create bubble-shaped voids. These trapped bubbles of gas are called vesicles. We created an approximation of those bubble patterns using our hringpoki technique to create a mesmerizing design to both see and touch.

Hringpoki stones are made using copper or copper alloyed metals, which are naturally anti-microbial. Our copper, brass, and bronze stones are fabricated using lost wax metal casting and hand polished. Our steel+ stones are made additively - a process in which layered steel powder infused with bronze and heated in an industrial autoclave. This method gives each stone a unique stepping pattern that looks almost like the whorls of a fingerprint.

HRINGPOKI: hringur = circle/ring; poki = bag/pack

ABOUT SCRIBE:

Scribe Fine Papers is Pittsburgh's premier paper boutique. It offers distinctive invitations, letterpress, stationery, greeting cards and gifts from the country's finest designers, including Arzberger Engravers, Crane & Co., Gilah, Julie Holcomb and Rifle Paper Co.

412.682.1644

731 1/2
Filbert Street
Pittsburgh, PA 15232

ABOUT J O Y C O M P L E X:

J O Y C O M P L E X is a content studio and design showcase that helps people, brands, and companies grow. It was founded in 2014 by Jeremy Burnich, a respected voice in 3D-innovation, content development, and community engagement.

412-449-9501

PO BOX 112554
2211 Lesnett Road
PITTSBURGH, PA 15241

Published by Admin Astrator in Announcements

Tags: hringpoki, Pittsburgh

March 1, 2020 — Comments are off for this post.

How To Stop Touching Your Face

When is the last time you touched your face? You probably didn't even realize when you did. How do you break a habit that you didn't know was terrible and that you didn't even know you had? You're not alone. We all touch our faces — a lot.

As you go about your day, you touch countless things — doorknobs, elevator buttons, credit card reader screens. Microbes, including the new coronavirus, can linger on those surfaces for days. Every time you place your finger on something, various microscopic organisms hitch a ride. When you touch your face, they hop off your fingertips and into your nose, mouth, and eyes - the express route into your body.

The coronavirus outbreak has raised awareness of just how often we reach for our faces. According to Dr. Vanessa Raabe, assistant professor in the department of medicine at NYU Langone Health, "It's a very difficult habit to break because we all do it, and oftentimes we're not even aware we're doing it."

What should you do?

Don't touch your face, touch this Copper hringpoki stone

Keep your hands busy.

Dr. Raabe offered this suggestion: "Be cognizant of triggers." Not to get all Zen, but take the time to be in the moment and pay attention to yourself and take note of compulsive behavior. Maybe you stroke your chin when you're trying to find the right word? Or, like many people, you rub your nose when you get a bit sleepy? Knowing where the trap is —that's the first step in evading it.

According to doctors, occupying your hands can reduce instances of touching your face. Fidget stones and stress balls are an excellent way to keep your hands busy and away from your face.

If you don't have a stress ball to squeeze, or a hrigpoki stone to rub, why not keep a special coin handy? Iceland's 10 krónur coin inspired the hringpoki fidget coin. As a bonus, using a souvenir coin to occupy your hands might bring back memories of your trip. Hey, even a mental vacation is a vacation.

don't touch your face, touch a hringpoki kronur, shown here next to an Icelandic 10 kronur coin

Coins made with copper are also naturally antimicrobial and anti-fungal. Research shows that copper has an inherent ability to kill a wide range of harmful microbes, and it can help prevent the spread of respiratory viruses. If an animal coronavirus makes a "host jump" over to humans, the result can be cases of severe infection with high mortality. "Researchers found that a closely-related human coronavirus - 229E - can remain infectious on common surface materials for several days, but is rapidly destroyed on copper."

The old rhyme, "See a penny, pick it up, all the day you'll have good luck," might be great medical advice, too. And remember, don't touch your face!

Published by Jeremy Burnich in Tips

Tags: copper, hringpoki, news

October 9, 2019 — Comments are off for this post.

Hringpoki Newsletter 02

Four Kinds of Hringpoki 10 Krónur Fidget Coins

Halló Hringpokimaður,

It's Yom Kippur so if you don’t feel like reading my message I completely understand. For everyone else, if you don’t read further you’ll miss out on some pretty cool news but no hard feelings if you also file this message in the trash.

Now that’s out of the way, there’s quite a bit to be excited about in the world of Hringpoki.

Artist Collaboration

For one thing, a collaboration in art between myself and Australian abstract photographer Matthew Schiavello looks like it’s finally coming together. This idea has been floating around since April but there have been some recent developments in the project that are very exciting.

First, I finally decided on a sculptural medium to display mine and Mathew’s work that is compelling and does service to both our work. After much experimentation and even some scientific testing - we are getting close. I expect to have two examples of this collaboration complete by December. I just uploaded a preview of some early test work to our subreddit. Longer exploratory pieces will appear on the Hringpoki blog.

Speaking of Reddit

If any of you happen to be on that particular social media platform and have an interest in seeing rougher behind the scenes and random posts about hringpoki work and whatever errata comes to mind, head on over to our fairly new subreddit: r/JOYCOMPLEX. Not quite a blog and not nearly as polished on an Instagram, this will be the place where I post quick news and updates and photos won’t be so perfect (good photography is hard work).

Please feel free to post pictures of your hringpoki items, discussions on how things have held up, ideas for new products, or complaints about old ones. I take pride in my work and want it to be the best that it can be. If you have suggestions for improvement then I want to hear about it.

Hringpoki Stones

Word is getting out and my hringpoki stones are making their way onto hands and into pockets all over the world. I don’t know how the word is spreading but for a not inexpensive rubbing stone, they are being purchased semi-regularly. If it’s word of mouth, I just want to say thanks for sharing!

It’s also very exciting to hear back from people about how much they like their stone. I am especially proud of reviews and notes I have received from customers who use the stone for anxiety or to help curb the need to self-harm - such as from skin-picking or trichotillomania. These anecdotal reports, while far removed from FDA approval, mean the world to me because for those people, something I made improved their lives.

Hringpoki Buyback Program?

I’ve been tossing the idea around in my head of a hringpoki buyback program. Kind of like how Apple does with phones. You send your old hringpoki stone back, you get a discount on a new one, and I refurbish the old one and sell it at a slight discount.

Any interest program?

Hringpoki Coins

The newest pocket-sized hringpoki objects are coins - 10 Krónur sized coins to be exact. They are available in various materials - I think the black steel+ is my favorite to look at, but copper still has the best feel. The photo at the top of this post shows what they look like. Prices are up on my Etsy store.

I did make a 1 Króna coin in titanium that came out well. But, wouldn’t you know, I lost it at the supermarket! I didn’t even have the chance to take any pictures of it. It was an expensive mistake so you’ll just have to take my word on it that the smaller coins are cool looking, but maybe too small?

A few 10 Krónur coins have already be shipped over to customers though. I’ll wait for feedback on the overall design before I offer a small coin. I’d like to make sure I have the overall feel of the coin just right before I start playing with sizes.

Icelandic Lesson

At the beginning of this message you make have asked yourself: what is a Hringpokimaður?

It’s a combination of the already compounded hringpoki (hringur+poki) and maður (man). If English worked like Icelandic it could be translated at circlepackperson. It encompasses both male and female hringpoki aficionados. For example, the Icelandic word Þingmaður literally means assembly+man, but all members of the Icelandic parliament (The Alþingi) whether male or female are call þingmaður.

PS - þingmaður is pronounced thing-mather (like father, with an m instead of an f).

Thanks for reading!

Stay Tuned for More Sometime Later

Published by Admin Astrator in Announcements

Tags: fidget coin, hringpoki, rubbing stone

April 18, 2019 — Comments are off for this post.

Further Review of The Most Interesting Guitar Pick in the World

Ryan Mooney of The Wool Hats String Band - A Connecticut based bluegrass/jamgrass group - takes another look at our #hringpoki guitar picks. He put version one through the ringer in January. Since then we have made some changes - based in large part on his feedback . We shipped him some new picks and he put some thoughts to paper. Enjoy.

Words by Ryan Mooney

First Impressions of version two of "The Most Interesting Guitar Pick In The World"

First off, I’d say they are much more comfortable to grip than the prior picks. Having removed the ridge that the old ones had and adding a little concavity makes them fit very well with how I hold a pick.

Second, the circle pack design provides a certain amount of grip that you don’t get on a solid pick. Overall, they have a very nice feel to them.

For the brass vs the plastic, the bronze one is much more stiff, even stiffer than the Blue Chip pick that I tend to play with. It has very little (or no) flex, likely because of the metal design. Surprisingly, the tone out of it isn’t as bright as I would have expected from a metal pick. This may be due to the smooth edge that it has. I found this to be a pleasant surprise and the pick that is most similar to what i currently use.

That said, it is a little brighter than my Blue Chip pick. The plastic ones are much lighter than I tend to use on an acoustic. They also provide a bit of bite, which I think comes from the textured edge on them. They seem to produce a pretty bright and immediate tone off of the acoustic strings. This may be due to the amount of flex that happens when they hit a heavy string. The black one was played for a while by my bandmate (Matt) and you can see the texture smoothing out.

Overall

In summary, I would say these are a good design and playable picks. They’d make a nice addition to a pick collection of someone who likes to explore the different tonal characteristics of various materials.

The Music

Angeline The Baker

As for pick comparisons, here's some picking I did of an old fiddle tune called Angeline the Baker. This will give you some idea of how single note stuff sounds.

Here are some chords from my song The Devil That You Know. This will give you a feel for how they sound strummed. As I’m typing this, I’m realizing how odd it is that I basically picked the Angel and Devil as my samples.

Recommendations and Possible Next Steps for Version Three

Lastly, if you want some feedback for other styles, if it is possible to produce the plastic pick without the texture on the edges, it may produce a mellower tone out of the gates. A thicker plastic pick might be interesting to try, too. Lastly, maybe make the tip of the pick solid with the circle pack more in the center of the pick where the thumb grips it. This may maximize the grip aspects while minimizing the flex.

Published by Jeremy Burnich in Investigations

Tags: guitar pick, hringpoki, Ryan Mooney, Wool Hats String Band