Polymer Clay Challenge Week 7

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Hello everyone! I fell victim to the winter flu season and have been under the weather for the past few weeks, but I'm hoping that is done, so I can start being creative again (not that I particularly cared about that while ill!) So as near as I can figure, this would be Week 7 (but someone can correct me if needs be). 

**I thought I had posted this last night, but apparently I missed the step of hitting that PUBLISH button**

For Week 7 of Katie Oskin's polymer clay challenge, I am continuing on my quest to use canes I have been collecting or neglecting. This is the case for a very specialized cane I made for a blog hop back in September 2012, for Erin Prais-Hintz's Challenge of Travel. The design came from satellite imagery of the African continent. I loved my Africa cane, but whenever I picked it up afterwards, I was utterly uninspired.

Slightly distorted cane end. Kindly ignore the wrinkles!

Enter the "Natasha" method. Not sure which Natasha this is named for, but she did the PC world a solid:

Beads #1 and #2

Each side of these four beads display a unique mirror image, formed by cutting lengthwise twice and inverting all the inner surfaces to the outside. The final shape is of a four-sided prism surmounted by a four-sided pyramid on each end. I've searched in vain for the "official" name of this 3-D shape... if there are any geometric wizards out there, I'd love to know. Otherwise I may have to make up a name for these. Which could be fun :)

Beads #3 and #4

The pendant was also a quickie method: take a length of cane, torture it a bit to distort, form into triangle, cut, cut, cut... and voila, instant (if very basic) kaleidoscope design:

A very loooong (30"+) necklace design with copper rolo chain. Lately I have been working a lot in sterling, but copper will always hold a special place in my heart :)

Hope to see everyone next week for Week 8 of our challenge (barring more illness, of course)!