Hello Kai.

I'm getting echoes from you of when I was a newbie (still am).

I have an ambition to 'strike' my own coin/medallion to commemorate the birth of my nephew, taking one of his birth photos & machining a die to re-strike a face of a Gold Sovereign. I spent about 40hrs on the project getting to the stage of actually machining a few experimental dies before I realised that to progress the project further would need 100's more hours & £1000's in software, materials & equipment with no guarantee of 100% success to my satisfaction.

http://www.designscomputed.com/vs3d/...mg_emboss.html

This is a site I learned a lot from.

I reckon if you can crack the process, taking a photo & then being able to strike a coin/medallion could earn you a good living !