I didn't get any pictures prior to after the rennet had set so we'll start there
In this case the rennet (animal rennet) had set and I'd checked for a clean break. I got what was probably a clean break around 45 minutes but I thought it might need a little more time (some residue still on my finger) so I gave it ten more minutes. This time I could easily push my finger into the curd 1/2" before it broke. Then got a nice clean break and cut the curds best I could with a kitchen knife.
After cutting I began to raise the temp (a lot of 'on' and 'off' of the stove burner but it worked) and cut the large curds into much smaller curds with a butter knife while stirring.
My PH meter that was mostly unused today
Mostly because I forgot to make use of it -- was helping a friend re-load some .45acp at the same time. In my case that means I would advise and he would do -- but before draining the curds the ph read 6.27 which Linuxbox explained to me in a PM (I asked him what it would do overall for the cheese being higher then 6.2 etc).
I found this thermometer seemed to work about as well as the meat one around this stage (funny because it wasn't earlier) but used both constantly to check temps throughout the cooking process.
Finally after draining off the remaining whey I set the cheese in the mold and set the press. It's a Frankensteins monster but it does work (one day I'll make a good one).
A lot of whey, that was milkier then I expected, came out on the first pressing (I press for one hour and then flip and re-adjust and repress for 24 hours).
The second pressing doesn't put out as much whey -- I'm not sure I really need to do it this way and have read some hear say just press it for 24 hours but flipping it gives me a chance to drain all the whey off.
The biggest challenge with this crappy press is getting the cheese plumb (no tilting etc) but we managed with some working with the lever etc
The press gives me 9.92psi which is as close as I can get to 10psi with the weights I have at the moment.
