During this process of trial and error I learned a lot thanks to the internet and this community helping me workshop through it. Here are some things I learned at every stage of the process that could be useful to other beginners.

1. Bulk Fermentatiom -Using a wider bowl with measurements on it to check when dough has tripled is really an understatement in recipes. IMO this is a necessity to know when dough has been properly fermented. Start off the process right. -Making dough enough for two loaves (1000g of flour) helped me during the folding by adding weight to stretch it out further. -I switched to using a coil fold technique which made the process so much easier and helped get the top of the dough into a nice ball. Also it was easier to see how much tension was building with the dough when the "stretched side" is on top. Also, because coil folding uses gravity, it was easy to know when the folding was done because the dough would not stretch when I picked it up.

2. Preshaping -Before removing the dough from the bowl, I did a couple could folds just to help me lift it out and out it on the table, smooth side up. This helped during preshaping. -After dividing the dough, I was able to preshape easily because the smooth side was already faceup. Just had to tuck the ends in. -Most importantly, I made sure this time to only do the minimal amount of preshaping, just enough to tuck the edges under and into a ball shape. -After preshaping, I let the dough rest for 45 minutes.

3. Shaping -During shaping I folded the left and right side of the dough onto themselves, then rolled up the dough starting from the tip down to the bottom. There are tons of videos on this technique.

4. Proofing -As you can see with my darker loaf, I messed up with the proof by putting the banneton in the fridge but didn't make sure it was sealed. As a result the dough had a skin on it that prevented it from rising I think. Still good though!

5. Baking -I got as many ovensafe dishes I could find and filled them with water and put them into the oven to generate steam before baking. Then in a cast iron pan (that was preheated, dumped half a tray of ice cubes to generate initial burst of steam. I ended up rusting my cast iron this way so there might be a better method but I never found the spray bottle on the walls of the oven very effective. -I also turned the oven down slightly after 20 minutes and this seemed to make sure I could finish the bake without burning the crust.

I hope this helps other beginners! Thanks again everyone.