The Stretch and Fold Technique from Peter Reinhart

Here is helpful tip from baker Peter Reinhart. He has recently modified his baking techniques to embrace more of the no-knead principles. I like the idea of folding the dough, but I do it differently. If you take the dough from the bowl with wet hands and just lift it, the sides naturally droop, thus beginning the fold. Then you can manipulate the dough into a ball by continually tucking the drooping sides under the center of the mass.

As he points out in this video, the dough will become more firm on top. His timing is about right though it doesn't make a lot of difference.

Jim Lahey seems to only fold the dough once and not until after it has fermented for quite a few hours. His method also seems to work. So, once again, there seems to be a lot of flexibility in how this can be done and still have excellent results.

As with anything else, practice will make you better and you'll probably develop your own variation on this theme.