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Carving post-turning

Joined
Jan 2, 2012
Messages
45
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Location
Kansas City
Website
www.phaedrusdesignlab.com
I was looking at some of William Hunter's work. Fantastic stuff. Are there any tutorials or videos on how one goes about shaping vessels post turning?

I understand that ultimately, just find something, even a dull butter knife, to remove material. I'm thinking more about if there are some basic techniques out there.

Yeah, I can put a flat slab of wood on a stump and call it a table, but there are techniques to get the most out of the properties of wood. Are there similar types of things when shaping wood?

I guess I am looking to try to understand form making and spending less time trying to invent a way to remove material. I would rather learn how to remove material and get on with the form making.

Maybe that is a bad approach?
 
Scott You nailed it. Just start carving using whatever you have. I did my first award winning carving with nothing but a Dremel, Cabinetmakers rasp and various homemade sanding sticks.
I use a combination of tools and don't try to be a purist. If it takes a rasp I use that if it takes a rotary tool then I use that. The basic difference besides skill level, is how fast certain tool remove wood.
If you have patience you can do an awful lot of work with a Dremel and some Kutzall bits. You might need a carving tool to make good crisp lines at certain points or if you need nice long curves a wood rasp or sanpaper on a stick goes a long way.
I have an article coming out before too long in Woodturning design on how to carve handles and feet on bowls. It will get you through some of the basics. I tried not to use fancy tools to do that.
If you have more money are are really serious about carving Get a Foredom flex shaft machine and maybe some carving chisels. I also tend to use my Nichelson Cabinet makers rasp a lot on my projects. It's a good fairly inexpensive tool. If you want to go a step up Airu files are fantastic but expensive.
 
Not alot of info available. But sit down and think what you want to carve and take it forward from there. In my case its spirals so this sets in motion the type of tools that could be used or handy.



I have just written a short article on how I layout and carve my spirals. As yet its not published. PM me if you would like a copy.
 
John--

Had you worked with a dremel for carving previously? I think I can work a rasp or even spokeshave good enough to rough something out.

On a similar note, was your design process to sketch out the piece or did you just jump in with both feet?
 
I had been playing with carving for a while. Mostly little stuff, shape a knob for a drawer or shape an apron for a table. Mostly using wood rasp and sanders. When I got into turning some where along the way I started caving little feet on my bowls.
Then I took a Windsor chair class and of course had to carve the seat and improve my skills with Spokeshave and drawknife. What that did was teach me to read the grain of the wood so I would at least carve in the right direction.
Shortly after that I came up with the clock shown below. It's called the Biological clock. I needed to carve baby legs on the front. I have a degree in Physical education so I know muscles. What I didn't know was how baby fat looked so I went to Walmart and picked up baby dolls and looked under their skirt to see how the legs were shaped. Yea I know, I'm probably on some here's how to pick out a pervert on a Walmart training video.
Anyway I sketched out the legs and then began trying to carve them. I only had a bandsaw, a coping saw, wood rasp, Dremel and sandpaper. With lots of patience and very little skill I carved the baby legs. It's more about seeing in your mind what you need to do and then finding the tools to do it.
 

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What I didn't know was how baby fat looked so I went to Walmart and picked up baby dolls and looked under their skirt to see how the legs were shaped. Yea I know, I'm probably on some here's how to pick out a pervert on a Walmart training video.

Wow John . I have a new perspective of you!!!!!!! 😀Gretch
 
Yea I know, I'm probably on some here's how to pick out a pervert on a Walmart training video.

On the contrary John, you'd probably be asked to fill out a Wally-World employment application, and get moved directly to management!

😀
 
I was looking at some of William Hunter's work. Fantastic stuff. Are there any tutorials or videos on how one goes about shaping vessels post turning?

I understand that ultimately, just find something, even a dull butter knife, to remove material. I'm thinking more about if there are some basic techniques out there.

Yeah, I can put a flat slab of wood on a stump and call it a table, but there are techniques to get the most out of the properties of wood. Are there similar types of things when shaping wood?

I guess I am looking to try to understand form making and spending less time trying to invent a way to remove material. I would rather learn how to remove material and get on with the form making.

Maybe that is a bad approach?

There are some articles on my website that should help. 🙂

John
 
I also put off carving for many years because I was afraid it was too hard. You simply have to start. Use whatever tools you have or maybe buy just one and see what you can do with it. I have an article coming out fairly soon in Woodturning design on carving feet and handles on bowls. It's a very good beginning. I use a coping saw, dremel, one carving tool and homemade sanding sticks. It's more about patience and taking small cuts. If you do that it's amazing what you can do.
 
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