Patterns

[cedarshavings]

I've been carving a while and like to make my own patterns. I still have problems with drawing out full body patterns, of course it doesn't help that I don't draw very well. I can usually find an image online that is close to what I want, but if I need an arm or leg in a particular position that is a problem for me. If you have any advise, I would appreciate it (if I've even made myself clear). I've never tried carving arms or legs separate like Lynn O Daughty has done on several pieces. He is so good at what he does and makes it look easy but I'm not sure it would turn out so good for me.

Steve

[woodburner807]

There is a free limited version of "DAZ," which a Scott's Carving video suggested. It will do an excellent job but has a rough learning curve. Here is the link: https://www.daz3d.com

[woodburner807]

Also, you can buy a small wooden artist manakin and that helped me a lot...

[Brian T]

The 12" wooden art mannekins are great = even set a pose then look at it with the computer camera to see a 2D image.
The great American painter, Winslow Homer, used a mannekin that he could dress up.

There was a time when I spent 30-60 minutes every day, drawing the mannekin. I did improve!

[mpounders]

Something that might help would be paper dolls. Lynn used to have a video about it, but basically you can use brass paper fasteners to make movable joints for arm and legs, kinda like a two dimensional manikin or an adjustable pattern. His was primarily for the side profile. I like to use Sculpey polymer clay for a model when I am working on something original. It bakes hard in your oven and by mounting it on a square wooden base, I can use it to make a front and side pattern to cut out on my band saw. Also, I then have a "go-by" to refer to when I am doing my carving.

[woodburner807]

Here is a link to some manikins, and as Brian mentioned the 12 inch ones are probably the best but I'm "space restricted" and use the smaller ones. http://smile.amazon.com/Artists-Mani...&node=12896811

[Eddy-Smiles]

I'm not a roughout sort of guy. I tried them when I first started carving but decided that my budget wouldn't support my carving habit so I had to go to using ready patterns or making a pattern of what I wanted to carve myself. To get to the point. I'll Google a figure of what I want to carve and download the image on my computer. Then I'll seach for a similiar figure that has the extremeties in a position close to what I want. From there I crop, cut paste, resize the two images until they look close to what I want my finished carving to look like.

[rickm]

eddy i do what you do an recently got a printer that enlarges and reduces and give wanted one for years so i finally told miss no that im getting one. the other solution is use play do or modeling clay I mean you can even make your own modeling clay from flour, looted times ill carve something and brought paint it and then i can see the boo boos better and then tidy it up and all what helps me see is to carve it take a picture of it and by studying the pic i can see better what else i need to do,