Water Girl Roughout

[William]

Just finished the second of six back burner projects, it really feels good to finally get them done.

This one is the "Water Girl" it was carved from a basswood roughout of a carving by Norma Nicks it's 3 1/2" x 4 1/2" x 17 1/2".

She's wearing a hand made blue painters tape bikini top.

I bought this roughout the same time I got the book "Carving Classic Female Figures" by Ian Norbury and started working on it over a year ago. The roughout had a square base and I just made it round but that was the only carving done on the bottom half,the rest of the bottom half was just sanded to get the router marks out and to make it smooth.

Top half was carved and painted with Jo Sonja's water base acrylics and coated with Deft clear Satin.

On to 3 of 6

Bill
^v^

[Ron T]

Re: Water Girl Roughout

William, that's a great carving. You've done a splendid job on it.

[Iowa Carver]

Re: Water Girl Roughout

Beautiful William. An excellent carving... finish almost looks like porcelain.

Corey

[Joy]

Re: Water Girl Roughout

You have a beautiful sculpture. The muscles of the stomach are incredible. For my curiosity....why didn't you carve a bikini top on the lady?

[William]

Re: Water Girl Roughout

Thank you Ron, Corey and Joy. This was my first nude, I'm also working on the Greek Slave by Hiram Powers but I think Bust with clothing will be my favorite carvings.


Joy,
Corey hit the main objective of this carving with his porcelain comment, I also did it with Diana and the Greek Slave. I really like the modern painted marble's and most of them paint only the clothing but not the flesh and hair and I was trying to get the same look with wood.

Now in hindsight I wish I had put some sort of top on her but at the time I was following Ian Norburys book and Norma Nicks carving on Moor's roughout website. This carving is for my sister and she has 6 young grand kids so I'm sure some ribbing is in my future. The water Girl is featureless under the tape but this being a family forum I thought the tape would be appropriate.

Thanks All, Happy Holidays
Bill
^v^
ps; here is a painted marble

[sccarnes]

Re: Water Girl Roughout

if this was not posted on a woodcarving site, you could have fooled me,
outstanding,
sam

[fpace]

Re: Water Girl Roughout

Beautiful sir.. beautiful!

[Irishman]

Re: Water Girl Roughout

That's a very nice carving Bill. I plan to soon start doing forms as I'm still trying to improve on my faces. You did a very good job of this carving. Thanks for letting us have a look.
Patrick

[CarverFromNoWhere]

Re: Water Girl Roughout

Nice work Thumbs Up.
Carl

[ragiarn]

Re: Water Girl Roughout

Beautiful work!!!!!!.

Where did you get the rough out and how did you achieve that marble look?

[William]

Re: Water Girl Roughout

Thanks Guys,

Doc, I got the roughout from Moore Roughouts Moore Designs - Over 500 quality rough-outs plus accessories for the woodcarver.

After sanding the Gesso primer very smooth I used pearl white and sprayed it with my airbrush then buffed it with a scotch pad to flatten it, the white looked very much like marble before the second coat of deft satin was applied. The water jug was painted with a brush and the bottom half was left natural basswood color.

Bill
^v^

[Gulf Coast Handyman]

Re: Water Girl Roughout

Excellent job Bill, really nice detail.

Dave

[cannuckcarver]

Re: Water Girl Roughout

Now this is special, I would even go as far as AWESOME.
Thanks for sharring.

[William]

Re: Water Girl Roughout

Thanks to all for the kind words and encouragement, my Mom (84) always tells me that I'm my own worst critic and most of the time I only see the flaws.

The flesh is actually more white than the picture shows because I still had the warming filter on my camera from a family get-together when I took that picture.

Bill
^v^