User Profile

[Brian T]

Yes. The vast majority of skews have bevels on one side only.
A carver's stop chisel usually is double bevel....

[Brian T]

Maybe don't go so close to the line? I will never make a smooth curve, first pass.
Dig in and do the carving up to the stop then pare away the last of the wood for a clean surface.

Took me a while to guess at this to cut away the face at the very end.
No matter how rough it...

[Brian T]

Back in the day and time when it mattered, I usually snail-mailed things to myself and didn't open the envelopes.
When I see a print and I can hold the photographic negative for that print, it's really mine.

[Brian T]

Copyright claim jumping? Not in Canada.
From the moment of creation, I hold all copy rights over whatever I create.
Some of the financial penalties are nearly automatic with very little needed on my part....

[Brian T]

I like the possibility that I'm seeing a carving with a totally textured surface.
Make all the final chips exactly the same size.

Agreed, there are spells when "desire" is in very short supply. I've learned to live with it....

[Brian T]

That is one good-looking stock pile of carving wood.
Aspen should hold great detail when carved dry.
Telephone installer's 18" bit to drill the pith?

I got some 5" x 24" pieces of snow-white willow, fresh cut and sopping wet.
With a Skil-Saw, I cut a 2"...

[Brian T]

Welcome to the chip pile, Saltamontes. I'm just 2 hrs west of Jasper.
Can you find a Windsor Plywood store? They usually carry bass wood and 80+ other species.
I can't comment on the WP basswood quality as I'm using red and yellow cedar, mostly.

With steady work, most edges...

[Brian T]

How big are these curls going to be? V tools have to cut against the grain.
If they are not really carving sharp, you will get fuzzies or tear out.
That might be part of the puzzle.

After drawing the spiral of a snail shell ( the ruler is 6" long) I made a center line...

[Brian T]

Grown-up Bert from Sesame Street.
Good. I see nothing sharp under the hand.
How is it to lean on? Quite stiff?

[Brian T]

For the families of those who never came home.
Vets in the family and friends here in the village.

[Brian T]

A lot of the freehand sharpening process has little to do with applying the tool edge to the abrasive.
You could watch me and never figure it out. I'll bet the YouTubes are the same.
It looks simple but really some points to learn.

You make your body the jig.
Stand up....

[Brian T]

I rest my crooked knives on my right knee. Usually beginning with 800 wrapped around something,
I'll guess that I'm sharpening for about 15 degrees or so, maybe a little less, total included bevel.

In the kitchen, Porsche* recommended a total included bevel of 20 degrees, finished...

[Brian T]

I'd like to watch what you do. I've never worn out an edge from sharpening.
I would be annoyed, too, if sharpening took me anywhere near that long.
Freehand, if there's very little damage, maybe 5 minutes.

I never need more than maybe 6(?) strokes on the strop
to hone...

[Brian T]

The most damaging dust particles are sub - 2.5 micrometers (microns) in diameter. Dust that you can't see.
Dust that might be going right through your DIY dusty and back into the room air.
Any system with a genuine HEPA (High Efficiency Particle Absorbing) filter will take out everything...

[Brian T]

Plan 'B' would be to cut lines with a knife to act as dams for the paint.
Once set/dried, you use a skinny blunt stick to burnish the lines shut again.

I guess it depends on whether you want burnt black lines between paint colors.
Will a pyro line stop paint flow?
If...

[Brian T]

Hybrids don't get to pick and choose which parental characters they will display. Same as human kids.
"Grandpa's" DNA tagged him as a hybrid.

Agreed, the bridge of the nose and the forehead makes the different bear species look quite different from each other.

[Brian T]

Alaska? Isn't that "grandpa?"
If so , it's a polar bear/black bear hybrid.
If so, he stands 6'6" at the shoulders. I would come up to about his ear.
If so, he stands more than 13' tall when he stands up.

[Brian T]

Here's my set-up. I was in the process of cutting and shaping abalone shell pieces for eye pupil inlay.
I might have needed something like 1" diameters.
...

[Brian T]

Agreed: I get maybe 20-30 minutes in western red cedar and I can "feel" the edge going away.
Just takes more pressure for the same cuts. Even the adzes feel that way = they don't want to bite.
Like Dileon, a bit of honing and back at it. Of course it's free-hand as I need to...

[Brian T]

Either the renaisance in Italy or at least a week in Grinling Gibbon's carving studio.