Wood carvings

[EdK]

Nice job on the table Greg! What kind of wood did you use?

Ed

[Micktoon]

Thanks for the comments lads ............... After another good few hours of Skullduggery today this is what 'Richard the 3rd ' looks like now to now

Greg then feet look really good, no problem adding to post , the more the merrier !, Mayhem, the wood is lime wood as you will see the skull must be smaller than you thought , saying that it might get more of a reaction if they thought a monkey had been harmed lol

This is the carving bench I have made so I can take it to the club, the front tool tray just slides off, the sliding seat lifts off and the front post with the vice on also lifts out so its able to fit in the car for transport, I just made the front swivel tilt set up the vice is attached to from what was lying about , its not ideal but does the job for now until version 2 gets made .



Just more of the same really , carve more out with the gouges , then sand smooth , then decide the next area to alter comparing to the drawings.



The same area as above after sanding smooth.



I have drawn the teeth on , I have just sized them up then done them by eye , so they will not be perfect but things like this are better a little bit random as in real life.



Starting to go around the teeth with fine gouges here , bearing in mind I have never carved teeth or been a dentist, its all just try it and see stuff going on here.



This is to give you some idea of size, it would be easier to do these teeth if the skull was bigger I think.



The indentations above the teeth in the jaw are the worst bit , the grain of the wood is running downwards and you can see where the wood has split off in places, I will get away with this much but I am having to be really carefull to stop anymore from splitting.



This is a top view , I think the teeth are sticking proud about the right amount, I will just have to keep refining the teeth until they are as good as I can get them , the worst bit are the indents in the bones where the roots of the teeth would go, I will have to do some trial and error here as the very small gouges are not doing the job.
So this is the stage its at now, I will take it to the club tomorrow night and see if there are any ideas about the jaw indents.







Hope none of you lads are having any skull nightmares mind :lol: :bugeye:
More to come soon :thumbup:
Cheers Mick

[DaveH]

Mike,
Really excellent carving
So Richard 3rd -I have a soft spot for him, but I would coming from Leicester.

DaveH

[f350ca]

Looking real good Mick. I've never tried carving anything that had to really look like something. All of my attempts have been used in furniture. Sawed several hundred feet of Bass wood (Lime wood) this summer, still have probably 1000 feet in the log form, may have to saw some carving blanks.
The table with the feet is Honduran Mahogany Ed, the one in the background with the barley twists is cherry.

[Micktoon]

Afternoon Everyone , I have got a bit more done to the skull , just really been going over and doing more detail on the teeth and reshaping/ sanding some areas, there has been hours and hours more time spent but maybe not easy to spot on photos ?........ I sure wish I was getting what a dentist would be getting paid for the time I have spent on them teeth !



This is the stage I am at now , the lines you can see on the skull have just been draw on with pencil this is where the fusion lines are on the skull, I am not sure if I will put these in or not yet as if they go wrong they will spoil the whole job.





I have started to reshape the back of the skull as it was not right , it still needs more work yet. I had intended the skull just to sit on the bottom of the jaw and the bottom of the rear of the skull but I might try to carve in a few neck bones and make a small base in a contrasting wood so it would sit up off the base supported by its own neck. If this did not work out I could revert to plan 'A' , cut the neck off and just have the skull.



There is still quite a bit to do yet , I wish it was a bit bigger as getting some of the detail is tricky with it being so small. Watch this space ........ and dont have nightmares !

Cheers Mick
Greg typical you are thousands of miles away , or I could take some of that lime off your hands and save you all the trouble of burning it ! I like those barley twists too .

[TomG]

All he needs now is a couple of LED's in the eye sockets.

Nice job Mick!

Tom

[Mayhem]

Funny you should mention that Tom - I have a ram's skull outside in which I did the very same thing. I hooked them up to the solar panel from a garden light and I must admit it does look quite good. I did think about drilling a hole in a ping pong ball and popping them in the eye socket but haven't gotten that far yet.

Mick - that is looking the part and you have done an exceptional job.

A couple of suggestions that may be of use: the fusion lines could be done with a scalpel and a steady hand but the lines need to have a little more zig-zag to them. You could also add a little more 'point' to the canine teeth. A rotary burr would be ideal for the fine shaping but probably not "carving" in the traditional/classic sense.

[doubleboost]

It is starting to look a bit to real for me
John

[Micktoon]

Evening all, I have got some more done to my skull wood carving , I have attempted to do a spine type neck then will make a base so the skull will be raised above the plinth by its own neck, if there is any spinal surgeons out there they will notice its not 100% true to a real spine but its as close as I can get it in wood :dremel: I have gone off drawings from the internet but could really have done with a 3D real object to copy from in front of me to be honest, anyway here is the progress so far.

The spacing for the vertebrae is marked on with pencil and start to carve off the first bits of waste wood.




Then its just a case of keep looking at the drawings and removing more wood a bit at a time , remembering that you can not put it back on ! and just slowly trying to get it into a spine type shape, the carving is tricky here as its so easy to break a bit off along the grain and getting into all the various angles is a nightmare.




Once all that can be done with carving tools is done , its time for the good old dremel and just grind away areas with various burrs and sanding drums etc, its still hard to get to all the places you want to get to and I could do with more varied shapes of burrs etc. Its starting to get the rough shape now.





I now use riffler files and sand paper wrapped around bits of wood etc to try and get into the hard to reach areas, refining the shape and smoothness, its starting to look more like bone than butchered wood anyway.





This is the stage I have got to now , its taken over a day to do the spine bit !!, I think operating on a real spine would have been easier to be honest lol. It now just needs overall refining and sanding smoother , the base made and to be sealed and waxed, I am hoping to get more done tomorrow............so watch this space .
Cheers Mick.

[krv3000]

brill work