Wood Elf Day 15, Hair, Spear, and makeup...

I was all over the place tonight, but I focused on the undercutting the arms and setting them apart from the rest of the torso. Then I worked a bit on the spear. Nothing too special, just defining the rope a little. I still have to work on the spears ultimate shape as it looks rather crooked and thick in places. Then there is the hair. I'm actually pretty happy with the way the hair is shaping up. I am using my only long bend veiner for the job and it is working out pretty well. I still have the top of her head and then there is the face. The more I work on her the more I find needs to be addressed. Here is a full body shot to give a little idea of how it is coming along. Front and back...Enjoy the pics.

Wood Elf Day 14, Not quite done yet...

It has been two weeks since I started and we have gone from this to this...Tonight I know I said I was planning on being done, but there is still a lot left to do. I finished the chest tonight and moved to the right hand and the right wrist guard. I used a smaller veiner on the chest leaves to set them apart slightly. Aside from some serious sanding, I'm pretty much done with the torso. After working on the arm. I set upon the challenge of carving the side behind the right arm and cloak. Once again the short bend chisel is awesome! I didn't get too far tonight, but I should make some serious progress tomorrow. Enjoy!

Wood Elf day 13. Chest and arm.

All this detail and stuff is fun to carve, but probably boring to read about and look at. After hours or working on her tonight, I still have little progress to show for it. It's like I creep about three square feet of carving per day. Well anyway, I worked on her hand, wrist guard then her chest plate. I really like the way the hand turned out and the wrist guard looks more like a wrist guard and not a deformed forearm. I still have to do the other side and that will be tough with that harder wood. The chest is coming along and I have a long way to go yet to make it all look even. My neighbor says I should easily be competitive in the Woodcraft Carving Contest. There are lots of really great carvings on there and you never know what the judges are looking for. But all this detail and time I'm hoping will pay off in the end. Enjoy!

Wood Elf Carving Day 12. My new favorite chisel!

So this is what takes so long in making a good carving great...Tonight I worked on putting more details in. It's actually quite fun! Though rather time consuming cleaning up those edges and undercutting all those leaves. My new favorite chisel is this Phiel Short bend that I purchased well before Christmas. It was discounted on clearance! It is my new favorite chisel because it allows me to get super cramped places that my normal straight chisels can't. You may be able to see the difference in the cape as I went up and down the folds and set the creases even deeper than before. As I said before, It takes time and I went around the skirt up the cloak and down the right arm. There is still much more to do. Tomorrow we'll be going out of town, so that Friday deadline I set for myself previously is looking pretty optimistic. We'll keep ya posted.

Wood Elf Carving Day 11, Piliated makes an appearance!

Remember when I said I wanted to be done by Friday? Well... You see the Woodcraft Carving contest deadline is February 28th. So I still have time to submit this carving in before the dead line for a second chance to win those Chisels! I'm so thrilled with the ones I bought at the moment, that I would like to replace all the old ones I currently have. Regardless, these are the chisels I have used up to this point! They have really been great for roughing out that log into what I currently have. ( with a little help from the chainsaw, of coarse!) I was planning on spending the remainder of the week sanding those tough to reach areas with some sandpaper flex strips that I made, But I decided to put forth a little more effort to see just how totally awesome I can make this full size carving. So I worked on the hair and oak leaf shoulder pads. I can see I have a ways to go since I want to do the oak leaf skirt and perhaps the chest area as well. I also worked a bit on the ears tonight as well. I came close to carving them off and making her human....but after a while the ears grew on me and I DON"T want anyone mistaking her for a Indian. ( native American for the PC crowd) Everyone carves those I want to be unique! Also...a little aside: Today we had our Piliated Woodpecker come visit our suet cake. I just left a comment on David Brock's Blog that we have one in our area but I have not seen him lately. Well this finally explains why we have went through three suet cakes over the last week and a half! ( usually one cake lasts several weeks!) They are a really great looking bird, and this guy can be friendly at times Once while out with the cat, he came to check us out so close that I could have touched him had I had a stick in my hand ( yes THAT close!) He really tears up the trees as well around here and greets me when I carve on the dead trees in the back woods.

Carving, Sanding and some origami

There was not much left to carve at this point so tonight I dove into sanding. after three hours and a huge mess ( outside this time) I still have not sanded every crack and crevice of her. By the way, an angle grinder is very helpful in speeding up the process. But you still have to go over things with lighter grits and finer points. I was very happy with the way the lower half turned out. her pants look baggy with wrinkles and folds. Her boots have a lovely fold around the ankle. Also, the cloak on her back is really looking good. At this point, I will continue to sand the finer points with smaller tools. Then I'll whip out the veiners and smaller chisels to clean up those little leaf lobes. Cheryl says her hair makes her look like she is wearing a bicycle helmet. so there will be more to do with that as well. And before I go.... An origami Tree Frog. It turned out pretty good. even though I ultimately had to use a little glue to keep it in shape. Those Arbies Wrappers just don't like keeping their form after they are folded without a little help. Enjoy!

Wood Elf day 9

My goal is to be done with her by the end of the week! Hopefully by Friday! Tonight I worked on the spear and her boots. I still can't bring myself to take too much off the spear yet because I'm afraid that it would become fragile and break if I continue moving her around. So mostly I cleaned up some of the areas that needed it and worked on the boots. It took a long time and I still have to make sure they look good 360 degrees. But for the most part I'm pretty happy the way there are looking. Oh! and by the way..from time to time i stumble upon some knots just randomly in the middle of the wood. At first I thought there would be hardly any knots because the log looked pretty flawless on the outside. However. I counted the rings and the log is approx 80 years old! I guess those must have been engulfed over the years. Either way they mess up my chisels. Hope to have more done tomorrow!