Perhaps you are into carving

Here is an excellent site for carvers, experienced to novice...Great Ideas and some free patterns to get you started..

Here is an example for beginners on the style of writing and excellent information available..
Introductory Primer to Carving
By L. S. Irish

Of all the art forms available to craftsmen, wood carving may well be one of the oldest developed skill in man's history. Carved designs and accents have appeared in furniture design, the building components of our homes and places of worship, the household items that we use everyday, and of course as simply beautiful decorative sculptures.

For a beginning carftperson, wood carving offers several advantages as a new hobby. First, the initial investment to learn craving is very minimal. With just a few Tools that create unique strokes and a small Selection of Woods, the new woodworker can well be on their way to completing their first project.

Second, this is a hobby that does not require a special place or area in which to work. Many of the carving designs that are presented within these pages have been created during the evening hours in the family room.

A third advantage to wood carving is that it is a quiet and comforting craft. If you are starting your new hobby using basic hand tools, there is no overpowering noise from power tools and saws. The wood that you work with has a warm and gentle feel to your hands as you create your design. Many woods even have a light pleasant aroma as you work with the carving blank.

Yet, the most important feature of this art form is that you will never run out of ideas as to what to carve next. Wood carving is done in every style of design, from the simple repeative patterns of chip carving to the extremely intrigue dimensional detail of a duck decoy sculpture. There is no limit as to what to do with you carving once it is complete. From furniture accents to picture frames, jewelry boxes to blanket chests, even key chain ornaments to large room dividers, there is always a place and a use for your new work. And you will never run out of people who want one of your pieces of art. Friends and family will be delighted to be the recipient of your next carving piece.

This is a small primer that might help you get start exploring the delights of wood carving. There are two main divisions in carving projects, first is three dimension work or carving in the round. Second is the flat work that is done as accent panels, box sides, or even pictures to be hung on your wall. Work that is done in the flat is called Relief Carving. Here the design is carved down into the wood blank giving an impression of three dimensional work. These primer pages are devoted to relief style carving.

With relief carving the pattern or design that you wish to carve is traced onto the wood blank. Transferring the Pattern is done with either carbon paper or by blackening the back of the pattern page with pencil lead. The pattern is taped into position of the board and a pencil or ink pen is used to trace over the lines. For multiple pattern use you can create a Pounce Pattern which allows easy repetition of the design.

Once the design is in place, you, of course, begin to remove the excess wood to create the layers of work. The Stop Cut is a basic stroke in relief carving. This cut outlines the edges of one area where it intersects another and prevents splintering of the wood.

Relief carving can be either Low Relief where the carved intersection is visible to the eye and the dimension has a shallow look or it can be High Relief where the design is cut in the round in place on the background of the board. The Background of either of these techniques is removed to create a raised design look.

Where Low and High Relief style carvings used the original surface of the wood to become the design level, there are several techniques that use the carved line to establish the pattern. Incised Carving is the simplest form of wood carving. Here the pattern is traced upon the wood blank and with even careful strokes just the outline of the pattern is carved into the wood. The incised style of carving shows it's greatest possibilities in the Wood Cut Block. This wonderful carving work allowed for the first time, during the Renaissance, artwork to be printed onto paper. The artist could now create one very detailed work yet be able to make multiple copies.


Intaglio Carving takes this idea one step further by carving the design work down into the wood blank making a negative of the pattern. The design is carved in full dimensional detail but it is carved deep into the wood, as compared to low relief where the pattern looks as if it is above the wood surface. Intaglio has been a favorite of furniture makers over the years as it allow the furniture element to be completely prepared for insertion into the carcass and then can accept Carving Accents without disturbing any joinery work.

Of the three main negative techniques, Chip Carving is the most popular and has become an artform in itself. Through the use of a basic triangular unit, intrigue designs can be created the delight the eye. Our page border for this primer displays the most basic of chip carving pattern work.

In all art forms Mistakes Sometimes Happen. No matter how careful you are, no matter how much time you take on each carving stroke, sometime, somewhere, you will make a mistake. The knife will slip or the grain will pull your stroke off the pattern line or a high area will get broken. Just because a mistake has been made does not mean that the project needs to be scraped, there are several options for correcting miscuts in your carving.

We hope that as you explore the information throughout this primer that you to will become "hooked" on the wonderful hobby of wood carving. There are so many possibilities when you work with wood carving that this art will give you many years of pleasure and rewards.

After browsing through the Carving Primer stop by "Classic Carving Patterns" by L. S. Irish, our book featuring traditional carving designs for your next project. Then slip over to Online Design Packets for carving ideas that you can download today and be carving tonight.