Realism Questions

[Seth]

Hey Y'all! I am looking for some experienced carver wisdom.

I am able to make basic in the round small carvings - 5" - 10" in length. They don't look great but I imagine they are OK for a novice. The faces on my figures are very abstract - one could say they are poor caricatures or heavily influenced by African art or we could be generous and say they are dada like.

However I aspire towards making far more realistic carvings that actually look like people and not just like modern art symbols for people. And ideally not cartoonish people - but carvings that look like real people.

I imagine that the smaller scale of the carving the harder this becomes. If one is doing a 12" face there is lots of room to try to get the eyes and all the facial details right. whereas a full figure at 12" requires one to be far more exacting and 'correct' to make a carving that looks correct.

Here are my questions:

Am I right in thinking that smaller realistic figure carvings are more demanding? What scale should I realistically aim for at this point?

Is it possible to do a realistic figure carving while holding the wood exclusively in one's hands? Or should this only be attempted with a carving stand and mallot?

Is it possible to create a realistic carving without a clay model, or is a clay model a really crucial step?

Any general advice on making the transition from sloppy carving to realistic carving?

Thanks in advance for any advice!

Seth

[scooter]

Originally Posted by Seth

Hey Y'all! I am looking for some experienced carver wisdom.

...

Here are my questions:

Am I right in thinking that smaller realistic figure carvings are more demanding? What scale should I realistically aim for at this point?

Is it possible to do a realistic figure carving while holding the wood exclusively in one's hands? Or should this only be attempted with a carving stand and mallot?

Is it possible to create a realistic carving without a clay model, or is a clay model a really crucial step?

Any general advice on making the transition from sloppy carving to realistic carving?

Thanks in advance for any advice!

Seth

In my experience, it's harder to create a realistic figure, as the piece gets smaller. Much less room for error.

Holding vs clamping is a personal preference, depending on size of material, tools being used, etc. If you're doing something realistic, it helps to stop often and look at the piece from a few steps away to check your progress, and in differing light. If the piece is clamped this may get cumbersome. If hand-held, you can easily place/move it to most anywhere to view it from a different perspective.

I wouldn't say having a maquette is crucial (I've never used one), but I suppose it couldn't hurt.

There's LOTS of general information that everyone on this board can impart. One thing I can point out would be to try to visualize how muscules stretch and contract across the skeletal structure when acted upon. And focus less on what you can actually see. Look under the skin.

These are just a couple of thoughts I had. Again, there'll be a lot of information that you'll be the recipient of. My $0.02.

S~

[Steve Reed]

Seth, I agree with Scooter, as you get smaller, the details become smaller as a necessity. With that said, many carvers when working on small pieces will limit or eliminate "details" as they become to small to see. In these cases, general shapes can "suggest" detail. It may sound strange but many times absence of "detail" can be better. I think of it like "negative space" in a drawing or other art work. One can use the negative space to make the positive space more revealing. Hope this makes sense.

[Hooked on Carving]

If the figure is small or large it is important to get proportions accurate. You don't want to get a bobble head or a pea head figure. There is a lot of stuff already on the forum with this info. The best model for a part of the body is your own. When I carve I constantly stop and check on an arm or a leg in a certain position. My wife thinks I'm nuts, and says "its just a caricature" but I think the more accurate you can detail it, the better the carving. Look at all the great work on the forum and you'll see what I'm talking about!

[cgm]

Hi Seth, Those r xcelent questions! I'm not smart enough to answer most of them. I wood say u will have to study real life sujects till u r able to really know what they look like. Then u will have a better chance to get the carving right.
Carl

[Seth]

Thanks for the great responses.

I am really asking for responses from a pure woodworking perspective as I already know the human form pretty well. I can draw a person fairly well from years of drawing, but am having a hard time bringing that same body knowledge into wood. I suspect it's because I am trying on too small of a piece of wood that would require better carving skills...

[Curly Early]

Seth, I like to carve realistic myself and I can't really say smaller is so much harder than large, unless we'd be talking about some of the miniture carvings shown on here from time to time. I have never made a clay model, some of the really great carvers do tho and their work speaks for itself. I usually draw the features on my peice of wood, eyes, nose, mouth, bottom of chin before I ever put the knife to it. A head has dimensions that will be close from head to head, such as, you've heard 5 eyes wide, making this easy, lets say an eye is one inch wide, there will be one inch between the eyes, and one inch on the outside of the eyes. The eyes will be very close to centered top to bottom of face, bottom of nose is half way from eyes to bottom of chin, edges of mouth line up under center of eye. There are several more but you can do a google search on drawing proportions of a head and really learn from that, so to make a realistic face, stay within the guidelines and you'll be amazed. I really enjoy watching the carving come to life as you are making the cuts. I will put a couple of pictures on to show small and larger carvings. Earl

[LMiller]

I tried to do it all at once and quickly became frustrated with my lack of progress. Then I heard a story about a greater carver giving a good carver some advice to "carve a hundred of 'em" in pieces -- carve a stick with lots of sets of eyes, another with lots of noses, another with ears, etc. until you were happy with the components.

I believe that helped me.

The issue of scale is something that I was bothered with alot at first, too. Everyone kept asking me what scale I wanted to do. I didn't get it at first, but now understand that people were trying to get me to decide and move on. The paralysis of indecision has an easy cure - start carving and improve on your results with your next on one.

Good Luck and Carve Safely!

LMiller

[Steve Reed]

Seth there is a great quote that I read in Chip Chats long ago. . ."Would be cravers, would be carvers, if they would carve wood!" Bottom line, carve, if you're not happy with it, carve again. As said above, if the proportions are correct, it will turn out alright. One other piece of advice from a carver I admire. There is no such thing as a "generic" eye, nose, etc. Think about what you're trying to do. What kind of eye, what kind of nose. Hope all this helps.

[A Willburger]

I personally would not like to cave a realistic figure under 24" tall anymore. A 24" tall figure has a 3" high head and that is a good size to carve anything smaller is harder to carve in good detail. I would also recommend trying oil based clay to sculpt and practice a lot. It is easier to play around with clay till you get what you want then carve what you sculpted.