[mark yundt]

Yes Brian the clay is a ball to play with,,seems odd at first when you're used to trying to move wood. But you can learn shapes,,noses,,eyes,,fairly quickly and easily compared to wood. Resolve the problems here first.Try it out,,see how it looks,,study it for a couple of days,,change it till it looks like what you want to see in wood.Work on the flow of beards,,cloth,,whatever you want to study.
Yes ,,the question of why do you want to do it twice does come up. But then again why do painters do sketches before a painting..why do Architects make models of their buildings,,or car companies clay models of a car they plan?All the above make a model very close to what they'll end up with,,why not carvers,,sure a sketch is nice,,but it's not 3D as the final piece will be.Some things only require a sketch,,others ,a model will be handy.There is nothing wrong with just carving and seeing what comes out. But at a certain point you might get tired of struggling,,you want more out of your carvings,,and you don't want to get to the point in a carving and wonder "now what do I do?" With clay you already had it figured out.If nothing else ,,keep some clay on hand so when you do get stuck on a carving,,make a sample of where it is you are stuck,,and play with the clay to find an answer.
Make them as simple or detailed as you wish. The Eagle I recently did was very rudimentary. Basic shape to indicate the block I would need,,the details I did find in the wood,,and the major change I made to him was cutting off his head and turning it to get a better pose.
Very glad to see the fun you had with the clay Brian. The more you familiarize yourself with it the clearer your ideas will become,,and the easier it will be to find the form in the wood that you are looking for. With clay you generally add,,with wood you basically subtract,,that takes some getting used to,,but it adds another dimension to your ability to see forms in a solid block,,or just create them out of thin air.
You're strengthening your artistic muscles. Good job!

[brian bailey]

Thanks for the tips.

Kathy, that is a great idea! The only problem I would have is making the 2nd bookend simular to the first one! But, who said they had to be matched .

I've been going to try this clay for quite some time. Every time I read someone's post on this and other forums describing how they did a mock up in clay, I say to myself, I gotta get some of that stuff. But then it always gets put on the back burner.

Not anymore!

[Robert Cahill]

I have never tried it either. Thomas said he used modified chop sticks are there tools needed or is it all done by hand

[mark yundt]

I use clay from Chavant. I had posted their brochure a while back. They carry about 20 or so different consistencies and styles of clay,,all non hardening,VERY reasonable too.
Depending on how big the piece is,,and how hard the clay is,,I use a 12 inch frying pan on a single electric burner and use a wire cheese type slicer I made to get it really soft,,almost liquid.The cheap-o pan and burner was from Walmart,,all totaled maybe 15 bucks. I do this because if I'm making a model of a relief for example,,where the edges of the slices meet ( easier than pushing it all in place) the edges show in the modeling. This way I get a seamless "pour" if you will.No changes in consistency.This stuff is pretty firm,,and after a few hours trying to press it in place,,your fingers are really sore!.
Also ,,I have made quite a few of my own modeling tools. Sure you can buy them,,but they weren't quite fine enough for what I want to do. They are very simple to make,,and I think they work better than some of the bought ones.
On another post someone mentioned dental tools.Got a bunch of those too,,work great,,bought handfulls at a surplus store ,,5 for $3.00.

[Thomp]

robert there is sculpting tools probobally as many as wood carving tools,
you can buy or make yourself, i guess if you wanted you could use your carving tools, the oil wont hurt them. but for making some wrinkles eyelids nostral work, its nice you could use your thumbnail but how to duplicate the same in wood might still remain a mistory, so i use babmoo chopsticks shaped like some wood carving tools.