[Willie]

Hi need direction in carving human hair

[chuckt]

Well - first you gots to find some REALLY small gouges. ;-)

Can't offer any real help here, but I couldn't resist the joke. Seriously though, if you make your question a little more specific I think folks might be able to offer some guidance. What is it about carving hair that you are having trouble with? What types of carving - caricature or realistic? That sort of thing.

Hope this helps you get some responses. There are several really good hair & beard carvers in this forum so if you make your question more targeted and maybe post a pic of a project you are needing guidance on, you'll get the help and advice you need.


ChuckT

[Colin_Partridge]

Willle,
Depending on how large a carving you are doing will depend on the size gouges you will need. This is the way I do hair not saying it is the right way but I have had sucess with this method. Firstly remember that hair is not a straight line. What it is I refer to as a slow S curve. Firstly take a U gouge and make your series of slow S curves all over the area where you want the hair. Then once you have done that take a V gouge and follow the curve you made with the U gouge. Vary your depth and continue all over the surface. Now have I got you terribly confused if so let me know and maybe I could do a few pictures to show you what I mean. There are many on this forum that carve great hair so you will probably get better responses that this. Hope it has helped
Colin

[Donna_T]

Willie,
I do hair pretty much like Colin. First I carve in the dips and high spots that are characteristic of a head of hair. (Most heads of hair or beards aren't flat and even.) I do this with a fairly large veiner. Then I go back and start putting in the long flowing gouge lines that add further variety to the head of hair or beard. Some I make deeper and others more shallow. But these lines are always curved and flowing--never straight. Then I go back with a smaller veiner and start laying in the hair--staggering so that the lines don't all start and end at the same point.

The last thing I do is go back and use a v-tool to add more lines to the hair although I do this sparingly--I don't like the harsh look of hair totally done with v-tools. I've even gone back and added lines with a woodburner but I usually save this for fur. And when I do, I burn with a really light touch and not much heat.

Get a catalogue or magazine and look at hair to get ideas on curls, flow, flips and other "looks" -- as well as just looking at people around you.

Donna T

[Dan S]

Jeff Phares has a good book on carving the Ears and Hair. I have a copy and it really helped me. You can find used copies at a good price on Amazon.

Dan

[doris]

i think it is essential to think of the different masses in hair first. not of how to cut the single strands. try break up the hairdo you want to carve in a few big masses, then break each of these up into smaller ones, representing thicker strands of hair. look for getting good flow. now at this point you can already stop, it will look believable if you made the strands well. or, you can now o with a small u gouge, like already described and carve single hairs in.

[redbird46]

Willie, this tutorial may help you some?
Norb

http://carverscompanion.com/Ezine/Vo...s/BTravis.html

[Willie]

Hey thank you all so much I look forward to annoying you in the future

Willie

[Mitchell]

Look at the section below "Similar Threads"......there are some posts about carving hair in those links.

[Willie]

Thanks printed out that tutorial its the best I'm a huge Enlow fan anyway
willie