[Irish]

I'll go out on that shaky limb with you LightningBolt! This is what is currently what I am whittling on right now.

Cane toppers were the first carvings that I learned to do, taught to me by my father. Mike and I probably spent our first two years doing sticks for sale at a local arts and craft gallery in a nearby town. As I learned more about wood carving I eventually ended up as a relief carver and that's where I have been for many, many years.

It's been forever since I carved any toppers, that is until BobD invited me to join this great forum and then Bob posted his dragon cane. So I am working right now on re-learning the 3-D thinking.

This little guy is a 1 1/2" x 1 1/2" x 12" basswood blank, I have already drilled the mounting hole and rounded over most of the body of the block. The top third was left in the square so that I would have extra wood for the leaves and the corner of the block for his face. Besides for the idea that I wanted a Green Man cane this is being worked on the fly ... designing the cane as I carve.

Right now the face is set in a circle of leaves and hopefully the face will eventually be deeply cut with lots of air space around the leaves. As I was working last night I needed something for the crown - cap of the cane. So I have added a little tree frog that will set on the tops of the leaves. You can just see his basic outline at this time. We will see where he goes ....

Susan

Standard WIP Disclaimer: I make no guarentees that this will ever be finished. I can offer no assurrances that he will be a successful carving. I reserve the right to declair him "Firewood Kindling" at any stage of the work. But mostly, I reserve all rights, either explict or implied, to have a lot of fun doing him!

[squbrigg]

Susan..... "that" is a nice piece of work! You can see already the character emerging from the leaves, while you have a lot of carving yet to do, you have the basic image set and just have to detail it out. I love seeing what you're going to come up with next!!! Disclaimer notwithstanding, I look forward to the finished product! Great design.

Bob

[Carvity_Carve]

Ha ha, I like the disclaimer. Though hopefully it will turn out to have been of no actual need to use.

I don't think I've ever seen a greenman staff before. I'm liking it, and can't wait to see the finished result!

[squbrigg]

PS...........if you get the carving magazine from Britain, (Wood Carving, No. 84, May/June) the latest issue has a spectacular Green Man carved in Ash, with Oak leaves and Acorns, very traditional European Green Man.

Bob

[Kenny_S]

A Tree Frog Stick eh? Boy howdy, I need glasses!!

[Irish]

Sorry Kenny, you don't need glasses yet ... he still is in a very very rough stage. I got the frog a little more defined today, undercut the facial leaves and added some shape and veins to the leaves. Now I need to decide just what I want to do to the lower section.

Bob and Cravity ... like that disclaimer! With any WIP I make no promises as I am working where I haven't worked before or in this case in quite a while. (Big Grin)

Susan

[Lightningbolt]

This topper is really exciting and I especially love the use of leaves which I have just recently begun to use in my own carving projects in different ways... they add such an interesting new detail to the woodspirit for folks to ponder upon! And then, if that's not enough, you're taking it a step further and even adding Kermit the frog to be resting atop the piece! That just beats all and I love it!! I also like the way you carve the sagging eye bags which is something I'd like to work on incorporating into my own spirit faces. I've always just carved one-piece walking sticks and never carved a seperate topper which was then attached to the walking stick, but I suppose that it can't be any more complicated than attaching a handle to a cane and by gosh, I've done THAT!!! I like the idea of "toppers" and yet I have a new avenue to explore!

It's also good to see you working on these 3-D carvings again. 3-D carving always drives my brain crazy too and not the least bit "natural" for me, but I know that by forcing myself to deal with it makes me a better carver and artist with all of my work as a whole. I recall the feeling way back then, when I first completed my first decent face. Once this is mastered it's amazing how I began to see everyday "real" people in a new way and seeing detail like I'd never seen it before. Before, I'd only looked at peoples eyes, noses, and mouths, etc. but NOW after I've mastered carving a face I can now SEE them in a new, most delightful and fulfilling way.

Sort of a tangent but I also had the same sort of experience many years ago when I first became a pilot. After I had begun to fly and to soar in the sky looking down on the earth where I lived, I have since looked at the land in a completely new perspective that I'd never seen prior to flying. Seeing the detail of the land, the roads, and buildings from above and from inside a small plane that I controlled really opened my eyes and helped me to see the detail more clearly during the course of my daily life down below. Moving on, I do think that it's a good idea to explore all areas of carving in order to harness our full potential and consciously choosing to occasionally leave our own personal comfort zones is just another chip in the stone (wood) of becoming full-circle in our art and in our lives. Whew! That's almost too deep for me!!

Anyhow... it's sooooooo exciting to have another WIP in the works here in our little cyber carving club! This method of posting might be just the inspiration that I need to dig into all those boxes that I have of unfinished projects and attempt to turn them into the gems that they deserve to be! Looking forward to the progress!

[S-Shamrock]

wow that is an awsome staff!! thats just what I need for wandering around the woods. can't wait to see it finished. if your walking stick jar ever get's to full you can always pass some along this way.
-silas

[Irish]

LightningBolt, That WAS deep! I'll have to chew on that one for a while.

When I started carving canes and walking sticks we didn't have a good source of sticks from which to work. So if we did come across a great twisty stick I didn't want to ruin the stick with a bad or crude carving of the top. That's where the idea of using toppers came into play. It's the same principle as carving a separate handle for a cane then attaching it to the staft.

When we didn't have sticks on hand Mike would make the staffs from a variety of hardwoods. Sometimes he would laminate several different colors vertically in the staff and and other times he would cut circular spacers that would go between the topper and the staff ... loved that look ... he would have the carved topper then maybe a 1/4" walnut slice then perhaps a wider slice of mahogany, back to the walnut, all on top of an ashwood stick. Really nice!

Once everything was glued together with the all thread in the center he would dress the entire stick down so that every piece of wood flowed into each other.

Since I carved the toppers I always found it so much easier to carve a 12" long block then to have this long 3 - 4 foot stick hanging off the bottom. The blocks let me, I think, do a lot more detailed carving then I think I could do otherwise.

Susan

[Lightningbolt]

Susan; Thanks for the further explaination of toppers and the creative ways that you prepare the sticks and yet another something that I can see potential for great things. This would also be the perfect way to continue carving our walking sticks whenever taking the full size stick along wouldn't be so practical. The whole idea of toppers is so intriguing and I can't believe that I haven't yet caught on to it. Sometimes my mind tends to get stuck with just one way of doing something and I needed this nudging. Thanks!

Now, I've even begun to think about stocking up on some basswood blocks... and I just recently bad mouthed such a thing in another thread here on "being spoiled by basswood"!!