[Scott Hagerty]

Recently there was interest in how I carve eyes. So, here it is.

Pic #1- Block in the nose.
Pic #2- Here I have taken a #9 gouge and scooped out the eye socket.
Pic #3- Here I have scooped out the other side. This is a preliminary placement for the eyes. I will have to remove more wood later.

[Scott Hagerty]

In this series I have started to work the rest of the carving. It helps to keep everything in perspective and balanced.

Pic #1- Here I have blocked in more of the features for the face, beard, mustache, and hat.
Pic #2- Here I have penciled in the inside and outside corners of the eye. I like to droop the eyes to the outside on carvings.
Pic #3- Take a detail knife and make a stop cut on all of the pencil marks.

[Scott Hagerty]

I might add, this is how I do eyes in small carvings.

Pic 1&2- Here I have taken a triangle cut out of the corner of each eye.
Pic 3- Just a different angle so you could see better.

[Scott Hagerty]

Moving on.

Pic 1- Here I have made a stop cut to place the crease at the top of the eye. Make sure to extend it out toward the temple to add wrinkles.

Pic 2- Pencil in the bottom of the bags.

Pic 3- Take a small veiner and remove the pencil line to create the mass of the eye and the bag at the bottom of the eye. You can exaggerate this quite a bit if you plan ahead.

[Scott Hagerty]

It's all about the mass.

Pic 1- I have penciled in the top of the eyelid. This can be played with quite a bit for different effects. Make a stop cut along the line and then remove wood in an upward cut to the stop cut. This creates the ledge of the upper lid and sets the mass for the rest of the eye. Keep the mound round!

Pic 2- Pencil in the line for the lower lid. Don't let it sag too much as you will end up with eyes too wide open. Make a stop cut along the line and then you are ready to start removing wood from the eyeball itself. Stab the point of your knife into the corners of the eye and remove a triangle cut. With a downward cut remove wood from the rest of the eye, upper lid to lower lid with a downward cut.

Pic 3- You can see what happens if you cut up toward the top lid. Disfigured eyeball.

[Scott Hagerty]

Home stretch.

Pic 1- Side view of the eye up to this point.

Pic 2- The other side.

Pic 3- At this point I'm pretty well calling this one done and ready for paint.

[Scott Hagerty]

Since I'm bored, let's go ahead and paint.

Pic 1- Wash him up with warm soapy water and a good bristle brush.

Pic 2- Just a close up. I love the way the water brings out the wood grain.

Pic 3- Painted the face.

[Scott Hagerty]

Pic 1-Base coated the beard with gray and painted the hat.

Pic 2- Paint a thin black line just under the upper lid. It doesn't have to be too neat at this time as the next step will thin the line and clean up the eye.

Pic 3- Paint the rest of the eye white. Cleaning up and thinning the black line.

I paint the eyes with full strength undiluted paint. Dry in between colors with a hairdryer.

[Scott Hagerty]

Homestretch!

Pic 1- On eyes this small I just paint the pupil black.

Pic 2- I tried to drybrush some black over the beard. Need to work more on that technique. This him befor dipping in BLO.

Pic 3- After dipping.

Pic 4- Just a closeup of Jaques Blaque Shellaque!

[Scott Hagerty]

After thoughts.

I purposefully didn't specify the size of the tools used. Everyone has different tools in the box and part of carving is using what you have and making it work.

Tools I find useful for these small guys are definately the dockyard micro gouges. I used tools from the smallest micro to my wood hawg 1" #3.

One last picture is a good side view of a human eye. This is what to strive for. (I'll probably be in trouble with my better half for posting this pic)

I hope you find this info useful. I find that when I have to slow down and think about what I'm doing I sometime learn too.