ClayB

Last summer we made a trip to Salt Lake City to visit my family. While there, my dad took me to the Tandy store and the Leather Factory store. One of my relatives came along and was really interested in all the leather stuff in the store. He was looking at some of the embossed belt blanks and said he really would like a new belt. I told him I could make him one (he was looking at the basket stamped ones at the time) He asked if I could put a design on it and I said I could. Then he asked if I could put fish on it. Well, I probably could, but I sure wasn't excited about it. First of all I don't like to make belts, so why didn't I just keep my mouth shut? Second, I don't like to carve small animals like they would have to be on a belt. Third, who wants to carve a fish???? Well, I said I could so I decided I had put it off long enough and decided to give it a try. He likes to fish in the ocean and I remembered Al Stohlman showing some fish in some of his early figure carving books that might work. My wife suggested trying to combine them with a belt pattern from Bob Beard that I really like, so that's where the pattern came from. I finished up the carving this evening, and I actually kind of like how it turned out. The next thing is the guy said he would like the belt black. Well, that just isn't going to happen. I don't know how I will finish it, but I wont dye it black. Here are some pictures of how it looks now.

Just wanted to remind you all that the drawing for this will be held December 16, so if you want to have a chance, you need to purchase your tickets soon. Drawing_December_16th.pdf Drawing_December_16th.pdf

That's so neat Freak. Your carving is WAY nicer than the tattoo. Are you sure he likes it cuz if he doesn't, there's a guy in ND that sure does

Regis, At this point there are no plans to judge the entries at all. You could request a critique on your entry if you like. Hopefully if we get a bunch of requests, we could get a few people to work on critiques.

Johanna, I am glad you continued the story. I hope that when you write the last chapter (in another 50 years or so) that the last line reads, "and they lived happily ever after". I passed on some thoughts awhile ago that with the growth of the forum, I was worried it would lose it's family feel. I think I was wrong. It's still a great place to hang out. Add me to the list of people that are really thankful for all you do to keep this thing going. Clay

Hi Mike, The guy that used to own the ranch west of us worked in a saddle shop many years ago. When I started making saddles, he asked me to bring a couple of them down for him to look at. While I was there, he went into a different room and brought out a box of old stamping tools. They were from the shop he had worked in probably 50 years ago. He had the tools at home working on something when the shop burned down. When he took them back to the boss, the boss told him to keep them, he didn't plan on re-opening the shop. Well, he said he hadn't used these tools in a really long time and didn't think he ever would again, so he told me to take them. There were a dozen old Hackbarth tools in the box along with a few dozen early Craftools, and a few hand made tools. I tried to pay him for the tools but he wouldn't take any money. I dont think he had any idea what the tools might be worth, maybe it wouldn't have mattered anyway. I gave him the picture as a gift as a thank you for the gift he gave me. I still got the best end of the deal, but he seemed really happy with the picture. The thistle story kind of neat. Weird, huh? Clay

Just for comparison, I put a couple of my pictures in a shop in a tourist town near here that sells books, music and art work. They marked my pictures up 30% for thier commision. What you figured is about 10% so that doesn't sound all that bad. I wonder how much you would sell on Ebay, but then, my pictures haven't sold either. I figure they have a better chance of being seen there than sitting on my basement floor though, and the guy is a friend.

Rayban, A finished project is fine. If you could though, could you try and get a close up of just one leaf from it too? I am really glad that so many of you are showing an interest in this already. I am getting excited to see what you all come up with.

Hey Mike, You did a great job on that! I love that picture, and learned a lot from the video. Did you email a picture of your completed one to Silva? I bet she'd be proud of you. Here's is my first attempt at that picture. I'd like to try it again someday too.

Regis, I would like pictures of all the entries without color so we can see the tooling. Another picture with color is optional. Jordan, All the doughnuts by the complaint box are sugar free, that's where I put the ones my dog licked the frosting off.

Thanks again Candy, There are some really great things in these sites too! I really like the first site with the flowers, they look almost real. Some pretty cool masks in some of them too. I'll need some time to look at all of the stuff in there. It's really fun to see what people around the world are doing with leather.

WOW!!! That is some amazing work. The figure carving is SOOO realistic. Thanks for sharing that site. I hope whoever it is joins up here.

Any size, any pattern, any tooling style. This one is pretty open. We just want your participation and to see what you come up with.

Announcing Leatherworker.net's first ever carving contest (sort of) The subject of this contest will be an oak leaf. You can use any pattern you like, your own, or anyone else's, and carve it anyway you desire. Coloring is optional, but if you choose to color it, we would like to have a picture of it uncolored as well. You can enter the contest as many times as you like, as long as each entry is a different pattern, or carved in a different way. For example, one carved traditionally, and another carved inverted. For each entry, your name will be thrown into a hat for prize drawings, but you can only win one time (sorry, but that's the way it goes) It's not going to be a competition where entries are judged against each other, but there will be prize drawings for the entrants. The reason it's going to be done this way is to encourage as many people as we can to participate, no matter your skill level. You don't have to feel intimidated in any way. By seeing how much participation we get in this contest, we can get a feel for how we should conduct future contests. Send pictures or scans of your entries to contest entries. Contest will close on December 21st, 2007. At that time, all the entries will be posted here on leatherworker.net for all to see. We hope you will all have fun with this. Drawing for prizes will be held on or before December 30, 2007. Prizes will be courtesy of Jim Linnell, Tandy Leather Factory. Number of prizes will be determined by how many entries are recieved. Any questions, comments or suggestions can be emailed to ClayB . If you have any complaints, take a number, have a seat, and help yourself to the doughnuts. Somebody might get back to you eventually.

When I was about 10, my grandfather gave me a belt he carved for my birthday. I thought it was really neat. Then a few year later in junior high school, I went to a brand new school. We were supposed to have a mechanical drawing class, but the drawing tables hadn't come in yet. They decided to buy some begineer leather kits from Tandy to keep us busy. I got hooked at that time and have been carving leather ever since.

Candyleather mentioned the lettering from an old printing press done on a Bible cover. Deb Starr wrote that article in the LCSJ and had a really long Bible verse on the cover. She went into detail on how to make a holder for the printers type in the article. It really did seem to work well and if I was ever going to consider doing a lot of lettering on something, I would look into getting some type. Back when the article apeared in the Journal, you could find a lot of old type on Ebay. Deb is a member here on the forum, but she is busy with life and other things these days and hasn't had time to do any leatherwork for a long time. If you have questions about how she used printers type, I could pass on her email address. I'll also see if she has a picture of the Bible cover she made using the type. I had it saved but lost it in one of my computer crashes.

The November issue of Paul Burnett's free online lessons are now available at http://paintingcow.com/free_lessons.html. If you haven't been checking these out, you are missing out on some great information on how to carve leather. This months lesson goes into detail about moisture content in leather for carving. It also tells the sequence for using tools to best use the moisture you have put into your leather. Along with that, he explains how tools like undercut bevelers, stops, cams, veiners etc. are supposed to work. Paul shows the proper way to use cams and veiners on scrolls which is a place I see a lot of people having trouble. Paul advertises his "for sale" lessons quite a bit in his newsletter. I have some of them, and have more of them on my Christmas list. His lessons are some of the best intruction I think you will find anywhere. I see that he is also going to be making some of his previous class lessons available for purchase. If you are serious about improving your leather carvings, you really owe it to yourself to check out these lessons, and the best part is, he is giving away a lot of it for FREE!!!! Next months free lesson will be on use of a modeling tool

That's great Dale! Make sure you keep us posted as to the dates here on the forum.

Dale, I think you did a great job on the foliage too, whatever tools you used on it. I have trouble figuring out how to use those tools. So is it possible this could be the pattern for an upcoming class somewhere??? I dont mean to hijack your thread here, but it really is a good lead up to something I have been working on. Last year we talked about doing some carving contests and there seemed to be some interest by the members, but somewhere along the way the idea just petered out. As a staff member here, I'd like to apologize for that. I have been working on getting some kind of contest going and was planning on announcing it this week. I have been waiting on something from Jim Linnell at TLF. Jim has generously agreed to supply prizes for the contest. What I had picked was a few sets of those new modeling tools because I had heard good things about them. I'll try and make the official announcement later this week at the appropriate place here on the forum. I think the yakity yak carving contest would be a lot of fun too. Lets keep that idea going. Now, back to our regualarly scheduled program. (Dale's mule deer)

Looks like the problem some of you were having finally found its way to ND. I had the same problem a couple times yesterday, but it has been working fine again today.

Hi Kate, That is a really neat demo. Now all you have to do is come up here to ND for a weekend and show me how you get all those neat effects with your airbrush. Thanks for taking the time to photograph what you did and share the pics with us all.

I use a Dimage Z6 from Konica Minolta. It's got a really good macro setting for close ups of leather work and a 12X optical zoom for when I am out looking at wildlife. It's supposed to have Anti Shake, but I am not convinced that works all that great because I can still take blurry pictures. I really like it for what I do. I am no professional photographer, but once in while I can get some pretty neat shots. Before this one I had a Fuji Fine Pix 3800. I really liked it too, until the lens fell off it. I think my kids might have had something to do with that.

I dont use antique a lot, but when I do, I finish it with Tan Kote. I put it on right after I wipe off the antique without even waiting for it to dry. That may be wrong, but I am impatient at that point. I wipe it on with a damp sponge. It might move the antique around a little, but I just wipe until it appears fairly smooth. It doesn't move the antique out of the impressions or cuts. I also dilute my antique quite a bit with Tan Kote before using it. Not sure how it would work for you but you could give it a try.

Hi John, I dont see anything choppy about your beveling. When I hear choppy, I think of being able to see marks everytime you move the tool. What I can see in your picture is what some people call a "halo" around your beveling. The halo is more of a border away from your beveling caused by the back of the tool. You can eliminate the halo around most of the pattern by backgrounding right up to the cut lines. On the smooth areas inside the skull and bones, you can eliminate the halo with a modeling tool. The modeling tool can be used sort of like an eraser. You want to blend the beveling into the background gradually. Another way to get away from the halo is with the use of figure carving matting tools. These can be smooth or checkered and are kind of like a beveler with a larger surface. By tilting the tool when you strike it, it doesn't leave the halo at the back end of the tool. Matting away from your figures makes them stand out more from the background. One other thing that you can do with the modeling tool is round your beveled lines. By running the modeling tool over the beveled line you can change the sharp edge to a round edge and that will cause your figure to have a round apearance instead of a flat one. Hope this gives you some ideas to try. You carving is really pretty good and with a little practice it will keep getting better. Clay

Hi Timbo and welcome to the forum. My first question and you might get this from a lot of us, Can I call you Daddy??? :biggrin: I can relate to the saying NO thing. I need to get to that point too. I keep putting off making a belt with fish on it that I agreed to do last summer. I think you will find a lot of really helpful people here. I'd offer you a doughnut, but somebody will probably warn you about them pretty quickly. Looking forward to hearing more from you. Clay