Mountain Lion, a work in progress

[ClayB]

Hi Doc,

You're right, this isn't a normal carving project so throw all the casing rules out the window. Before I do the first part of an embossing project, I'll quick case the leather. I usually wet it first from the back, then a little more on the front. Then I'll trace, cut and bevel the outline and do some rough beveling of the muscles etc. You will know if the moisture is right if when you bevel, you get a dark line on the back side of the leather. Then you need to wet the leather that will be stretched some more. Usually I will add this moisture on the backside again, either with a spray bottle or a sponge but only inside that bevel line. You want it fairly damp to do the stretching, but you dont want it so wet that it comes through to the front side (if some does it's ok, but you dont want it soaking wet). Once the stretching is done you apply rubber cement to the back and fill in the putty. Then I hang the picture up to let the putty dry. I usually let it dry overnight so the putty sets up and the leather is going to be completely dry again. When you get ready to start working on it again, I will just spray water on the front again to get it ready. At this point I usually rubber cement the leather to a piece of cardboard. The leather needs to be damp enough to get it to flatten out against the cardboard. The next step is to shape the leather with bevelers and pear shaders so it needs to have about as much moisture in it as for regular carving. When I cut in the hair, the leather is again pretty much dry. Now that I'm back to shaping the grass blades, I'll dampen those areas a little. So for a project like this, the leather gets wet and dried several times and it doesn't seem to hurt anything. Hope that helps.

It got really nice here in ND again so I'm back to work and not sure when I'll get back to this, but I'll post a picture when I get it finished. Thanks everyone for your comments.

[TomSwede]

Glad you both like it. It's been fun to work on so far.

Remember when you said you were wondering how one of my pictures would look with some airbrush work, Kate? I could send this one your way when the carving is done and you could find out

Yeah, I do remember that. Okay, I'll take you up on it... looks like it would be fun!

Kate

DO IT!!!!

I just love seeing your work in progress Clay. Looks just like you are molding clay and not leather ;-)

Can't wait to see it finished with Kates touch to it.

Tom

[techniques]

Clay,

your mountain lion is stunning. Can’t wait to see it finished.

Gisela