Looking For People Who Started Rough But Found Their Craft Anyway

[lydian8]

Hi,

I really love leatherwork. I love the beauty of it. I love the feel of intricate carvings. I love the sense of connection to humans thousands of years ago using the same material to do similar things.

I am finding it difficult to carve. I am finding it difficult to trace onto the leather. I have found other avenues to work in leather. I make bracelets and basic stamped book covers. I'm proud of my ability to construct clean lines and even make patterns of my own. But I started this because I wanted to carve. I keep telling myself it's a matter of practice, but I'm to the place that I'm intimidated to pick up the tracing tool because I can't seem to make it go where I want it to go, let alone the swivel knife.

I look through the forums and see people say "This is my first project. What do you think?", and it looks like they have been tooling leather for a lifetime. It's beautiful and almost flawless, and I wonder if I'm not wasting my time wishing for a talent I just might not have.

Is there anyone out there that carving did not come easy? If you are out there, can you show me what it looked like before and what it is now, and can you tell me how you pressed on through to get good? I really need to be inspired at this point, or I need to be told the hard truth that maybe some people just can't carve. I hope that's not a truth, because I can draw and I can produce fantasic forms and templates on my PC. But in drawing I can clean up lines and computer based stuff can be made very precise. I can't take back a bad line in leather, and I think it's kind of defeating me.

Any help would be appreciated.

Lenore

Edited October 14, 2014 by lydian8

[Roq]

practice, practice, practice

You may not be able to take back a bad line, but you can modify the design and only you will know.

Post some pictures of your work, the experts here will tell you how to improve it.

[JLSleather]

I can't show you the "early" work. In fact, some of the very early attempts, i disposed of quickly so there would not be witnesses

Those of us who know how to carve leather - the honest ones - will tell you that we destroyed some perfectly good leather before figuring it out!

Try to relax and enjoy it. Leather is more expensive than, say, notebook paper. But it's not gold... $50 will get you a LOT of practice.

[MonicaJacobson]

Those people who post really good first carvings are few and far in between. Some people notice things more, some people just have an eye for making what they want line up with reality. I started carving bone, etc. before I started leatherworking, and I was pretty bad. Then I got a bit better after I started leatherworking because I started to see what would work best. It's not obvious, and tooling takes a lot of decision making. My husband, who is a designer and very good at making great looking drawings, doesn't instinctively know how to tool. In fact, when I asked for advice when I first started, I ended up liking my own decisions better than his advice. I'm still only so-so at tooling, but I think half of getting where you need to be is discovering the style that you're best at. You may not be best at Sheridan. Or maybe you need to try Sheridan. Or you may be trying to tool patterns that are too small. Who knows.

[Treed]

It has been a struggle and continues to be in some areas. The best thing is try to find leather workers in your area that you can work with and get help and advise from. The books an videos do a great job but working with some one is the real key. Practice and more practice, pick an area swivel knife cuts, beveling, etc. and keep practicing and perfect that area before moving on. Try to keep your self in one area and get good at it. I usually start new students on geometric s to learn control over the tools, hammer, layout, casing and other aspects of tooling before going into carving. We in leather work are usually our own worst critics. The key for me was the desire to learn it and still keeps me going today. I can tell you that I had no talent at all for the craft and had to learn every aspect, It has taken me much longer than others that I know started out at the same time but I just refused to give up.

[lydian8]

Thank you all. I need the boost.

When I was young, I had a skill that people marvled at, completely unrelated to leatherwork or any type of artisan work. It came as naturally as breathing, and earned me a lot of respect and accolades. It was all that there was of me. It was needed at the time, because my home life was a nightmare. I could cling to it as showing I had value in the world.

Now I'm old-ish. That skill is fading some with age, but more importantly, it no longer defines me. However, I am wired to create, and I can choose where I want to invest that creativity. I don't know tenacity that well, because I really haven't had to work for a skill this hard before. I want this. I want to carve leather. I just have to be reminded that all the work will pay off at some point. I need to know there are others who got to where they wanted to be even if they started with very little. If you can do it, I can too.

Thank you Roq, JLSleather, and Monica. And Treed, I think you are right. I need a mentor. The people in my area are very giving, and I need to take advantage of that. I put a lot of pressure on myself still, but I'll try to relax.

Lenore

[irishsuperfly]

As a fellow newbie to leather working, all I can really offer is some empathy. I love working with clay. Make a mistake? Just reform it! I am trying hard to stick to a small budget getting into leather and the thought of ruining even a piece of scrap is enough to make me hesitate starting on something. The only advice I could offer is to just throw that caution to the wind and jump in with both feet. I'm trying to accept that I'll waste some leather in the process, but I'll never get better if I don't try!

[billybopp]

Leatherworking is much like any other talent. Some people have such talent that they need little work to achieve greatness. Others achieve greatness, but with much more practice and work. Persistence is key. Most of us fall somewhere in that second group. Keep at it and you'll do well!!

Bill

[Wild Bill46]

I like most all these answers, as each has its own merits, However yes persistence is great, but,

I would think its a matter of individual need, of how to use the talents we each are given !

Art, is or has been a part of my life since I can remember.

I try to theorize, how it would be if, one with no talents would prevail ? or if they even could ? ------------------- Wild Bill46

[Bob Blea]

I certainly didn't start off carving well. I do have a bit of an artistic background (I used to paint in oils) and even did some painting of flower still lifes, so I was drawn to floral carving off the bat. The best advice I was given was to take a small floral craftaid design for a corner and carving it five times in a row, critiquing it each time and working on improving those parts I didn't like. Number each one and then go back and compare number 5 to number 1. You will be amazed how much improvement you will see. Also, make sure your not trying to do too complex of a carving. Start with some of the Tandy craftaids, particularly the older ones that don't have such fine linework and tight scrolls.

For me it really has been just a matter of practice, and occasionally making a duplicate of something because I didn't like how the first item turned out and knew I could do better.

[Northmount]

When tooling, I have found that a good beveler makes a huge difference in being able to smooth out the beveled lines and avoid the choppiness. My best beveler is one I bought from Tandy back in 1961. It has the proper shape to the toe and the bottom. Many of the craftool stuff produced over the past several years do not have the correct shape. So getting a few (how do you stop at a few?) good tools can make a world of difference.

A good sharp swivel knife is requisite to making smooth cuts. The knife needs to fit your hand and be comfortable. A simple rolled "U" for your finger is not comfortable. The edges need to be rounded and the "U" shaped to fit around your finger. And you need to learn how to sharpen and strop the knife to keep it cutting smoothly and neatly.

The proper method of casing makes lots of difference to both the swivel knife cuts and and to stamp impressions. I learned by myself for the most part. The first efforts at tooling were pretty bad, mostly because the leather was too wet. Once I got past that, things began to improve substantially.

And as mentioned before, practice, practice, practice. Buy a bag of scrap vegtan leather and use it up, then go get a couple more bags and make some small useful projects. If you wreck something, it won't be a big loss; you can toss it, or keep it for reference for a while so you can look back and see what didn't work, and the improvements in the next projects.

Good luck with your endeavors.

Tom

[sharkeyfinn]

hi ;-) a few things i would recommend, decent leather, if you havent tried them,try theidentitystore.com i never have any trouble carving on their leather, i always had trouble with the standard swivel knife blade so i tried one of the angled ones which made a huge difference to my control of the blade,especially with tight bends and curves etc. and dont try anything too complex to start, keep them simple, this was the first carve i did that i new i had the hang of it

and this is what i juat finished this evening

and lastly yes.it is all to do with practice,one other thing, try using a pen instead of a stylus, you can see where your tracing amd what you might have missed before you remove the paper to look, most of all keep at it,you couldnt find a better way to waste time lolol ;-) good luck

[lydian8]

Thanks to everyone. I needed this and will hold on to it when I feel frustrated or hopeless. This is a pretty awesome bunch of people on this forum. Actually, I feel like leatherworkers in general are pretty awesome people.

Wild Bill 46, I wasn't sure if you meant leather or just talent in general, but talent comes in a lot of flavors. My husband is amazed by what I can do with my hands. He is not about artistic creation at all, not visually, musically, theatrically. He appreciates it, but has no interest in it. However, he writes computer code for a living. I know just enough to see the elegance in his coding. He works to write the most stable programming with the least amount of unnecessary commands. There is an art to it. In the house, he tinkers with automation, like having the TV in the 3rd floor bedroom pop up a message when the washer is done in the basement since it can't be heard. He is talented to me.

I think the people who have no way to channel the fire in them are the most unfortunate. They might not even know they have a spark inside. I'm not sure how people like that get up in the morning. But in a forum like this, where people have a passion and share with each other, those people don't make sense.

Not completely sure if that was what you were thinking about, but that's my 2 cents.

Thank you for all the encouragement. I may be getting older, but there are still parts that are green, like sticking to it when it doesn't just fall into place easy. You all have helped me today.

Lenore

[Wild Bill46]

Lenore, --------------------------

Im sorry if I hurt your feelings in any way, Was not intended at all !

Was not trying to take anything from your work, And yes, was trying to say Leather tallents,

I think you have a talent for wording as well, because your wording is eloquent and what I was trying to say !

Sorry ----------------------------------------- Wild Bill46

[lydian8]

Wild Bill46,

I didn't take offense, I was trying to figure out where you were going and added my philosophical thoughts. Now as far as leatherwork talents, you are actually right in my opinion. None of us are children, and if I picked up my swivel knife every day for the next year and posted my work every day without incredible change, I think it might be safe to say, carving is not for me and it may be time to put that energy to better use. None of us is great at everything. I just needed a push to say, keep going, try again. I'll never know if I don't put in the effort.

Lenore