First Tooling - Dragonfly

[Penden]

My first try for carving and beveling

[DJole]

It's always scary to post your work and have others look at it. But take heart -- we understand you are just learning, and we want you to feel the joy and accomplishment of getting a piece to look right.
You've got the ideas of various tools; now it's just a matter of practice with the basics!

Here are some things that I see, based from my own learning experience:

1) You seem to have cased the leather correctly -- you have pretty crisp imprints, without excessive mushiness, and that helps. I see your granite slab there, and that makes a big difference in tooling.
2) The beveler tilt is not uniform -- it's not a stamp, so you shouldn't see the whole "footprint" of the tool. It needs to be consistently leaned into the cut a bit off the 90 degree vertical so that the "uphill side" (away from the cut line) fades to nothing. You can see where sometimes you did that, and sometimes not. 
3) The beveler needs to be "walked" along the line so that it becomes one continuous line, rather than discrete imprints. Use a series of lighter taps with the mallet and a continuous motion along the line. It's a "tappity-tappity-tappity" motion,  rather than a "*smack* -- move the tool--*smack*" action. It takes time to get your hands to do this, and properly cased leather makes this possible.  I have found that It may also be necessary to go over the same bevelled line multiple times to smooth out the tool marks. It's a pain, but it's worth it!
4) Using a lighter touch on the beveller will also help you follow curved lines. You can see this in the wing edges, where the delicate curves look like a series of straight lines. Part of that may be the cutting of the lines, which leads to...
5) Swivel knife practice -- the knife must be sharp and stropped, and the leather properly cased and ready to carve. Then, you need to practice cutting curved lines. Spend some time learning the feel for the tool so you are relaxed when cutting. It should be like drawing, rather than actually trying to "cut" the leather with force. I can tell you are still tense and unsure of the lines, so they end up straighter instead of sweeping curves. We all go through this at the start!
6) It seems you are cutting deeply enough, but I am not sure--  people who have more expertise can correct me if I am wrong. 
7) That's an ingenious use of the textured pear shader for the eyes! I think that the effect would have been better if the tool had not been turned for the 2nd eye (so the pear shape orientation matches on both eyes). And to suggest the convex bulge of an actual eye (rather than the concave tool-print), maybe bevelling around them would work? It may be possible to do modelling from the back to push the eyes out, but that may be more than you want to do. It's also possible that there is one tool, a concave shader or flower center, that would do this,  but I don't know if it's worth the time and money trying to find the ONE tool just to make dragonfly eyes!
8) I see you did some bevelling on some of the lines on the front legs and the face area, but not doing all the lines makes the design look incomplete. If you didn't do them because you realized your beveller was too big, then you know that a smaller beveller might be something you need to have! (That's what happened to me.)
9) Doing all six legs is a scary proposition, because in real life they are very thin! I am guessing this is why you only did the front two. It's possible to make a thinner line than the ones you used here, bevelled on both sides. It takes some practice, though, especially if the lines aren't straight! Or what might be possible is to not tool them (so they stand above the leather) , but sort of "draw" them in with the stylus end of a modelling spoon tool.
10) Using the camouflage tool on the body was a good idea. But up towards the head some of those lines got tilted and crushed together, like you were rushing it. 
11) Dragonfly wings would be tough to do in leather, since they are delicate and lacey! I think I can see why you went minimalistic here, because doing those wings with all those lines would be a LOT of fiddly, complex swivel knife work. (I Googled dragonfly images, just to see what it might entail .) But it does leave the design looking half finished. Maybe using a checked backgrounder tool might work to suggest the texture of the wing.

There are my 11 cents worth of comments. A dragonfly is a nice subject, and not a simple one to tackle -- I certainly didn't try doing realistic insects back when I first started, so good on you!



 
 

[Penden]

 

Thank you!

How do you keep something this small still while you work? I had a rubber mallet resting on it and it still moved and was trouble to work around.

I might do some celtic knot work next so I can follow a pattern and I think that might help. I agree that the legs stand out too much. The image I went off of only showed the two because the others are behind the wings. It looked OK in the drawing but really stands out here.

I made it into this bag:

[DominickTuroski]

I bought the springfeild leather Dead Weight a while back and have been using it for all my tooling projects. It works really nicely. Just lay it across a part where you arent tooling (make sure it touches the leather AND granite to anchor for a small piece) and that will stay pretty dang still. 

http://springfieldleather.com/SLC-Original-Dead-Weight

 

You could probably make one yourself, but honestly I think its worth it to just buy. Also be careful, if you get dye on your granite that can get onto the weight and then onto the topside of your projects. If you have a separate spot for dying thats not a problem then. I just get a bit lazy...

Best of luck!

[YinTx]

1 hour ago, Penden said:

How do you keep something this small still while you work? I had a rubber mallet resting on it and it still moved and was trouble to work around.

 

Sometimes, you have to tool it on a larger piece of leather and cut it out of that when you are finished.  This gives you a place to set the weight without getting in the way of your work.

Also, not sure, but possible you have placed the beveler 90 degrees off when using it, resulting in the "chatter" marks.  Thickest part of the stamp should be facing your carved line, thinnest part pointing away.

Pretty impressive taking on such a detailed object as a first piece,  I rather like it!

YinTx

[Penden]

 

Thanks, every one!

Cutting it out afterwards is a great idea. I may have to try that! The dead weight looks ingenious, too, so I don't have to worry about scuffing up the leather with the weight. I had the beveler correct/not backwards I believe. I had just watched a video showing how to hold it and the tapping you guys described. I'm just new at it and hand trouble getting it to skip...and carving the lines how I wanted them.

For dyeing I saved and cut up card board boxes, and put those on top of painters plastic... The dyes can even dye concrete. Ask me how I know! It is really nice not to have to worry about any spilled dye.