Rod's Green Man Part 9
Created | Updated Dec 22, 2013
One Man's Woodcraft: Carving.
The Green Man: Part 7
There hasn't been a lot of cutting since last time. A bit around His cheeks (with trepidation, and quickly paused for a rethink), some softening of some edges, plus a fair amount of sanding.
The sanding was to tidy things and prepare for some initial sketching of a leaf or two, to see what they look like. A ridged surface doesn't easily allow the pencil to go anywhere near where it's intended, not that my sketching, even on paper, does all that much, if any, better...
His face is grimy, and will stay that way while the rest catches up, until closer to being finished, with ridges removed then filed/sanded.
The five files shown on the photo are called Rifflers and are shaped in cross-section (flat, round, rounded, triangular, knife edge...) and curved/bent towards the ends to allow some degree of getting into awkward places for finishing. By looking on t'internet, I reckon my set of ten rifflers would have cost about the same as a single 'proper' one. It seems the best ones are hand-cut, primarily in France. There are shapes to drool over and they really do make a difference, it says here, and I believe it. Maybe one day, when my boat comes in...
He is still somewhat shallower-cut than my profile suggests but then, there are leaves to be overlaid, and their thicker stems, so it's just as well that he is shallow, in that sense.
A problem that may well appear soon is that, very early on, I cut His nose first, and undercut His nostrils (it seemed like a good idea at the time) quite deeply, leaving not a lot of room for modification.
Rod