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Mike Henderson
12-31-2008, 5:26 PM
A while back, I did a tutorial on a simple shell. Here's another shell for you to carve. It's similar to the simple shell but it adds curved flutes and tight lines at the bottom of the shell. If you've done a couple of the simple shells, you should be ready to tackle this one.
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I'm not going to start from basics here - you need to review the simple shell tutorial (http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?t=95974) to see how to prepare the carving blank and mount it.

Note that I use the Swiss system when describing carving tools in all of my tutorials.

I had prepared this blank long ago and just pulled it out for this tutorial. Note the red marker on the top. I usually do that when I want to remind myself that there's something unusual about this blank - maybe the wood has streaks in it, or I had glued up wood to make the block, or something. Problem is, I can't remember why I put that mark on the blank. It turned out that the blank was fine.
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For some reason, I didn't completely rough out this blank on the bandsaw. Maybe I was planning to do something else with it. But since we have sharp carving tools, the blank is fine.

To begin, I use a #2/19 and start to rough out the shape of the shell.
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Here's a view from the side to show you the profile of the rough shape.
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Once you have the blank roughed out, draw a vertical line that approximately divides the blank in two.
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Mike Henderson
12-31-2008, 5:36 PM
Next, use a pair of dividers and lay in five lines to the left and right of the center line. You have to think about the flutes which are outlined by these lines to get the width of dividers but by now, you should be able to do that easily.
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The next step is the first "complexity" - you need to draw curved lines to outline the flutes. You pretty much have to do this by hand - I don't know any "mechanical" way to do it. Draw some lines and see how they look to you. If you don't like what you did, use sandpaper and erase the lines and do it over. One difficulty is to get the two sides looking alike.

You don't need to take the lines all the way down.
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Using your V-tool, make a V-cut on the center line. You can start your line at the highest point of the shell - you don't have to take the cut all the way down the bottom/front yet.
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Now, do the same with the rest of the lines. Just take a light cut along each of your lines. Don't try to take the cuts down the front yet.
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Go back and deepen your V-cuts, especially at the ends of the flutes. Note that I haven't taken the cuts down the front yet.
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Mike Henderson
12-31-2008, 5:53 PM
Now comes the second "complexity" - take the V-cuts down the front. Start with the center cut. Then do the two cuts on either side. Cut lightly and try to space the two cuts close and equally on both sides of the center cut.

Then make the next two cuts moving outward on both sides. Continue this until you've done all the cuts. It's easy to "jump" a cut so be careful that you get each one in order.

When you make these cuts, start at the top and go down the bottom. Do not try to start at the bottom and go up - you won't be able to meet up with the existing cuts well.

If you mess up, just carve your cuts down and try again.

Make all the cuts end in a straight line - that is, take all of them down the exact same amount. The ends of all of the cuts should line up.
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Once you've completed those cuts, we'll lay in the hinges. Draw lines to outline the bottom of the lowest flutes on each side (see picture above). I think I used a #3/8 to clean cut in the hinges.
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The next step is to round over the flutes. You have to be careful with this step because you need to go one way (from outside to inside) on one side of the flute and the other way (from inside to outside) on the other side of the flute. A very small amount of experimentation will tell you which way to go. If you go the wrong way, your gouge will dive into the wood and you'll take chunk out - more than you wanted to.
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Now we can shape the end of the flutes. I used a #7/10 to make those cuts but a variety of gouges could be used successfully.
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We're ready now to use a bit of medium sandpaper to smooth out the flutes. I use P150.
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Mike Henderson
12-31-2008, 5:59 PM
You're now ready to remove the shell from the backer board. See the Simple Shell Tutorial (http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?t=95974) for how to do this. With the shell removed, you can complete the sanding. Use P150 until all the tool marks are gone, then use P220 to get the flutes smooth.
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Once you get it sanded to your satisfaction, you can mount it on your furniture. I used a bit of oil finish to show you what it will look like finished.
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That's it for this shell. I intend to show you how to carve more shells in the future. There's so many different carved shells I sometimes don't know which one to choose. But if you can do this shell, you won't have trouble with the future shell tutorials.

Good luck!

Khalid Khattak
12-31-2008, 11:11 PM
Wow..Mike.. it looks beautiful.. How long it will take to carve a single shell..e.g that one in ur hand?

Mike Henderson
12-31-2008, 11:37 PM
Wow..Mike.. it looks beautiful.. How long it will take to carve a single shell..e.g that one in ur hand?
I can only answer for me. Given that I had the blank already prepared and glued to the board, it took me less than an hour to do the carving. I wasn't paying attention to the time so it's hard to answer your question accurately.

I was taking pictures while I was carving. I think if I just focused on the carving - and had a blank prepared - I could do it in maybe a half hour.

But the one you see the pictures of is actually my second. I didn't like how the first one came out and started over. I'm not counting the time I spent on the first one in my estimates above. So the fact that I had just done one (even though I didn't like it) meant I could go faster on the second one.

Mike

Khalid Khattak
01-01-2009, 1:30 AM
hmmm... Thats pretty good timings:).... Thanks for posting your beautiful work...Hope in coming future we will see some more marvellous work.

Mike Henderson
01-01-2009, 9:00 PM
To expand on my earlier posting, here's the first shell I did. You can't really see it in the picture, but I didn't like it because it's too flat - I just didn't put enough depth on it.

It's really not "finished" because I gave up once I could tell I was not satisfied with it - note that it's still attached to the backer board. I took pictures the way I left it, then I put some oil on it so you could see it better (the oil is still wet).

Mike

Doug Mason
01-01-2009, 9:41 PM
I'll be posting my attempt soon.

Khalid Khattak
01-01-2009, 10:13 PM
Very nice.. :)
European peoples like shallower designs upto 3~4mm depth, whereas South Asian looks deep carving upto 12mm depth;)

When i saw the thumbnail of the shell, its seams that u have left the upper half thicker and i saw a depth line on the design..but when i enlarge the picture it was a grain structure..

Mike Henderson
01-01-2009, 10:27 PM
I'm not sure what you mean by 3-4mm depth. I was referring to the depth of the finished carving, from back to front. You must be referring to the depth of the cuts into the carving because a 3-4mm blank would be very thin - a deep cut would go right through it.

I'll go take a picture from the side of this shell and you can compare it to the side view I put in the tutorial above.

Edit: See the picture below which shows the first and second shells from the side (first shell on the right and second shell on the left). The first shell is 10-11mm at the highest point, while the second shell is about 15-16mm to the highest point.

Mike

Khalid Khattak
01-02-2009, 1:54 AM
yes i am talking the depth of carving not the depth or thickness of wooden stock...:)

See following of my work..The stock thickness is 16mm.. The Flower carved from top to bottom is 5mm... So carving is 5mm deep from its top..

Mike Henderson
01-02-2009, 9:46 AM
That's some very good work, Khalid. You're quite a carver.

Mike

Zahid Naqvi
01-03-2009, 11:49 PM
Mike, I just got back from an out of town visit, I plan to jump on this project tomorrow. Since your last shell tutorial, I have acquired some more chisels and now I think I have all the tools recommended for a shell (so I can't use that as an excuse for low quality work).

Khalid, if you are interested in learning how to carve by hand these tutorials by Mike are great. But I remember you mentioned something about lack of time. Hand carving does take time when you start learning.

Mike Henderson
01-04-2009, 12:00 AM
Welcome back, Zahid. I was wondering why we hadn't heard from you.

What would you like as the next tutorial? I can do a more complex shell, or I can do that early American fan. The fan is very easy - a good beginning project. And there's lots of variations on the fan theme so I could do a simple one, then do a more complex one.

Mike

Zahid Naqvi
01-05-2009, 2:29 PM
I think we need to get out of the shell and/or fan type stuff, how about a basic architectural carving. I am also interested in learning some basic "cuts" for practise when there is nothing specific to do. I have seen these for chip carving, where you do a series of repeated cuts to keep you skills sharp. I am not sure the concept translates into furniture carving, but it would be great if it did. For days when you have no projects, but you want to spend some time in the shop some practise exercises for carving would be a good soothing activity.:D

Mike Henderson
01-05-2009, 3:09 PM
I think we need to get out of the shell and/or fan type stuff, how about a basic architectural carving. I am also interested in learning some basic "cuts" for practise when there is nothing specific to do. I have seen these for chip carving, where you do a series of repeated cuts to keep you skills sharp. I am not sure the concept translates into furniture carving, but it would be great if it did. For days when you have no projects, but you want to spend some time in the shop some practise exercises for carving would be a good soothing activity.:D
I'm not sure what you mean but "basic architectural carving" - do you mean things like molding? Maybe an egg and dart molding. Any type of molding will give you lots of practice making cuts because the design is repeated over and over (and over and over and...).

I already did the fan - took pictures and all - so I'm going to post that just so people have that tutorial available. I haven't had much to do over the holidays so I was looking for a project.

Let me know what you want for basic architectural carving and I'll see if I'm qualified to do it.

Mike