Tuesday 13 July 2010

Recent Works: The Serpent's Bite - Viking Knife With Carved Antler Handle


Another one of those things I ever wanted to do is to combine my two favourite crafts - carving and knife-making. I mean, is there anything that screams as loud for a carved decoration like a knife handle made from antler? I think not.
So I took this knife which I actually made a few years ago but never finished. It served me in it's unfinished state sometimes as a working knife, sometimes it was completely forgotten.
I just found it again a while ago and after all the progression of my carving abilities in recent times, I decided to finally dare it. There was this little wrist cuff lying around and I thought, "Hey, this pattern would be great for this handle!" and after 5 minutes of freehand transfering and some further hours of work the result was convincing. This is the first one in a long row of knifes with carved handles - you can be pretty sure about that!
Since I do not know when I'll be able to make a fitting sheath, this piece is not for sale yet. However if you are interested in a "pre-order" don't hesitate to contact me!

Thursday 8 July 2010

At Work: Carving a Thor's Hammer Bone Pendant

After many many requests about how I carve the bone jewelry, I decided to show the process of making a Thor's Hammer here step by step. Keep in mind that this is NOT a real tutorial, since these steps display my personal way to reach my aim and may be totally improper for others.
Though I am of course happy if you find it helpful for your own work.

Let's start!
Of course there are some things needed before the actual carving work starts.
First of all there was the design which you can see above. And a pile of "material" which you can see below.
on this picture you see my staff considering the most suitable piece for my work

I often get questions about the bones I use. Usually I simply buy bovine bones in the supermarket, frozen and filled with marrow. This is when my little helpers (see pic above) come into the play.
During weeks of intense engagement they clean them very well and make them almost ready for the use. However, the sun and the weather are additional factors in the preparation process of the material.

The last step of preparation would be to choose a suitable piece of bone and to roughly cut it out.

Below you can see numbered pictures of the following working steps including the actually used attachments/accessories for my Dremel Power Tool. (click on them to make em bigger, you know?!)
The numbers correspond with the steps of work. If there's no number on the single pictures, it means that they show the result of the previous procedure.
Underneath you will find a short description of each particular step.

1. Transfering of the design onto the roughly cutted and grinded bone
2. Engraving the outlines with a medium sized, round-headed, engraving cutter
3. Cutting out the workpiece and beveling of some of the hard edges, using an engraving cutter with a cylindric head for both procedures

4. Using a big sized, round-headed, engraving cutter to deepen the section around the bottom knotwork
5. Using a small sized, round-headed, engraving cutter to deepen all important lines
6. Adjusting irregularities of the surface and the thickness of the workpiece

7. Using a small sized, round-headed, engraving cutter to deepen all important lines that may have vanished during the previous working step
8. Shaping of all edges with an engraving cutter with a cylindric head
9. Engraving the cuts on the lateral sections with a conic headed cutter
10. Using big sized, round-headed, engraving cutter to make the dots in the background of the bottom section
11. Using a small sized, round-headed, engraving cutter to deepen all important lines, add some new ones and "dotting" the lateral areas

12. Using different Diamond Wheel Point accessories for grinding down and smoothing



13. The final sanding with good old school sandpaper
14. Polishing

Ready! The result can be found here: Bone Hammers

Wednesday 7 July 2010

Recent Works: More carvings

Here are some recent custom bone carving works: