Hand carved HDU sign with Raven and apples

[signmeup]

Here's one I just finished. It's 4'x4' double sided HDU. The little apples are magic sculpt. The raven and the larger apples were carved out of HDU and applied. The rest is carved in place.
This is the first sign I've made for a farm so I'm hopeing some other farms will get into some "one-up-manship" and I'll have a few more to do.

 

[iSign]

awesome work Adrian...

ever posted any video of your carving?
I'd love to see the process of doing the incised lettering!

 

[CentralSigns]

That looks really nice.

 

[SignManiac]

Very nice Adrian simply elegant...

 

[GAC05]

Wow, smashing or carving wood you seem to have it down pat, nice stuff once again.

wayne k
guam usa

 

[signmeup]

ever posted any video of your carving?
I'd love to see the process of doing the incised lettering!

Doug, I might give that a try but I don't really know anything about posting videos. I have a camera that will make avi files but they seem pretty big to me. Is there somewhere I can get some info on this? (I know... "let me google that for you") but since you did some videos I thought you might be able to steer me to the place I need to start. It took 20 to 30 minutes to carve one letter so I'd probably have to edit out a lot of repetitious stuff.

 

[TheSellOut]

Great Work as always! What type of chisels do you recommend for V-grooving letters? Are they just your average wood chisels from the hardware store?

 

[Letterbox Mike]

Awesome as always!

 

[TheSellOut]

It took 20 to 30 minutes to carve one letter so I'd probably have to edit out a lot of repetitious stuff.

A time lapse would be great for this process!

 

[iSign]

two thoughts come to mind...

a slide show of numerous photos might tell the story very well, and require little to know learning curve on the presentation... plus you control when you think it's worth putting down the chisel & taking another pic (on a timer... after you pick up the chisel again, of course) ...plus you could fairly easily add a voice over...

Bradster is a video expert who has offered to help signs101'rs put together useful videos, so maybe he would help.

The other clue i do have is that I import large AVI videos into windows movie maker, where I very easily (with no real studying) learned to do fades, edits, add audio, paste in titles & save to computer as a .wmv file, vastly reduced in size.

 

[signmeup]

What type of chisels do you recommend for V-grooving letters? Are they just your average wood chisels from the hardware store?

Yeah that's pretty much what I use. I have a 2" wide flat one for for the long straight V cuts and one that I bent for going around corners. I use a 1" chisel for the ends and the serifs. I use a box cutter if the letters are small. I used to use the box cutter for larger letters but my hands aren't as strong as they used to be. I get more accurate cuts on the big letters with the chisels anyway so it's all good.

 

[signmeup]

two thoughts come to mind...

a slide show of numerous photos might tell the story very well, and require little to know learning curve on the presentation... plus you control when you think it's worth putting down the chisel & taking another pic (on a timer... after you pick up the chisel again, of course) ...plus you could fairly easily add a voice over...

Bradster is a video expert who has offered to help signs101'rs put together useful videos, so maybe he would help.

The other clue i do have is that I import large AVI videos into windows movie maker, where I very easily (with no real studying) learned to do fades, edits, add audio, paste in titles & save to computer as a .wmv file, vastly reduced in size.

Thanks again Doug. I see I have Windows movie maker so I'll give it a try once I get my work caught up.

Here is a link to my site that shows some carving steps and some of my tools are visible in the background of some of the pics. http://www.showpiecesigns.com/carving.htm

 

[wes70]

Very, very nice! Excellent craftsmanship!

You have apple trees up your way?

 

[Farmboy]

Very Nice Work!!

 

[Jillbeans]

As a joke, you could cut a little cartoon balloon out of PVC saying "Nevermore" and attach it to the sign.
It could have a little chip saying the same thing
(like those greeting cards which talk when you open them)
I'm kidding!
I like the starkness of the black and white.
It's clean and a nice balance for the colorful pictorial.
Love.....Jill

 

[signmeup]

Thanks Jill. I designed it for viewing from a distance so I exaggerated the depth of the cuts and the colours quite a bit. The raven's feathering is quite deep because it is painted plain black with no highlighting and I wanted the shadows and reflections to give it some dimension. I won't know how it went until I see it installed.

I also need to figure out how to carve trees. I don't remember ever carving a tree before. These will do but I'd like to have them look more realistic somehow. I'll have to study how other people have done it in the past.

I think I have apples down pretty good though.

 

[Brandon708]

very nice!