Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Vessel in Progress

I wasn't sure I was ever going to finish the details on this piece! but alas, it's closer to done! I still have some touch up work to do, along with staining and finishing...



















This piece will be titled "stone".

Monday, March 14, 2011

Flower

Over the weekend I was able to get together with a photographer friend that snapped a few shots of "flower" for me. It's amazing what a difference a good photo can make!



















The black background really looks killer I think. Though the white background provides some really nice detail to the piece.



















I'm looking forward to finishing these other couple pieces so I can get some more amazing photos done!

Tuesday, March 08, 2011

Segmented Hollow Vessel #2 - Carving Complete

After another 3+ hours tonight, I have finished the carving in this vessel. I still need to finish sanding the whole piece... I think I will tackle that tomorrow.



















thoughts?

Sunday, March 06, 2011

Segmented Hollow Vessel #2 - Turning

After yesterday's glue-up, I started turning the new vessel today. First up was to mount the lower section of the vessel and layout how the base needs to be turned.














Next I turned the rough shape of the vessel and finished the bottom (not shown... sorry).

With the vessel turned around I could start hollowing the inside of the lower section. The tools I have can only go about six inches deep, so I first had to turn the inside of the bottom to the size I wanted. Then I could glue on and start to hollow the next ring.


The final two rings were then glued on and I could finish shaping the outside of the vessel and hollowing the inside.

I didn't want to make the walls of the vessel to thin since I am going to be doing the carving to the outside. The last thing I want to do is carve through the vessel! That would be bad...

This is how the vessel looks after turning...

and this is how the vessel looks after four hours of carving...

It's a slow process for sure, but I do like how it's coming along. I still have more carving and sanding to do, but I think I can get this one pretty close to done this week.

Saturday, March 05, 2011

Segmented Hollow Vessel #2 - Ring Glue-Up

Today I got the segmented rings all glued together. Next up is gluing the rings in a stack to form the vessel blank. I've started this too, but there isn't anything to take a picture of yet!















Progress is being made!

Thursday, March 03, 2011

Segmented Hollow Vessel #2 - The Beginning

And here were are, right back at the beginning of another segmented hollow vessel. I think I learned a lot from the first one (which still needs to have the gloss poly applied by the way) and hope to make this one even better! so let's get down to it... here's the post-segment cutting mock-up for this new vessel.















This piece includes 85 segments and is 6" tall with a 6" diameter. The glue-up should start tomorrow... hopefully!

New Technique

I had this idea the other day for a way to incorporate carving into my segmented turnings. I didn't want to build a whole new piece to try this out on for fear that I might not like it, so I used an old dish that I've done some color sampling with...














I'm really diggin it! There is some great depth added to the overall look and now I can't wait to put together a new hollow vessel and try this out full scale! I have a couple other ideas on how I can work with this technique in other ways too...

what are your thoughts?