This carving represents the carving of a Chris Hammack rough out. Chris is a very accomplished caricature artist who passes on his creative instructions through his various rough out projects. Carving a Hammack rough out allows a little of Chris’s creativity to rub off on the carver if the carver is willing to learn while doing.

Recently the WOOD BEE CARVER sat in on a Chris Hammack class to carve along with the students by carving a Hammack rough out entitled Bull’s Eye Bob. The photographs reveal the end result of Whittle-Carving a rough out using only a knife. The polychrome finish is artist oil paint mixed with boiled linseed oil in the Painting Softly method.

The WOOD BEE CARVER is primarily a Block Head Carver which means the carving from a block of wood rather than from a rough out or sawed out blank. With BLOCK HEAD CARVING, the advantage of carving from a block rather than from a band sawed blank or a rough out is that when shaping the block towards in interior design-pattern or imagined project is that the design guides itself while it is being shaped. This process allows priming the pump of using the cutting tool to shape the wood while relying heavily upon inner creativity to guide the shaping and detailing of the carving project.

Occasionally it is a good learning experience to carve a rough out which is carving another person’s creative idea imbedded in a roughed out to the basic form project waiting to receive minor cleanup of the machined marking and then carving in the details. Normally there is a photograph of the artist’s completed carving as a visual guide toward which to carve the rough out. One can, however, carve a rough out using one’s own creative subtle changes to make the carving have a change in its original appearance.

In some ways, carving a rough out is a little more difficult than carving from a block of wood one’s own project which is guided by the inner creative nature of one’s imagination. With a rough out one is continuously trying to figure out how to stay true to the original creation by second guessing the artist’s intention by trying to only color within the lines.

On the other hand by carving a rough out one can learn ways to enhance understanding of body pose along with clothing and accessories that are part of the overall design. Allow the carving of rough outs to learn various lessons to guide the carver when designing and carving one’s own creation from a block of wood.

Whether one carves from a block of wood or from a rough out, remember that every carving project is a learning experience to push the carver into trying more challenging and creative projects. Never settle on the mediocre but go to the next level of trying a new subject that awakens one out of the comfort zone of doing the same old ~ the same old over again.