Chopping Out

If there is one time in carving when you think about it as a big mess, this is it. I call it chopping out. You are essentially removing the waste wood, mainly the background. It’s messy, time-consuming, and necessary. You need to do this before you establish the shapes, masses, and perspectives of the work. It’s messy.

In the case of the current ship portrait, there is a lot of wood to be removed. The panel is eighteen inches by thirty plus. And a lot of that is background needing to be reduced. In this photo, most of the background has been removed, and I am taking out the background around and between the masses of the sails.

I took a long time sketching the lines for the vessel because I remained unsure of how much perspective and volume the carving would take. Better to procrastinate at that stage than when you’ve already removed a large volume of wood.

Somewhere after you’ve finished the chopping in, you begin to refine the shapes, and give a feeling of depth perception. There will be much more depth in this portrait than in most of my works. The ship is heeled over in the wind. As you look at it, the deck will be slanted in your direction, and the sails will be heavily filled and tilted in your direction.

After this ground removal work is done, the deck and bulwarks of the vessel can be defined and the sails shaped. All within less than a half inch in depth. Fun!

Here are a few of my other portraits showing how the process works out when done”