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| Mulberry, Yew & Boxelder Published On 08-01-2008 , 2:30 PM The more I learn the longer it takes to finish a piece. A year ago I'd take something off the lathe and call it done. Now I may take several weeks applying various treatments to a piece, several days of sanding and several days of finishing.  First up is this Mulberry Leaves vase. When I picked up the vanload of Mulberry last month there was a few stems with leaves on some of the pieces so I photographed them to use for carving reference. The trees have very interesting leaves and they change shape as they grow, similar to sassafras. I did all of the carving and piercing live on my webcam. I turned the vase to 1/4" thick with the intent of carving it. Using transfer paper I roughly traced the outline of the leaves on to 4 of the 8 panels I carved on the piece. This is meant to be a rustic piece; I left the dark edges from the carving/piercing and only lightly sanded the inside. Mulberry Lace, on the other hand, is a more refined and delicate piece. The dividing lines for the eight panels continue to the center of the bottom where I carved a faceted pinwheel.  Next up is more mulberry! This Mulberry Paperweight was an exercise in turning a sphere. I turned it live on my webcam except for the boring hollowing. This is not really thin walled. I left it quite chunky as I wanted it to sit solidly and be a useful paperweight. You can stick a pen or two in it as well. It was a perfect sphere but I turned a flat spot for it to sit on. It was a fun project and I will be turning more spheres.  The next piece is really take two on a previous piece I didn't feel was finished. This Mulberry Natural Edge Vase needed something else, it just didn't seem "finished" to me. So, another technique I learned at the symposium came to mind. I took a rotary tool with a grinding bit in it, which I loaded up with cherry saw dust. Using a clogged grinding bit creates friction and heat which when hard pressed into the surface burns a rounded depression. Randomly filling an area with this technique gives a beaded effect to the surface. I like how the black compliments the yellow. Alright, lets move on to a different species, shall we?  Here is a nice piece of box elder. I call this the "Kapur Cup" as it was my husband's idea to make this a goblet "like those sporting cup things"... This piece was started as a demo at a turning meeting in July. Once it was back home I turned on the webcam and was taking the final cuts on the inside of the bowl. Apparently my husband was watching me and came down with the suggestion that "everyone makes bowl, how about a goblet instead?". I had enough stock left in the chuck so I said "sure, why not". The cup is less than 1/16th of an inch thick. It now sits in my husband's office. It may not be my best piece, but I hope he likes it.  Moving along to our next species.Hearing chainsaws one morning before work I saw a tree service at our neighbor's house. I ran over and asked if I could have the stumps of the Japanese Yews they were cutting down in preparation for some construction. They were happy to dump them on my lawn. It saved them the grinding time! Yew has a purplish bark, and to my delight, the resin (sap) turns the wood purplish as well. The log centers near the bottom turned a dark purple. I was quite excited! On the down side, conifers are soft and subject to tearing easily. So even though my tools were razor sharp, I still had to do tons of sanding. As the piece is so thin, the heat from sanding dried the wood and the resin got sanded all away in some spots. Once again, the symposium came to my rescue. I had recently gotten an airbrush and decided to give it a try. I started with a dark violet and worked my way up to the rim in orange/yellow. The sapwood rim was pierced live on my webcam. I doodled a pattern on scrap paper that I liked but did the piercing freehand. it kind of reminds me of Klingon or another alien language from a sci-fi show. I did the airbrushing off camera. The colors reminded me of some aurora borealis buttons I had so I recessed one into the bottom for some added glitz. I'm extremely happy with this piece. The colors remind me of a sunrise, ergo the name "Sunrise Over Yew". All the pieces, except for the boxelder goblet, are available in my Gallery. You can see more photos and descriptions over there. The goblet is on my Portfolio. If you'd like to catch me on my webcam working live, click on the link in the lower right of the Blog page. There is a small video box there that will take you to stickam.com where you can sign up to be notified when I go on air. I usually do this in the evenings and on weekend afternoons/evenings. I've had a lot of interest in it and even invested in a better camera so my viewers can see better. Thanks for your continued interest in my work. Please feel free to leave a comment. Comments (2) | ||
