Thursday, January 17, 2008
This figure was an experiment in making a Bear Claw Necklace. I have done this type of detail on other full figures so this time I thought it would be a challenge to try something completely different. I guess you could say that I worked backwards, first making the necklace then the base and finally the head and other details. Sometimes this is necessary just to see if the concept will work out. While I did have a close call with the first attempt at mating the head to the necklace after a little overnight thought was able to work the problem out.
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When I first cut out the blank for the necklace the wife commented that it looked like I was carving a toilet bowl lid. It does sort of look like that. However, once the claws were added and then the head it would be hard to imagine a bathroom fixture somewhere in there. In laying out the necklace I ran the grail of the wood with the length of the piece for strength. It is held to the base by three dowels…two 1/8″ dowels on each side and one 1/4″ dowel on the bottom. I was a little worried if this would support the weight of the piece but once glued up it’s really quite strong.
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If I were doing it again I would change the eyes a bit. He has sort of a “Deer in the Headlights” look about him which I find a little off from what I was after. Also, I would have liked to have the central hat detail to look more mirror-like but couldn’t figure out how to do it. The next time I’m in WalMart I will be scouting out the women’s jewelry section to see if I can find something that would allow me to add that detail. Overall I think he looks pretty good and once the name plate added on the bottom of the base he should really sparkle.
Comments Welcome!
