butternut carving

Well I have cranked up the band saw and have cut out a few rough-outs, one in Butternut and one in bass wood. I started with the butternut because a while back I carved a soldier and was real happy with it so wanted to try another one and thought it might look good in the grain of butternut.

So far I have carved out the head and will begin carving the base of the bust possibly tonight. I still need to determine what rank this soldier is. I may simply carve a patch on his helmet for his unit and when it comes to unit he won't be airborne but rather my Army Reserve unit or the unit my grandpa served in in WWI. The only issue with putting a unit on him is that if I decide I want to sell him in my Etsy shop I have possibly limited who may consider purchasing him, but when I carve I don't always carve with the goal of will it sell or not sell. I am not very business savvy when it comes to that part of carving and having a shop. Who knows maybe this one will be entered in the yearly competition, then again maybe not. But hey it's not even done yet so I don't want to put the cart before the horse, for now I am back to carving and in the end that's where the joy is found.

 I forgot to mention I will be painting him and will also get out the wood burner to clean and highlight some areas. I will be working on my technique of burning, I like when it is burned in just enough to tell something was done but no extremely dark lines. I think butternut has enough lines in it without needed to add to it with the wood burner.

as always

 "good night and may God bless"