Dragonslayer? Hey ARTISTS, I need some Help...

xaman

xaman

Joined
Nov 27, 2005
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Well, I sat next to Moonwilson at the Fogo dinner at Blade (he's a professional artist,) and he showed me a little textured artwork he did on some Chuddy Bear leather. His looked great, so I thought I'd give it a try...

I am NOT an artist, got none of that gene... So i chewed on it for a while and thought I'd try a dragon for the Silent Knight sheath. I wasn't brave enough to tackle the front --- I put it on the back of the sheath so my 40 year old friends wouldn't make too much fun :p I'm looking for a clean and simple cross (maybe celtic) for the front...

Here's the results of my first attempt (do you call this "tooling" or "carving"??) BTW, I posted this over in the sheathmakers forum as well, but thought it would be fun here, since HOGS would know best what is fitting for a grail Busse blade like this :thumbup:

DundeeSheaths018.jpg


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DundeeSheaths023.jpg


Artists, I need some critique. My personaly opinion is that the dragon and flames came out fair, but as an afterthought I tried to squeeze in the angel on the belt loop ( after putting the dragon and flames i thought it looked too ""dark" and it needed some "good conquering evil" type of symbol.) I think it might have been better if the angel was longer and I lost the cobblestone "filler." Somehow the stones gave it a real comic book feel :confused: It just seems to comic and too busy up top...

BUT, I must say that my 9 year old thinks it is VERY cool :thumbup:

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She's claimed this one for her inheritance...
 
That looks very good to me Xaman:thumbup:

And this was your first attemt?
No way I could do that, very impressive!



edit- not an artist either, nor slept in HI last night. But it looks great to my eye
 
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I think it is pretty cool, Eli! :cool: Not an artist myself but I know what I like!
 
I am not an artist by any stretch of the imagination. To my eyes it looks pretty bad a$$ :thumbup:
 
Eli...that looks effin' awesome! I'm sure there are people here who will be able to offer criticisms, but damn...I'm impressed. Your little lady knows good isht:D:thumbup:
 
Thanks for the compliments everyone, it's really simple and a lot of fun.

I'm thinking i'll invest in a few more simple carving/stamping tools -- stuff to fill in backgrounds and such... The next step would be color, but oh man do i stink at painting...
 
I believe it's called tooling, but I'm no leatherworker so don't quote me on that. I figure it's carved if you actually cut into it.
 
yoda4561 said:
I believe it's called tooling, but I'm no leatherworker so don't quote me on that. I figure it's carved if you actually cut into it.
Click to expand...

yeah, that's what i was thinking... I actually did cut it, then pressed along the side of the cut??? I need to go camp out at Dwaynes for a day and get him to learn me somethin' -- he really is an artist :thumbup:
 
Bro! Nice job...I'm liking the dude with the hair and wings the best. Nice concept...looking down at the dragon in the fiery pit. Yeah....Cool!:thumbup:
 
Eli, that is extremely well done, especially with minimal preconceived design layout. Interesting, I've been reading Revelations again, and this looks very much like some of the visions from that book.
On the Cross image, give me a holler if you require any assistance or inspiration.
Again, nicely done.:thumbup:
 
The way I see it:

Carved is cut, embossed is stamped, and either or both are tooled.

Looks like very nice work. :thumbup: I wish there were more detailed photos. Most noticeably from what I can see I'd say you could have cut deeper and done deeper beveling to get more contrast. Did you use a stain/antique to highlight the tooling? If you live next to a Tandy store they occasionally have carving classes and I highly recommend it!
 
Sheesh... No artistic gene my AZZ! That's pretty darn good for "no talent" there, xaman... I like it! :thumbup::thumbup: Nice work!!
 
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