How do you sketch up your designs?

G

groy87

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Feb 11, 2016
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Do you sketch up your knife designs by hand or do you use a computer program for making drafting up your profiles? I usually draw all of my handle shapes by hand and curious if there were software package out there for that could be used make slight variations to help hone in on a design.
 
I use graph paper and French curves. A lot of folder makers use Google sketch up or other programs. I've been wanting to learn to use one but with what little I have it seems like it will take a good amount of time to learn how to use it.
 
Get a french curve drafting tool and a short straightedge and sketch your knife lightly in pencil. Erase and change lines until it looks like you want and then photocopy it to save it before cutting it out and laying it on a piece of blade steel to see if it will fit. At that point you can tape it down with pieces of pinstriping tape and carefully trace around it with an ultrafine black Sharpie. Cut around your design with straight cuts from an angle grinder or band saw) and grind to the center of your lines on your wheel to profile the blade...holding it up to sky several times to see the profile and where to smooth the pattern on your grinding wheel. Square up all the edges on a disc sander and finish the finger hole on a small wheel or sanding drum chucked into a drill press and smooth the underside of the tang. Now is the time to make any changes like shortening the blade or enlarging the finger hole, ETC. Now grind the bevels, heat treat and finish. It's that simple.....OR you can learn the design software for your PCV and spend quite a bit of time initially to make really cool diagrams of your project....it's your choice. I can design on paper and cutout and profile a new blade in less than 45 minutes. I make one of a kind knives so I sometime change the design as I am profiling on the grinder. There is no real mystery to the process...watch some videos by good knife makers and you will see their methods. If you want to make folding knives then you might want to make mockups out plexiglass or G-10 to check the initial fitting of the parts. Design software might help more with folders...read the stickies for books on folder making. Lastly show your designs to others and ask for comments before you cut out the steel in case you have no taste and are about to make a truly ugly knife. It happens. Larry

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Designs created solely in software rarley look organic. Best to start with a pencil and paper and once you have something your happy with scan it to your computer, you can then use software like Inkscape to refine the lines and proportions. An easy way to make a template is to print your design, then affix it to card from a cereal box using double sided tape and cut it out with scissors, this also lets you scale your design up or down. Or if your feeling adventurous just take a sharpie to the steel and grind it out until it feels right, great for those odd sized pieces of steel lying around.
 
I use millimeter paper and sketch by hand
When I have a drawing that I want to make, I photocopy it, glue it in to thin hardfoam board (1mm) and cut it out to have a template around wich I scratch on to the steel.

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I prefer to design digitally. It gives me the ability to easily compare one version of a design to another. If I want to see what a different handle material will look like, it's just a matter of a few clicks. All my designs can easily be stored and recalled. A card stock printout can be printed and cut out with scissors anytime I need a template. There is a learning curve for using something like Coreldraw or Illustrator, but for me it's much more flexible than pencil and paper.

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I just start with a pen and paper. I usually get an idea from the internet. Not a styling of a knife but just a section or part I like. These ideas will be for folders because that is all I make.I can mention a list of makers whose work I always admire and if I get stuck for ideas I can just look at one or two of theirs to help me start. This can be say the front of the blade or end of the handle or ----.I mark how long I want the blade and then draw in the rest . I use masking tape to cover the areas I want to re do. I then will cover the back side of this with 8 or 9 layers of masking tape, cut it out, and transfer this to my hard pattern. This may sound pretty crude but it does work very well for me.
Frank
 
Chuck, Which software do you use for design and is it difficult to learn? I would like to play around with designs but I have no software for this. Thanks for any suggestions. Larry
 
paper -> clay and cardboard -> Pro/E ISDX -> clay and cardboard -> steel and micarta ->Pro/E ISDX -> CNC -> design perfection Shangri-La

The ability to tweak a design in a smooth organic way is important. The spline tools in Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop are good tools. I wouldn't use CAD with straight lines and constraint radius arcs for design development.
 
A lot of designs start out with pencil and paper. Sometimes I might use a ruler if I have some size constraints in mind. Other times, I'll start everything in AutoCAD where I can tweak certain things a little more precisely. Some designs start on paper and end up in AutoCAD.... it just all depends on what I'm trying to do.
 
LARRYZ10 said:
Chuck, Which software do you use for design and is it difficult to learn? I would like to play around with designs but I have no software for this. Thanks for any suggestions. Larry
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Larry, Adobe Illustrator and Coreldraw are the two big guns in the industry as far as vector software. I've used them both, but my favorite is Corel, just because I've used it the most. Both can be quite expensive, although you can find copies of older versions on ebay for a reasonable cost.

The learning curve can be quite steep, but there are plenty of tutorials online. If you can get someone familiar with either of these programs to spend a little time with you, it would really lessen the curve. I used to teach graphic arts and could get a student proficient in the basics, which would include designing a knife and handle profile in a couple of hours.

My suggestion to you, would be to download a copy of Inkscape. It's a free vector program that will certainly let you create blade profiles and again there are tutorials online for it as well. It's pretty easy, you create a rectangle, convert it to curves and you just drag different points of the rectangle (nodes) to create curves.

Here is a video that shows a crude example that gives you an idea of how it's done:

[video=youtube;Kv8sdp5zEq4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kv8sdp5zEq4[/video]
 
I'm just getting started in making my own, but this is the progression I've been using.
I start with pencil and paper.
Transfer that to MDF, cut out a mockup, and refine until it feels right (or toss it if it's just not working).
Scan or photograph it, bring it into Illustrator, and refine it a little further. This is also where I start drawing out ideas for the scales.

The MDF mockups.



My drawings in Illustrator.

 
I scribble all over a piece of copy paper with a pencil until the paper is completely covered in black. Then I simply erase everything that doesn't look like a nice knife.:D
 
Seriously though...after rough sketching an idea, I've become fond of doing it on a piece of software called DraftSight. Its a free download with limited features, but not too limiting. There is of course a payed version of the software as well. There are also a lot of YouTube tutorials to get you up to speed in learning the software. Mike at EKIM knives, a member here, has done a nice DraftSight tutorial on designing a folder. Just google Draftsight if interested.
 
Another vote for Inkscape. Great for curves and there are tools you can use to scale to the dimensions you want. Not as exact as a proper CAD like Autocad or Solidworks but a lot cheaper. (FREE)
 
I always start in coreldraw, the few times I start freestyling on the grinder I later scan the blade and vectorize it.
Time ago I used to cut profiles with my cnc router, but nowadays I rarely do it anymore, only if I plan a batch to be lasercut of a new design.

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(hopefully this one gets approval from the customer, I plan to use VG10 DPS Suminagashi steel)


Pablo
 
interesting variety of sketching methods!

Previously just sketched by hand on grid paper but its hard to get single hard lines on the edges, so I started using some french curves to get a crisp outline of my sketches.
I really like this oversized grid paper :D

 
+1 for Inkscape. Pencil and paper will never be overtaken, but benefits of inkscape:

1) Free!
2) SVG format can be opened in the browser, which can help with customer communication
3) Can embed any data in it, such as steel choice, copyright info, and publication date. Useful for historical or search reasons.

It's slow coming, but I'm creating free software resources for knife makers, which will include svg templates, display/form tools, and other stuff that just might make life easier.
 
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