This free online wood carving project by Lora Irish will take you through the simple steps of adding a stained dry bushed finish to your carvings.
Working a water based acrylic paint over an oil based sealer or stain sound counterproductive. Everyone knows that water and oil don’t mix so the the acrylic can never adhere to the oil , but it does when it comes to painting wood carvings.
In this Whittle Bird project I am using acrylic craft paints over two oil steps – one sealer step and one antiquing step. As I add the acrylics they take on an oil paint look.
Supplies:
1 1/4″ x 1 1/4″ x 3″ basswood block
bench knife
v-gouge
linseed oil
turpentine
burn umber artist oil paint
soft, dry rags for antiquing
Acrylic craft colors:
Summer Sunset – pale burnt orange
Cardinal Red – red
Alizarin Crimson – maroon
Honey brown – golden brown
ivory
Carbon black
large brush for antiquing
medium sized #4 filbert round
mixing pan for the oil
Step 1: Begin by carving the body of your Whittle Bird from the basswood block using your bench knife. With a v-gouge add fine detailing lines for the beast on the underside and finely packed short lines along the top back for feathers. Buff the carving with a dry cloth to bring it to a soft sheen.
Step 2: Pretreat the Whittle Bird with a mix of one part linseed oil and one part turpentine. Brush this mix over the wood and allow it to sit for 10 minutes to soak into the wood. Wipe with a clean cloth. Repeat. This linseed/turpentine mix can be used as a final finish for your carvings if you want a natural wood look.
Step 3: To the linseed/oil mix that is left from step 2 add a 1/2″ of burnt umber oil paint, mix well with a stiff brush. Spot antique your bird by applying one coat of antique mix to small areas at a time then wiping off each area. When the entire bird has been antiqued wipe one more time with a clean cloth.
SECRET – By pretreating this bird with the linseed oil/turpentine mix I can even out the final antiquing coloring. The oil mix prevents the end grain cuts from absorbing excessive amounts of stain while the straight grain cut barely take the grain. Note in the photo how even a coloration the antique finish has.
SECRET – This painting technique is being worked on a Whittle Bird Decoy. The carving steps to create the bird’s body are the same as you will discover in the Whittle Fish Wood Carving e-Book which includes an introduction to the history of ice fishing decoys, the six basic carving cuts needed to create these fun fish, and two complete projects. Complete your decoy with the painting steps and by creating a simple wire hanger.
Whittle Fish Wood Carving e-Book by Lora Irish of Art Designs Studio. 60 pages of instructions, patterns, and ideas included are 20 small decoys patterns with fin variations, 4 long minnow decoy patterns, and 21 large full-sized decoy patterns accompanied by full-colored photos of the carved samples.
Step 4: I am using a filbert for this project painting steps. This is a flat shader at the ferrell but a round at the tip. It makes perfect flower petals, and for our project, perfect small feathers. The filbert is loaded exactly like the shader. Then you touch the round tip of the filbert to the wood and pull straight back for the length of the feather. Now it just a simple lift motion that ends the stroke.
Step 5: Place a small puddle of pale burnt orange, red, and maroon on your palette. Lightly load the filbert. Working from the base of the tail towards the head make staggered rows of small feathers using first pale burnt orange for the back half, then red for the next 1/4th and ending with maroon at the v-gouge breast feathers.
Each brush stroke will be semi-transparent. Acrylics when used over oil do not grab instantly so as you pull your brush only a medium amount of paint is left on the wood.
SECRET – Did you notice that I did not say between the oil stain steps and this first painting step to let your carving dry. That is because to work this technique easily, with fool proof results you want that oil base fresh and still moist.
Step 6: While your filbert is loaded with maroon paint the throat of your Whittle Bird. Again you will see that the acrylic takes on an artist’s oil paint look.
In the photo you can see that the acrylics are clearly adhering to the oil pre-treatment and oil stain.
Mayan High Priest Wood Carving E-Book by Lora Irish of Art Designs Studio. Follow along with the highly-detailed, well-photographed, step-by-step instruction. This project contains information about the different styles of relief carving, a quick look at the different carving tools and supplies needed, clear tips on working with your pattern, creating layers, as well as complete carving, shaping, and finishing (painting and antiquing) instruction.This Mayan High Priest, Lord Bird Jaguar I, is worked in a low relief style of carving. The side walls of each area or element is round over with little or no shaping steps to the main body of the element. Elements within a design are any identifiable area of the pattern.
Dry brushing can be worked in two ways – light acrylic colors over a dark oil stain or dark acrylic colors over a pale oil stain. For our Whittle Bird I am using a dark oil stain to antique the crevices of the wood carving details with paler acrylic colors dry brushed across the high ridges of those carving strokes.
The acrylic craft colors, although lighter than the antique are worked from the darkest dry brushing color to the palest, with several different colors in each area.
Step 7: On your palette add a puddle each of honey brown and ivory acrylic craft paint. Lightly load a large flat shader, or you can continue using your filbert, with honey gold. Dry brush honey gold over the v-gouge feathers on the top back of the bird. Repeat this step using ivory.
Step 8: With a lightly loaded brush of honey gold add color to the sides of the bird. This area will fall under the copper wing and although not worked over a detail carved area is applied as a dry brushing stroke.
Step 9: Now it is time to paint the head area on both the top and bottom by dry brushing it with black acrylic.
Birds of Prey Wood Carving and Crafts Pattern Pack at Art Designs Studio. Includes 12 detailed line art patterns of various birds of prey that range from close-up facial portraits to full-bodied birds in landscape settings and feature the California Condor, hawks, falcons, and more from Lora S. Irish.
Step 10: Allow the carving to dry overnight. Do not microwave this project or any project that has oil, turpentine, or spray sealer to force dry it. All three are chemical based and flammable.
Step 11: Cut and file your wings and tail. I have already cut, filed, and adhered the beak before I decided to use it for this project.
SECRET – You can change the color of your copper is several ways, it does not have to be just bright copper.
1. Use a foam core nail file and work over the copper in tight circular motions to add fine line shine.
2. With a ball peen hammer tap the copper fins or wings on a scrap wood block to give it lots of small indents.
3. Follow the directions on the can, use Liver of sulfur to give copper an instant dark penny patina.
4. And for our Whittle Bird turn on your oven burner to a medium-high setting. With flat nose pliers, working one piece at a time, place the copper wing onto the burner. Wait a few moments, as the copper heats you will see it begin to take on a brilliant orange color. The copper quickly will move to red, silver, deep brown patina, to pure white. When the wing hits a color you like remove it quickly using the pliers. Let the wing cool on a plate or hot pad. Repeat for the remaining copper pieces.
When you flame copper, PLEASE!, work carefully and work safely. The copper becomes very hot very fast. It can burn your skin. And, of course, do not leave the copper on the burner unattended .. nor forget to turn off the burner when you are done.
- Wood Carving and Burning Painting Supplies
- Paint Kit Supplies
- Steps to Success
- General Techniques used in Wood Carving Painting
- Burnishing your Wood Carving
- Simple Blending with Acrylic Craft Paints
- Acrylics over a Primer
- Simple Dry Brushing
- Dry Brushed Acrylics over Oil Based Stains
- Marbling and Splatter Painting
- China Painting with Acrylics
- Vintage Painting with Acrylics
The Americana Eagle Pattern Package, by Lora Irish of Art Designs Studio, contains three different large panel patterns. Highly detailed feather work and flowing lines will make this package great for any craft. Great for Pyrography! Eagle Mantel 37″ wide x 8: high, 4 pieces Column Eagle 14″ wide x 20″ high, 4 pieces Tall Eagle 6″ wide x 18″ high, 2 pieces, three versions of the classic 1800′s wood carved eagle, 4 eagle cane handle toppers, and 1 Civil War military caps design – a total of 11 patterns.
