Mar 06

Carved walnut seahorse

Walnut seahorse carved from an antique chair arm

Last summer I started this little carving from an antique walnut chair arm (2nd pic), given to me by my step-father-in-law @freetimemike. I had no plans when I started – it was just an excuse to whittle outside. Eventually I saw this shape inside it. Once it got cold, I threw it in a corner and got distracted. This past week I decided to finish it up. Most of it was carved by hand with @flexcut_tools knives, then finished with some @saburrtooth dremel burrs.

May 14

Caretta, Daniel D. Brown, Ph.D., 2019

“Caretta” – 2019, walnut and scorched maple.
This loggerhead sea turtle started as a simple experiment after I sliced up a walnut firewood log into “cookies” and had a vision of turtle shell scutes in the endgrain patterns. I then designed the shape in illustrator, basing it on a few different turtles. The shell pieces were cut on the scrollsaw, shaped with an oscillating sander, epoxied, and sanded silky smooth. The fins and head were cut from maple, which I shaped with a variety of @saburrtooth carbide bits and sanders, burned with a blowtorch, and the spaces between the scales were ground with more bits and hand-carved with gouges. A final bit of detail was burned with @tamarynart’s @colwoodwoodburning wood burner. Finished with @odiesoil specifically because I wanted to retain the super-smooth natural wood feeling of the shell. All in all, I’m pretty excited with how it turned out! The entire process took just over three weeks, taking up most of my personal free time. Most of that was sanding and shaping. I documented the entire process in stories which are now archived as a highlight in my Instagram profile for those of you curious to see how it was made.

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“Caretta” – 2019, walnut and scorched maple. This loggerhead sea turtle started as a simple experiment after I sliced up a walnut firewood log into “cookies” and had a vision of turtle shell scutes in the endgrain patterns. I then designed the shape in illustrator, basing it on a few different turtles. The shell pieces were cut on the scrollsaw, shaped with an oscillating sander, epoxied, and sanded silky smooth. The fins and head were cut from maple, which I shaped with a variety of @saburrtooth carbide bits and sanders, burned with a blowtorch, and the spaces between the scales were ground with more bits and hand-carved with gouges. A final bit of detail was burned with @tamarynart’s @colwoodwoodburning wood burner. Finished with @odiesoil specifically because I wanted to retain the super-smooth natural wood feeling of the shell. All in all, I’m pretty excited with how it turned out! The entire process took just over three weeks, taking up most of my personal free time. Most of that was sanding and shaping. I documented the entire process in stories which are now archived as a highlight in my profile for those of you curious to see how it was made. … #woodworking #scrollsawart #woodart #powercarving #woodsculpture #pittsburghwoodworking #madeinpittsburgh #turtleart #turtlelover #seaturtlelove #savetheseaturtles #loggerhead #turtle #tortuga

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Quick update on my sea turtle in progress for those of you who see 50 stories and think “nuh uh. ain’t got time for that. swipe” (like me). I’m getting closer to finished. It’s looking more or less how I envisioned. I still have to do a lot of detail cleanup and carve out notches in the appendages for attachment so the depth between them and the shell isn’t quite so dramatic. I always intended this to be flattish, with the full 3-dimensionality only hinted. Thanks to everyone who has responded with questions and comments to my stories. I really didn’t expect this much encouragement and support given that this started as just a little experiment after looking at a piece of firewood. I love this community of makers and artists, and you all remain the reason I even post this stuff. … #woodworking #intarsia #scrollsawart #powercarving #pyrography #pittsburghwoodworking #madeinpittsburgh #seaturtle #seaturtleart

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Mar 26

No Risk, No Reward or Safety in Numbers, Daniel D. Brown, 2019

The title is meant to embody the dual possible fates of that lone fish racing from the school. Schooling evolved for a reason, as there can certainly safety in numbers in this scenario. Unless the sharks devour the entire school (google “baitball” from Sir David Attenborough’s Blue Planet). But perhaps if it swims fast enough it may escape being lunch. Or it may just make itself a target. I think this duality can serve as a metaphor to many aspects of our own lives as well, if you use your imagination.
I built this piece over the course of a few weeks, the process of which I documented with more stories than I’ve ever made (see “Sharks!” highlight on my profile). My inspiration came from both Blue Planet and from a photo of unknown provenance I saw online showing sharks swimming through a school of fish. One of my goals was to use different tools and clashing styles, with no idea how the final piece would look together. I was filled with trepidation starting it, just because of the complexity of scrollsaw work in the fish layers. But it wasn’t as difficult as I feared. I did make the fish bigger than planned, due to the exponential increase in the number of cuts with decreasing fish size.
I drew the initial design in illustrator, making many versions of one fish using the new “puppet warp” tool. The fish are built of three two-tone layers, with an alternating gradient of tones (i.e. mahogany/walnut, red oak/mahogany, ash/red oak – from bottom to top). These were scrollsawed. 
The blacktip reef sharks were made from a single piece of ash, first roughed out on the bandsaw, then power-carved with various Dremel burrs and some hand carving. The fin details were all pyrography using @tamarynart’s wood burner. The ocean floor is a nice piece of “curly” maple I had that I thought would be nicely reminiscent of both a sandy floor and the caustic light refracted from waves above. Finally, the walnut frame was power carved using @kutzall carving dishes on an angle grinder. The scene was finished with minwax gloss and the frame with Arm-R-Seal semi-gloss.

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“No Risk, No Reward or Safety in Numbers” The title is meant to embody the dual possible fates of that lone fish racing from the school. Schooling evolved for a reason, as there can certainly safety in numbers in this scenario. Unless the sharks devour the entire school (google “baitball” from Sir David Attenborough’s Blue Planet). But perhaps if it swims fast enough it may escape being lunch. Or it may just make itself a target. I think this duality can serve as a metaphor to many aspects of our own lives as well, if you use your imagination. I built this piece over the course of a few weeks, the process of which I documented with more stories than I’ve ever made (see “Sharks!” highlight on my profile). My inspiration came from both Blue Planet and from a photo of unknown provenance I saw online showing sharks swimming through a school of fish. One of my goals was to use different tools and clashing styles, with no idea how the final piece would look together. I was filled with trepidation starting it, just because of the complexity of scrollsaw work in the fish layers. But it wasn’t as difficult as I feared. I did make the fish bigger than planned, due to the exponential increase in the number of cuts with decreasing fish size. I drew the initial design in illustrator, making many versions of one fish using the new “puppet warp” tool. The fish are built of three two-tone layers, with an alternating gradient of tones (i.e. mahogany/walnut, red oak/mahogany, ash/red oak – from bottom to top). These were scrollsawed. The blacktip reef sharks were made from a single piece of ash, first roughed out on the bandsaw, then power-carved with various Dremel burrs and some hand carving. The fin details were all pyrography using @tamarynart’s wood burner. The ocean floor is a nice piece of “curly” maple I had that I thought would be nicely reminiscent of both a sandy floor and the caustic light refracted from waves above. Finally, the walnut frame was power carved using @kutzall carving dishes on an angle grinder. The scene was finished with minwax gloss and the frame with Arm-R-Seal semi-gloss. #powercarving #scrollsawart #sharkart #woodart #woodsculpture

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🦈 If you’ve seen my stories, you know I’ve started a new art project. This will be a 3D piece with blacktip reef sharks swimming into a school a fish, made with a mix of scrollsaw, dremel, handcarving, bandsaw, and pyrography. When I first came up with the idea, I was VERY skeptical that it would even be worth trying. Even after designing it in illustrator, I wasn’t sure if I could really pull the scrollsawing off, or whether the layered pieces would look as cool as I imagined it might. I also wasn’t super confident I could carve a decent shark. But I’m far enough along to say that I’m pretty stoked with how it’s turning out. Each of the 3 layers of fish are themselves made of two layers. I wanted to give the fish a two-tone appearance on the sides, with walnut/mahogany on the bottom layer, then mahogany/red oak, and finally red oak/ash on top. So the bottom of each layer matches the top of the next higher layer, creating a sort of alternate gradient. The sharks are being carved from ash and I plan to burn the “black tips” on them. I used a really nice piece of curly maple I had lying around to be the “sand” beneath them. There will also be one escaping fish between the sharks. #woodworking #woodart #woodsculpture #shark #sharkart

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Dec 23

Hippocampus, Daniel D. Brown, 2018

Wooden intarsia seahorse artwork, built from lacewood, cherry, mahogany, maple, walnut, mulberry, bloodwood, purpleheart, and ebony. The frame was made from reclaimed furniture: either black stinkwood or muninga (unclear which). The mulberry and cherry were milled myself from downed neighborhood trees. The frame wood came from a couple antique chairs purchased by my mother-in-law in Cape Town, S. Africa in the 1970s.
My final project of 2018 is now complete!

Posts during the making of…

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The purpose of this post is to talk for a minute about this super cool wood I’m using to make this frame. This is supposedly antique South African “black stinkwood” (Ocotea bullata), also called “cape walnut”. My mother-in-law @avrashorkend, a South African herself, bought a couple antique chairs made from this wood in the 1970s. She and my step-dad-in-law no longer wanted them, so we cut them up with a sawzall over thanksgiving and I brought the pieces home. Stinkwood used to be prevalent on Table Mountain in Cape Town, which @tam_a_ryn and I visited when we got married (she spent her childhood there). But the black stinkwood was massively overexploited by the timber/furniture industries in the ‘70s and was eradicated from most of its previous habitat. It’s now a protected species and no longer commercially available. It’s name apparently comes from the smell when it’s freshly felled. But I can tell you, this who-knows-how-old wood smelled *really* good in my shop. It actually smelled very similar to that characteristic sweet smell of African padauk. Thus, with the smell and comparing the grain to the limited images I could find online, I think there’s a decent chance this wood is actually Pterocarpus angiolensis (Muninga or African teak), which is closely related to padauk (Pterocarpus soyauxii). This species is not CITES-listed and often used in furniture. It’s also known for being a pretty hardcore nasal irritant; and this wood made me sneeze and my nose run within a minute of taking off my mask with a little dust still in the air – more so than any other wood I’ve worked. Either way, it’s pretty cool to use these pieces in my artwork. If you or anyone you know is an expert in exotic African woods, feel free to add your 2 rand. #stinkwood #muninga #africanwood #padauk

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Just a random little intarsia begin this evening.

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