CUTTING OUT AND HOLDING DOWN YOUR CARVING BLANK

The next step is to cut the blank out. Since you traced the carving around the outside edge of your tracing, your line is slightly outside of where you will want to make your cut. In order to deal with this, simply cut right on the outside line of your carving blank. If you get done cutting and there is no visible outside line, then you know you have done a good job. Like I said before in the tools section, there are alternate tools for lower cost like a coping saw that you can use to cut out your carving blanks as well.

Add some Cyanoacrylate (CA, superglue) to the backside of this extra wood.

Now, take a scrap piece of wood and clamp it down into your vice. Glue the carving down to the scrap piece of wood. Now you are ready to start the main carving process! Notice that I glued the back of the carving down so that the edge that needs the most carving is at the edge of the scrap piece of wood. This way I can get at this face more efficiently in order to carve it.

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