Gargoyle, How does one "carve" a stone?

[Spookwriter]

You gotta have one sharp knife. (unlike me and Em, who
are not the sharpest tools in the box)

But....you made the cool gargoyle in you picture? Awesome
job. I've been looking for some good size fellers made in stroyfoam.
Or at least lightweight.

How many hours do you have in him?

At any rate, that stone-carving looks like quite an interesting
thing.


Spook....who thinks gargoyles are cool

 

[EmtheFishLady]

Did you stalk his website too Spook?



Terry doesn't know it yet, but he's buying me a fireplace...

 

[Spookwriter]

Certainly, I've poked on his website.

I'm slow, not stupid.




Spook.

 

[EmtheFishLady]

*snicker*



Beautiful stuff he's got eh? I want the frog.

 

[Spookwriter]

Em...We've told you before.

You really can't turn a frog into a prince....

 

[EmtheFishLady]

I've already got a Prince



Could use a maid though.

 

[mississippifarmboy]

Just jumping in to say that the one fireplace with the vines is the most beautiful thing I've ever seen of it's type.
I can't afford it, but if I could.....

I would give anything to have that kind of talent.

Seriously.

 

[Gargoyle]

You gotta have one sharp knife. (unlike me and Em, who
are not the sharpest tools in the box)

But....you made the cool gargoyle in you picture? Awesome
job. I've been looking for some good size fellers made in stroyfoam.
Or at least lightweight.

How many hours do you have in him?

Chisels, lots of them. Some are tempered steel (hand forged by blacksmiths), some are carbide tipped. The choice depends on the type of stone and what I'm trying to do. Many of my best chisels are 100 years old, passed down to me by other carvers I've known.

The one in my avatar went under a bench in a cemetery, to watch over the grave of a young man. It probably has about a week in it.

Chicago Public Television just did a nice video on my work last month, it helps explain how I carve stone. I have it linked from my site:
http://stonecarver.com/news.html

Note that it's a large video, about 45 mg, so if you have limited bandwith or pay for usage, you might want to stick with the still photos through the links listed on the right of the "resources" section of my site,
http://stonecarver.com/carvtool.html

btw, sorry about the huge copyright across most of the photos on my site, but too many of my shots were ending up on Chinese websites, where they claimed it was their work.