Critique Request Buck knife scroll design

[Andrew Biggs]

Hi Jason

The answer to that is both. Make sure that they are both consistent and not too thin...........give yourself a bit of meat on the bone. If anything it is better to have it a bit thicker so you can always trim back if you want........but you cant add to it once you start cutting

If they are too thin then you will have problems when it comes to shading where all the lines converge at the base of the leaf. Over time, and the more you draw you will develop an eye for what proportion it should be.

I have reached the stage where it's getting harder to explain and easier to just show you.

The two pictures below...........

The first is your drawing with a few of my very rough modifications. As you can see the gaps between the leaves need to be a bit more consistent and not so big and the leaf between the last two left hand scrolls needs to come off the scroll I've indicated. Also your leaf tips want to touch the inside of the scroll........plus the right hand secondary scroll needs a bit of work.

The blue line indicates the thickness of the scroll spine.

None of these things are radical changes as you have all the elements in place. All you are doing now is refining and slightly altering. It is all fairly subtle stuff from now on.

The second picture is something I want you to take into consideration when drawing your leaves. Pay careful attention to the contours of the leaf and its segments............I have tried to graphically demonstrate the effect that this will have on the shading later on when you cut.

So when you start redrawing your leaf shapes pay careful consideration to their form and contours and try to visualize the shading and how that will be formed as well. So take your time and consider each shape carefully.

You are going great guns!!

Cheers
Andrew

 

[filbertius]

ah - kiwi scrolls soon to join the potato-head.
wonderful thread - keep it up.
Gary

 

[airamp]

Andrew,

Every time you help on a design I learn more. You really have a great eye and are a very good teacher..

When will you make a beginners/intermediate DVD on scroll design?

I would buy it for sure.:thumbs up:

Please keep up the great work, you are really helping us understand the theory and approch.

Thanks,
AirAmp

 

[Marcus Hunt]

Jason, Andrew has been giving you some excellent advice and I've been watching your progress with interest. If I may I'd just like to add a couple of things. Firstly, as Monk said earlier, make sure you cut this up to an engraved line/border. If what you've drawn is the edge of the actual knife you risk going over the edge and it will look terrible. A fine line cut a half mm in from the edge will help stop this happening.

Secondly, make sure you spiral your scrolls a little bit more and try to keep the gap consistent all the way around. The small filler scroll within your starter scroll especially needs attention. This is a classic case of 'hooking' the scroll.

Well done indeed. You are definitely learning!

 

[KCSteve]

These design threads are great! :thumbs up:

Andrew that is one of the best explanations on shading I've seen - definitely keep that for the book you should do on design. And you really should do one, giving some of this information that you've given in these threads and moving up to your exquisite Oceanic Scroll and Maori-inspired designs. The tricky bit to teach wouldn't be that exact style, of course, but the way you meld the styles of traditional engraving and Maori artwork to arrive at that style.

(and now back to your regular thread, already in progress )

 

[Andrew Biggs]

Thank you for your kind comments. But there will be no book or DVD from me. I'm hard pressed to get everything done in a day as it is.

All of this information is already out there in Ron's books and Sam is making a DVD about scroll design for which I'll be lining up to watch.

If you look at various artist work like Sam Alfano, Sam Welch, Phil Coggan and Marty Rabeno............they are all very distinct and unique styles but they also share some very common elements. And that is their basic structures. We would all do well to study these at length.

One of the most common things I see is that new comers try to leap into a style that they really don't understand and then try to emulate it without knowing the basics that make up the style. Generally what they end up with is a butchers mess and they never understand why. Even worse is that they carry on and never really "get it"............An example is the "Lindsay Style" scroll/design. Steve didn't start out with this style, it evolved from basic scroll layouts, to more complex designs and then into a style that is unique to him.

Phil, the Sam's and Marty are all the same. We are seeing 30 or more years of evolution with each of these artists........but the basic principals and concepts are all the same in each of their work.

The tradesman carpenter doesn't give the first day apprentice a hammer and tell them to build a house...............but that is what a lot of us try to do with our scrolls and designs.

If you start out with basic scroll structure as we are seeing on this thread..............learn how to draw it, but more importantly understand how it works. Then that becomes your foundation to more advanced and complex designs. If you can draw and cut one decent bog standard scroll...........then you can draw and cut a 100 of them. You then can join them and start interweaving and overlapping them. From that will come a style that will be unique to you as you explore different ideas.

Well, that's my theory anyway and others may disagree

Beleive me, I struggle with my designs as much as the next guy and generally have to draw them a few times to get everything right. Even then, all I can see are my mistakes and how things could be improved for the next job.

Cheers
Andrew

 

[spank7357]

Biggs/Bardon, This is one for the "Tips and Tricks", but at any rate a fun and very helpfull exercise for us new scroll drawers.

 

[Mike Fennell]

Thanks, Jason, Andrew and all who contributed. This reinforced, in greater detail, the lessons you, John and Roger gave me at Reno just the other day.

Mike Fennell

 

[Arnaud Van Tilburgh]

Definitely a very interesting tread and successful because Jason did not give up.
And I know a lot about Andrews patience.
So I was very curious what design would come out during Jason’s progress as I recently showed my design for the same knife.
And besides the third scroll from the right, the backbone of this design is quite similar to mine I think.
So I also have a question about this: Is my third scroll from the right facing the wrong way and as the backbone is quite similar, is there only one good way to design the backbone on this knife?
And I don’t have the intention to highjack Jason’s tread, so if my reply is misplaced the moderator may delete mine.

arnaud

 

[pilkguns]

Is my third scroll from the right facing the wrong way and as the backbone is quite similar, is there only one good way to design the backbone on this knife?

It's not growing the wrong way; it does flow correctly. What is a problem is that you have a big scroll growing from a smaller scroll and this is something that never happens in nature. It is still a nice pattern and looks very attractive but from a purist sense is not correct. What is more problematic to me is the way the third main body scroll is scrunched to allow room for the fourth and fifth main body scrolls to fit into their areas.

As to you second question, absolutely not! There are no doubt hundreds of ways to design scrolls in this shape correctly and yet all be different. I think the pattern Jason has been working on in this thread is perhaps the most straightforward way to design it, i.e., start on one end and go as evenly as possible to the other end, but it is certainly not the only way.

 

[Ron Smith]

Jason,

I have one other suggestion to add to Andrew's fine tutoring. If you want to give more power to flow and movement, and for continuity's sake, Split the stems of your second and third spirals to match, as you did to the first one, even if you must go under the border line to do so. This is against most design rules, but will give you much more dimension and flow. Maintain consistent stem thickness throughout, even on the small spirals.

Shade it to where the small spiral stems come from behind the border. This will enhance the power of the major spiral to give more expression to it over the smaller spiral. The eye will not mind at all, if you get what I am trying to explain. Does this make any sense?

I think this would be a slight improvement which will make a big difference.

Ron S

 

[Jbardon]

It took me quite a while (crazy week) but I finally got my design shaded, this is probably my fourth redraw of the shading, I wanted to see if everyone thought I was on the right track before i refined it more.

Ron I'm not sure I understood your advice on splitting the stems, and should i shade the small spiral stems where I have the red lines going into the border in the following?

Thanks, Jason

 

[Andrew Biggs]

Hi Jason

Well done...........very well done!!

Consistant scrolls, leaf size, good use of positive and negative space, good use of the canvas, a pleasing design with good flow from right to left.

The only thing I can suggest with the shading is to leave a gap of metal down the centre of the leaf as this creates a stem and gives the leaf a bit more contour. Go to the photo gallery and have a look at Phil Coggans work and you will see a better example of what I'm getting at.

The other suggestion I can make is the background area. Darken this in with a pencil and that will highlight and small problem areas. Move the design around, even upside down and they become a bit more noticeable.

Now post your very original drawing next to your last one and have a look at the difference. You've come a long way and I take my hat off to you.


Cheers
Andrew

 

[Arnaud Van Tilburgh]

Looks good Jason

arnaud

 

[Marcus Hunt]

Wow, what a great online tutorial and lesson. I think it's great when someone asks a question and then we can see the progress as he/she acts on the advice they receive. Well done Jason, this design is lookin' goooood!

 

[dlilazteca]

what happend??? where is the end result??? does the prince save the princess? What a cliffhanger!

 

[rod]

Jason,

This is such a good thread for all of us, and you have been a very good sport. You have also gotten some terrific input for some of the best engravers and teachers.

We can get immersed in the design and details of the piece, and make great improvement, so all of that is excellent.

I would still advise you, before you start cutting, to isolate and trace out your back bone scroll paths, with no elements, it should show that you do need to get your scrolls right, they are too sketchy, not smooth and their decay rates are a bit unresolved. You are about to start cutting a lot of good element and layout ideas you have developed here, but you will regret not spending a bit more time with the pencil on perfecting the smoothness and decay of your backbone scrolls. Pencil and paper time is a good time to get this right, then all those great design ideas will shine?

Try taking a copy of Araund's scroll design for the same knife, and have it sit side by side with your present nice design, you will see a difference in the smoothness and decay rates of his scrolls. Around is good at Illustrator vector drawing, as well as the pencil. That is neither here not there, pencil or vector, the backbones have to look pleasing on their own. Most pros, who have been working with you, are pencil and paper, producing excellent work. Scroll designs do not have to follow any mathematical formulae to look attractive, however, if your eye is not catching shapes at first blush, you and I can do worse that simply googling "Images ... spirals" and immersing yourself for a day or two in various mathematical scrolls, they will train the eye to look for form, then look at your backbone design for small details of form. Do not worry, you will not become addicted to mathematical only forms, you will simple up the gain of the eye for detail.

Others may differ in their opinions?

It is going to be a great knife!

Rod

 

[Andrew Biggs]

I think this knife may have been well and truly cut by now and Jason moved onto several other projects..........the thread is from February 2010

Cheers
Andrew

 

[Eugene Carkoski]

that looks much better

 

[dlilazteca]

I think this knife may have been well and truly cut by now and Jason moved onto several other projects..........the thread is from February 2010

Cheers
Andrew

I know, but just wanted to see the end product, it would have been nice. It's like a complete story you follow it from beginning to the climax and you want a conclusion.

Carlos De La O III