Spoon Carving: Full Tutorial + Tips!

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Video Transcription

well welcome folks to another video today I have to stay inside so I decided to go back to my old carving and calling this video some cabin-fever carving and I will be doing another spoon what you see in front of you is pretty much the tools I'll be using for now so I hope you stay with me and we'll try and make something out of this piece of wood this is gonna be a very quiet video may not be too much editing so if you're about to watch this sit down relax if you're in a rush well maybe watch another time I'm not sure yet this is a piece of birch seasoned birch that I harvested I don't know a couple maybe last year so first thing I'm gonna do is I want to see if there's not a pattern or shape that I'd like to keep in the spoon I'm gonna make it different this time if you've seen my other videos I usually keep my spoons really short because I want them to be compact and easy to bring in the bush but this one's gonna be different it's gonna be a longer one now I see a knot here okay so this is gonna be under the spoon I may want to try and keep this knot to give it some character so what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna try and split it that way hopefully it won't twist on me anyway you never know with wood so let's start by turning this thing into so like that sounds pretty good what looks pretty good anyway she's twisted okay so it didn't work out like I was wanting you know what that happens all the time

look came right on the side so now what I'm going to do next is just figure out which piece I really want and we're going to use this small axe here this is the from graspers and Brooks I've had this for years what is it it's the hatchet I think it's not the mini one but it's a hatchet I just love to use this for doing small carving so what I'm gonna do is use the axe to take away some excess that I won't need to do with the knife okay another little tip now this is seasoned that won't dry any longer if there's anything they have to crack it cracked so what I do when I decided to choose this piece here now it's twisted so I'm gonna have to fix that up but what I wanted to mention is where the bowl is going to be I make sure that there is no cracks going this way because when you start your bowl then you have a problem with cracks you don't want cracks in your bowl right now this is all nice okay so let's start doing a little bit of work slowly charlie

any type of carving you always want to take your time there's once the wood is off its off the back and that's what it's supposed to be anyway so right now I'm trying to do the handles a little bit but I need to straighten it twist it right off okay that's not so bad a little bit on each side at a time when I take too much off of one side you want to bring it even is the point of using the axes using less as less as you can let's work with the knife as you can because it's you know it's a lot of work with the knife you don't take time to take all this excess now what I want to do is I want to make the handle okay take off a lot of the handle here take some corners off and take the back off as well here for the bowl because any spoon you know I don't I don't make deep deep bowls I don't know I just never liked deep bowls if you take a look at your there's nothing wrong with deep bowls I mean people make beautiful spoons but if you do take a look at your spoons that you use every day in your kitchen you'll see that they don't have a very deep bowl so now I'm working the bottom of where the bowl is going to be need to be very careful here you don't want to take too much off and you know the worst place the carb is always this end here now you can use a saw to saw the excess off but to be honest I just like using an axe so it's a good time I'm gonna probably not here nuts beautiful decorative spoons they make a nice design but sometimes it can be an obstacle so but once I'd worked out a bit here now I'm going to work on the other side

okay so for now I'm pretty satisfied with the ex work not saying I won't come back to it maybe not but roughly it took quite a bit of wood off and I don't need to do with the knife now my next thing that's important to me is as you can see this bowl here's I don't know if you can see it wait anyway it's all twisted so what I like to do is straighten this part here where my bowl is going to be and you know once it's all straightened out and smooth then I know where where you know it's easier for me to see where I can work out the bowl and you know the way I'm doing this right now everyone has their own little ways and tips of doing their own thing and it's not just in carving this is just you know the way I when I started making spoons that's how I started doing you and I improved and I made mistakes and still make mistakes but I always do the same thing you know when I first carp I take I choose my piece I use the axe then I flatten my bowl when it nice and flat and soft it's already nice there then I will make sure here that it is once I know that's done then I'm going to start working already on my bowl at least doing the limit of where it's going to be in any case yeah you make like one side of a special spatula specially nice and flat so now you can start well that's why I like to do anyway still needs go down some more okay so now that I've determined the shape of my bowl roughly then I slowly go around and start digging now again when you're carving you have to try and follow the grain of the wood because if you don't let me just give you an example if I go this way you see how it wants to chip out and that's not good sometimes you're gonna take big pieces that you don't want to so it's best to go the other way where I won't do it see it just makes a nice follow-through and then you turn around again and you just cut that off or you can go across brain and do it and it's the same when you do the rest of that wood with your knife you will see as a car which way you have to go and but then sort of the wood is the less chance this is going to happen because sometimes when let's say you use cedar and y'all going the right way and you would just want to carve a piece off here well it splits and it comes all off now that will happen with you know wood that are not dense the denser it is the less chance that will happen but you still need to figure out which way is best while for digging I usually go across rain like this try and make a nice even Bowl and you take your time I know it won't split on you this way you take your time slowly the bowl takes shape okay so now do you think your bowl is deep enough and good enough you want to try and get these higher points everywhere and get it as smooth as you can with your crook knife so you avoid so much sandy how to do that you can use your knife the cook knife but don't put any pressure at all just let the knife do its job hardly putting any pressure the knife will cut weren't supposed to making a lot easier for you to send it after just

already is looking a lot better so you just keep doing that until you're done with the bowl and then you can start shaping the rest I'm working behind the bowl right now thinning it out and you know by the way all these tips and tricks I'm giving you this is all stuff I learned you know myself self-taught if I can say it that way and that doesn't mean it's the best ways or the best techniques I'm pretty sure there are a lot of master carvers out there that could show you better ways of doing it but as I told you before I just got used to doing it this way and I get satisfaction usually when I'm done when I'm not satisfied well spoole usually birds stop doing the back end of it doesn't look like much right now I'm thinning out the bowl and you know even though you do some mistakes as you thin it out and the shape and all that I'll probably be going back to my spoon knife a little bit to some tweaks here and there but when we get to the sandpaper you can do quite a few fix them stuff with it which is pretty cool now I know this looks dangerous when you've probably read it and survival books and stuff never to cook towards you but there are techniques that you can use is completely safe see my hand here is right against my belly and as I come here I can't go any further but I need to carve this way to see the shape of my spoon so I don't have a choice so it's slowly starting to take some kind of a shape I have a nut problem right here slowly let's take your time again just like the bowl you want to try and smoothen it as much as you can less working sanding it and I'm pretty much pretty much satisfied for this one anyway it's not gonna be anything special see how it turns out so so far it looks like this wanted a little too much help to go up a little bit you'll see what comes out of this this is a really full-size full-size spoon I'd say two inches across this way maybe two and a half so I still have a little bit of work this little tiny things and we'll send her up I guess

okay a little tip for you man I'm sure some of you know this if you're not equipped like I am and have a shop and decide to do this in the kitchen yep I'm in the kitchen make sure you do it when your wife is not there and cleaning up good for me anyway because I love the pols to be perfect I don't want any you know bumps I want it to be smooth everywhere because this is what goes in your mouth hey still have a little bit of work to do but now I usually start with a tea then when I'm satisfied with the a tea I'll go to 180 and if I feel like doing another one I'll stop at 220 and that's it

so when I'm done with all those others tips I'll show you the knife and I'll show you what you do next it's not I'll show you the spoon and I'll show you what you need to do next and give you some tips so it starting to look like something

okay um so I'm pretty much done my sanding for now this is my 180 second stage which is pretty much this is nice and smooth now I see a few imperfections but you won't see those in the camera so that's what she looks like so far you see those things I didn't send that right down for a reason give it some character see there's a few there's a little bit here but I don't want to have to sand that way down then I destroy the shape of money so it's not so bad you see them now the imperfections there's a few here and there now I could have used you know any type of machine to send this down perfectly but I don't know I find satisfaction sending it with my hands it's I don't know relaxes me just like sharpening knives okay so now I'll show you Nicks what did you okay so my next step is I will run it you know like clean it if you want in running water and I'll use hot water because it evaporates easier now the reason I do that is because when we do sand let's say this spoon we don't sand it perfectly even though it's all nice and smooth we have to remember that there are different grains you know stages of grains in the wood so what the water does it will show us let's say I clean it up and as it dries it will show you the places where you are in between two grains or something like that because it will be a little bit rough okay so when that happens you can then use your smooth sandpaper and just gently smooth that place you know send it really down you don't want to hit the other grain because it'll still come out and you want to do this because if you don't and you use it this way as soon as you wet it it's gonna be rough at some places in your mouth so you would you wet it the dry a little bit and you're gonna see the spots I'll show you and you just sand them down and you do that until you're completely satisfied or you wait to get a little dry and once everything is all smoothed out once it's all dry then you can go your next step so let's just use some hot water in here when you wet it of course it will show you what you're you know a little bit what it's going to look like when the oil it at the end oh nice dark pieces see that third piece that's cool a nice grain so anyway I'll just wipe it a little bit Scott towel let her dry and I will know exactly where I need to continue sanding a little bit and I will show okay so she's dry enough for me to feel now of course the handle this is not as you know serious to me as the bowl I can feel some places here on the side a little bit here too I'll give it a little touch on both sides here on here and here as well on the bowl up here and the end so I know if I can show you let me see don't move you can see that in the camera see that little white those little white hairs or there see I need to send that off so I just use a clean sandpaper the 180 and just roughly Santa just a little bit where I find all these spots wet it again find the spot until I'm satisfied once that's done I'll show you my next step okay so what I'd like to do next is to give it a little bit more I'm just using this normal I know what you call it iron burner wood burn I just put all kinds of designs and as I've mentioned about million times I'm not an artist so I never know what I'm going to put on it but I put something and they come with these different patterns - if you can see that well anyway so that's my next step now that I'm satisfied with it I'm gonna start hopefully doing something that will turn out not too bad have no idea what I'm doing here folks never know how it's going to turn out so I can't try and explain it really sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't but that's how you try stuff and see if it works or not course you need a steady hand which I don't have my job pretty much done with this one just gonna add a few more things give it a light sanding oil it and she will be done

one more

to burn myself and we'll be done folks wait for her to get Hut that's what she looks like so far

okay so I'm pretty much done with this one what I use is always mineral oil okay you can find that at your local drugstore or pharmacy it's a little expensive but it lasts a long time and using this oil is safe for humans and also I won't turn rancid on you so what I usually do is I'll give up to five coats

one coat with a dry give it another coat until I'm satisfied with it so that's what she looks like so what I'll do there give me a second I'll change angle I'll give you a closer look of this hold on okay so here she is not so bad even finished with another little something in the end now these little designs don't mean a thing okay they're not symbols of anything it's just what it is that's all it is so that's about it folks what I'll do I may take a few pictures of it so you can maybe see it better in another light I encourage you greatly to start carving it's really fun you can start with the more knives you got the 160 to 164 they're not expensive and start with those and learn and come up with stuff that you'll be satisfied with now I understand this is not everybody's cup of tea this kind of spoon but that's what I do and I like it so thank you again for your patience and you guys take care this is Mike from bushcraft parts bye