The Continuing Adventures of Jud

A while back, a friend contacted me about doing a commission, specifically a particular individual from my carving Gators. (above) Given that she was a friend and had read my woodcarving book twice and actually quoted parts back to me that I had forgotten, I agreed. I had no idea what I was getting into! The original was done many years ago, when I was young and foolish, had eyes that could focus, and was new to woodcarving. In getting underway on this I was to become shocked at just how small the particular gator was- and of course, she chose the one that was in the most difficult pose. After preparing a block of a particularly beautiful fruit wood, and making some starting steps on it, I decided I needed to do a practice piece as I simply couldn't get a handle on the piece. Yesterday, I brought that practice piece to an acceptable point despite having really messed up the initial roughing out: this gave me the confidence that I could now begin on the real piece and today that went back on the bench and is underway.

Above, the practice piece.

The real piece, back on the bench and underway.

Note how much smaller the new line for the head is versus what I first thought it was!