The Gnomon Workshop has a new dvd featuring Josh Murray titled
Introduction to Wax Carving (Tutorials | The Gnomon Workshop). If you’re
interested in wax carving, but haven’t had the courage to take the
plunge, this dvd is great! He answer ed a lot of my questions on
getting started and he demonstrates several different tools, so you
get an idea of what you need and what you don’t. I’m totally
inspired…the wax will be flying at my house this weekend!
Michelle Walbeck
I downloaded the sample clip and watched it. In the clip, much of
what he’s doing is blocked by the brim of his hat or is off to one
side of the screen partly out of camera range. For $50 I hope the
video itself is better than the clip.
Kathy Johnson
www.fgemz.com
Great, in this age of ever more useful technology its nice to hear
interest in hand carving. No i’m not against CAD or CAM, I use Rhino
for modelling and have a milling machine on the way. Creating
something from a block of wax to the finished piece is so rewarding
for me that not many things come close to giving me the same
satisfaction. Right now all I do is custom work for the trade, I stay
busy lol. Here’s a link to a gallery that has a small portion of what
I do, I think 1/2 to 1/3 have at lease some wax pictures with most of
those being start to finish. http://www.williamjosephdesigns.com/.
While I dont write anything up or offer any description to whats
going on feel free to email and ask.
Bil
Bil,
Your hand carving is fabulous! I can see why you keep busy. I was
surprised to see how much of it is done by hand and not CAD. Maybe
you should consider making a video. People love to see a master at
work! I am interested in how long it takes to carve some of those
rings. I carve wax too but it seems to take me forever to finish a
piece.
Regards,
Kathy
Bill,
If the pieces shown on your website are hand carved out of wax, as
you say they are, then you are a true master of wax carving!
Regardless of any arguments on Orchid about whether fabrication or
casting are preferred methods of making things, your work is
incredible! Having someone look at your work and claim it could be
made better by fabrication just makes no sense to me, as your work,
cast from hand carved wax, looks to be perfection itself.
Jay Whaley
Hi,
Even though I was really impressed with the 16 micron wax printing I
saw at the show, I’d buy a decent DVD on wax carving.
That makes two customers right off the bat 
Regards Charles A.
If the pieces shown on your website are hand carved out of wax, as you say they are, then you are a true master of wax carving!
Very kind of yall, thank you. Yes, they are all handcarved with the
exception of one I had milled. To date it’s the only piece I had
milled and wasnt really happy with the detail. I do use Rhino but
only to nail the design down, it’s so much better than sketches from
start to finish in the design process. My goal with a milling machine
is to produce the basic shape, the blank, then finish carving by
hand. A moderately difficult wax can take me 8 to 10 hours with 2 to
3 hours of that just creating the blank. Every stage has to be right
and what seems like the easiest part, the blank, is actually not that
easy and almost the most critical. If a plane is off by a few degrees
or a stone placement isnt exact its almost counterproductive to try
and compensate in the metal.
Bil