finkdaddy's '06 art ( Army 'o Tangs pg 20 )

:D Sweet stuff Finky. Way to go!

-Gman

Hello finky, Where are you too? I'm having to go out and round up all the tiki carvers who are goofing off and you are one of them. Get back to work. I'll have to be the slave driver to get this show on the road. WE NEED TIKI

:blush: You're right Ben, I have been slacking. Today I have to work on one more bone pendant for Mr. Polynesiac, then it's back to wooden tikis for a couple of rounds. Thanks for kicking me in the behind. :wink:

No Problem since I've been slacking too. Where's the bone?

Heya Finky! Wore #1 to Marcus' luau - man it got a LOT of admiring comments! Ill badger Marcus to post some pics...

Thanks Hewey, I would love to see pics of #1 in action! :wink: I still think that guy is my favorite of all my stuff. It's good to know he's with some one who appreciates him. :D

Note to Benzart: Expect some new pics from me later tonight.

Here is a hook I carved for Polynesiac. The engraving looks a bit uneven in the pics, but that's because they're wrapped around the contour of the hook. It didn't show well for some reason.


I think I'm going to work on a couple of wooden tikis again. I might be able to gain some ground on Benzart while he works on some stone. :wink:

Finkdaddy, you are really doing great stuff with the hooks, pendants and the
wall candy. Whenever I see your new creations I am more proud of the "early"
Finky that I have. It was a hit at Coontiki.

Thanks for the kind words Conga. I think the shark-tiki you have was the last one I did before I started buying micro-knives, so he's the last really big pendant I did.

Another Fine Hook-Hack from the Fink.. Really well done.

Yes indeedy, another fine bone carving from Fink. Way to go brother. I can't wait to see what you have planned for the wood. Keep us informed.

-Gman

Hey, thanks Ben and Gman. Last night I finally bought a couple of super tiny engraving bits, so hopefully from now on my lines wont look so uneven. I don't know what I'm going to do yet with the wood, I just figured it would be nice to change it up a bit.

Hurry up and get past me with the wood, I'm carving wood today as it's too cold to keep my hands wet today.
better hurry.

wood is good Finky :)

On 2006-11-13 17:55, hewey wrote:
wood is good Finky :)

...but cheddar is better!

Hang in there guys, I've something in the works that I think you'll enjoy, and no, it doesn't involve cheese. :wink:

On 2006-11-11 13:59, finkdaddy wrote:

That looks like porcelain. It will be nice to see some wood carvings, but you are kicking butt with the hooks, don't give them up.

JP

That looks like porcelain. It will be nice to see some wood carvings, but you are kicking butt with the hooks, don't give them up.

JP

Don't worry, as Benzart says, I'm hooked on the hooks. :wink: There's just a wood project I want to try and finish before Christmas.
Thanks for the kind words! :)

On 2006-11-06 14:36, finkdaddy wrote:
Thanks Hewey, I would love to see pics of #1 in action! :wink: I still think that guy is my favorite of all my stuff. It's good to know he's with some one who appreciates him. :D

There he is, strutting his stuff on the left :)

Yes! That's my boy! :D

Thanks Hewey. Please, if you ever find yourself state-side, let's get together.

There is a wood project I'm working on, but it's turned out to be a bit tougher than I'd hoped. So in the meantime I've created another hook.
I'm getting the lines a bit cleaner on the engraving, finally, thanks to a new bit that GMAN recommended.


Thanks for looking. :)

all you guys are making me "Nuts" with this bone stuff. I'm hooked. Gonna
get some sardine bones and give it a try.

Finky,

Tres sweet dude! I'm telling ya, that's the way to go. Did you feel much of a difference, control wise? Additionally, if you lay them over, they won't bite deep and leave craters.

This one is supa smoove! Excellent work!

"The saw is family"

[ Edited by: GMAN 2006-11-25 06:03 ]

Conga, Sardine bones eh? Now THAT would be impressive! :lol:
Gman, OK I'm forced to admit that I stretched the truth a bit. I went out searching for the "spear" shaped tip you told me about, but I couldn't find one locally. I settled for a ball shaped one instead. I know you didn't recommend that, but it is light-years better than what I was using which was a super cheap set of bits covered with that diamond-dust stuff. I'm lobbying Santa really hard for a pro set of tools this month. :wink:

On 2006-11-24 17:30, finkdaddy wrote:

Very nice, very graceful. Must have taken a long time to layout to make it look so good. How big is it?

JP

Thanks JP. I do spend a while on design. I go through a lot of scratch paper. :wink: This one is about 3" at it's longest part. The next one will be a little more complicated, I hope, and the one after that will be a very thin and simple; a little more feminine. Thanks for looking.

Here is how I spent my Sunday. I wanted something in between a shark and a hook.

sketching on paper

drawn on the bone

roughed out

ready for sanding (I hate sanding)

extra lines drawn on

engraved and polished, ready for tea bath

finished!

Thanks!

Very nice piece finkdaddy - that one has a great flow to it. I'm nuts about sharks and love seeing them incorporated into tiki/pacific art forms. You're starting to break the shackles with your designs too - the only thing a hook really needs is a curve, and the possibilities are endless. I'm looking forard to doing some more hooks myself soon...thanks for the inspiration!

Looks great man - love the inclusion of the shark and hook together :)

another nice piece Finkdaddy. Thanks for posting all of the progress pics. The multi-stage
pics give a better indication of what's involved. Wanna see more!

YES, Another cool hook. Ditto what everyone else said too! The shark is a really cool animal that you have fit well into this hook. Thiis must be a shark hook used for catching hammerheads. Well done again.

Finky,

Killer! He looks great, send him on over to me!

-Gman

Here is my latest. It's a carving of Mokopeke, a snake-like creature from Moari folklore. It was interesting to carve, but I could find very little about him on the web. Anybody know more about him?

Anyway, I started with a piece of hickory-smoked bone to see how it would turn out. I am very pleased with the finish, and believe me, it looks way better in person than in these pics.

Thanks for looking!

Gman and Benzart, I'm going to fire off a couple of lengthly PM's to you two with some carving questions tomorrow. Thanks in advance :wink:

I've heard of a pekapeka, and a koropepe, but not the mokopeke...after googling I see it is on the carving.co.nz site, but it doesn't look at all like a traditional design to me - at least not one I've seen in any of my books on Maori art. Another one, the "traditional" design they call Roimata, is a contemporary design created by a NZ jade carver in the 1980s.
There are a lot of so-called Traditional Maori designs that have no basis in tradition and are given made-up names and obligatory legends to capture the tourist's imagination and money! (the single/double/triple/xxx twist being the most famous...) I'm as guilty as any of this when I was only working in jade, although I made sure they were my made-up names and designs!
It pays to take anything online related to bone or jade carving with a grain of salt....
Nice carving regardless!

I can add a little...

Moko (apart from the facial tattoo) is the Maori name for lizard & this piece does have a bit of a lizardy feel.

*Had to look peke up in the trusty Maori/English dictionary, which tells us 'to jump' - Leaping Lizards Finkdaddy!!!

What ever he is, he's a sweet wee fella for sure. He kind of looks like he's hungry & pleading for food; or is it just me? Cute.

Tama :)

FINKY!!! I Love the Hickory smoke color and the piece is Way excellent. The way the lines flow and meet is really clean and gives it more of a sleek look. I Might like this better than the sharks but the sharks are So Sweet, I Dunno??
When I'm ready to carve bone, I'm coming to you with questions.

:blush: Awesome. Now I have a completely non-Maori/tiki thing that has a very nice finish. I guess I should stick to subjects that I can pull off. Anyway, than you for the compliments. It means a lot to me that both of you take interest in what I do (or try to do :blush: ). I think I'll try another tiki next. :wink:

[Ben, you snuck that reply in sometime before I could hit enter on this one. Thanks! I like the finish on this one too, I'm going to use it more often. GMAN's the guy to ask about bone stuff though. :wink: ]

My thoughts were so loud I couldn't hear my mouth...

[ Edited by: finkdaddy 2006-12-13 05:20 ]

On 2006-12-13 05:17, finkdaddy wrote:
:blush: Awesome. Now I have a completely non-Maori/tiki thing that has a very nice finish. I guess I should stick to subjects that I can pull off. Anyway, than you for the compliments. It means a lot to me that both of you take interest in what I do (or try to do :blush: ). I think I'll try another tiki next. :wink:

There's nothing wrong with your carving, and it is still very much in a Maori vein - it's only the provenance of the design in "tradition" that is questionable. Stuff available on the WWW really is hit or miss in terms of authenticity (there's that word again Tama!)
One thing I would recommend is to grab a couple of the many very good books on Maori Art ( http://www.reed.co.nz has several of the best in print), find something that strikes a cord (not necessarily a jewllery design), and adapt it to your needs, but making sure it's your "take" on the design. I did a whole series of pendants based on old canoe bailers using this approach, which then morphed into a series of tikis!

On 2006-11-26 16:16, finkdaddy wrote:

Wow FinkD! That's a very nice piece. The hammerhead design is very well done. Sharp lines, nice detail. Nice job.

TG

I love the new stuff Finkdaddy. Is there a future in resin for any of these?

Wow, thanks everyone.

Raffer, it's funny you should ask that. Hopefully, I will be making a mold of everything I carve starting with the most recent snake-thing. I don't know how soon I will be making casts of things, but I figured some day I could sell some hand-painted copies and maybe sell them in sets in a shadow box or something.
Thanks for the props. :wink:

Love your "moko" Finkdaddy. I haven't studied the bone-styles nearly as much as wood
carvings, but I know what looks great. Really nice flow and design. Now that you are
on rehab...let's forget about the day job (or is it night job) and get to carving full
time.

Finky,

Very nice work. That smoked bone is great. I've found it takes color very nicely. I can set you up with a link that discusses the lizard images found in Maori art works. This rocks and is a very solid stylized piece. Very very nice.

-Gman

Thanks Conga and Gman!

Here's what I did today:

It's a little less than a finger wide, and a little longer than 4 fingers high.
I started out trying to carve a patu(sp?), but during the process it morphed into some kind of spear head, which is OK too. :)

I decided not to stain this one at all because the finish turned out very, very nice and I was afraid to cover it up. I wish the pics were nicer. If anyone is interested in this piece, just let me know.

Thanks all!

Here is one that was cut from the same piece of wood as one I did earlier this year. I've had it roughed out since before Hukilau, so I thought I'd better finish it. It's carved from bird's eye maple and has a beautiful grain.


Here is the three that I did this week.

Mahalo!

Finky, love the hammerhead and the club thing. I think the hammerhead would have worked better had the cord ran through the tail, so she was more like a hook? Very nice, keep em coming

Very nice, all of them Finky. And I feel it is appropriate to offer some constructive
criticism, which seems to be what many of us are looking for.
Although these pieces are very nice Finky, I suggest that you do MANY MORE AND MUCH FASTER.
I hope my input is not offensive to you.

Great work fink!!! that moai is great - I love the profile view and how smooth it looks. Those hooks are very creative too, I like how you're tweeking the design and bringing in the finky twist. The hammerhead is really great. 3 in a week?!?! MAN you're prolific!

Did you hookknife the moai?

Hey Fink,

You should have surgery more often OR quit your job and start carving fulltime!

-Gman