Learning to carve

pyro gaz

Seedling
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good stuff im completely new to mixing bonsai soil , i know what you mean about the large training pots! some of them take loads!!!!
 

BE.REAL

Mame
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I use 1:1:1 pumice, growstones and coco coir in deciduous, and I'm thinking I'll replace the coco coir with sifted pine bark for coniferous. BTW, growstone is a manufactured glass particle very similar to pumice that I buy locally at a hydroponic supplier. You could probably use lava instead. I've never sprung for akadama yet, but maybe once I start getting trees out of large training pots and into smaller bonsai pots I'll be able to afford the smaller amounts.
Hello, I been doing just about the samething, however the I got the clay ones, which are a little smaller than a marble, and the Gstones I could get are bigger and was thinking of getting a breaking them down. The glass stones that are available are like a half golf ball aprox. just curious if you get the larger size. glad to see someone else with same soil type , but then again I try so many different mixes, like I'm going to reinvent the soil market. LOL
 

SU2

Omono
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Hello, I been doing just about the samething, however the I got the clay ones, which are a little smaller than a marble, and the Gstones I could get are bigger and was thinking of getting a breaking them down. The glass stones that are available are like a half golf ball aprox. just curious if you get the larger size. glad to see someone else with same soil type , but then again I try so many different mixes, like I'm going to reinvent the soil market. LOL

What are you seeking in "trying" mixes
I don't post much but I have been watching Graham Potter carving videos and searching Harry Harrington's posts on carving deciduous trees. I know not everyone likes deadwood or carving on anything but conifers, but I do. I realized that if I was going to learn anything I would just have to dive in and go for it. I picked an old privet that I didn't much care about as the victim and decided to go a bit extreme to learn how to get depth, grain etc. The first picture shows the before (with some old carving from a year or so ago) in the middle of the bench. The second showsView attachment 91065View attachment 91066 where I am so far today. It's raining so I had to stop. It's not going to win any contests but I got some new bits for Christmas and figured what the H***. Anyway, I'm pretty happy with some of the results I got using different techniques and bits. Feel free to chime in. Like I said it's a practice tree/stump.
Tona


Hi Tona, hoping you're still around to answer this but I'm incredibly eager to hear, specifically, how you treated that wood (the coloration)? With the exception of the perfectly-circular hole in the upper part of the deadwood feature, I think that came out *awesome*!!!

I don't have many conifers but, since I collect most of my trees and collect larger material that gets chopped, deadwood is just part&parcel of it in many instances and despite it not being a universally-accepted approach I'm happy working deadwood into my trees, I see you mentioned h.harrington and I've tried his "wetted ash + lime sulfur" approach (including doing the wetted ash by itself before the ash+LS mixture) and as less-than-happy with it, I began messing-around with black&brown acrylic paint mixed-into the LS but still haven't "found my groove" for getting good color. Did you burnish that before doing any of the color work? I'm starting to suspect I should be doing burnishing and LS-dying, not just one or the other!

As an aside, am curious ~how long something like that took you to carve? I've found that, once I'm at the point I consider myself ~95% done, I can then spend another hour just being nit-picky, and will actually just tell myself "you're stopping in 20min" to prevent spending hours on fine detail (can always do that later ;D )

Thanks for posting/sharing this!
 

BE.REAL

Mame
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@SU2 , not trying anything, but seeing which will work for me and are readily accessible, don't even remember that post, I use almost all pumice now, but I have mostly conifers and still developing trees, once I get into refinement, I may rethink the mix.
Be well!
 
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