One great effect you can get with pumpkin carving stencils is to use them to create layers. You can use one large stencil, or several depending on the results you want to achieve. Here's some ideas . . .
Using the same large stencil you can work in sections either going deeper the further out you carve to create a 3D effect, or digging deeper as you get more toward the center to create a concave effect.
If you're using a "landscape" stencil like a bat cave picture for example, you can dig deeper around the outer edges to give the sky an eerie glow from the candle light inside the pumpkin, leave more to the grass and shrubs, and finally leave the cave or big tree and bats all the way up to the peel.
Or, dig the cave opening out completely as your centerpiece to let the light shine through it and build up to the outer edges, taking less and less meat as you go.
Either way your pumpkin will look amazing in both daylight and nighttime candlelight.
Of course the best way to achieve your desire effect would be to draw out your own stencils, cut them up per section, and carve each piece out. There's no limit to the effects you can create this way. In fact, all you'd have to do is use some tracing paper and you could get a stencil of just about any picture you'd want.
Imagine tracing out a picture of a huge haunted house, adding some bats and some eerie looking trees?
You could even take a picture of your own house and trace it out to go on your pumpkin. Carve out a couple of windows, and then leave the lights on in the same windows in your real house.
Might just get people looking twice!
I find that carving layers can be difficult with just a knife. Even knives that are specifically used to carve pumpkins can dig a little too deep when you don't want them to.
So I use the great new Dremel Tool for pumpkin carving. It lets me gauge just how deeply I want to dig without worries. Personally, I find it makes all the difference in the world when I'm doing some precision carving.
Whatever you decide to carve into this year's pumpkins, remember there's no limits. Whether you use ready made pumpkin carving stencils, or trace them out yourself, you can create some amazing effects that'll be the talk of your entire neighborhood.
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
Friday, September 7, 2007
What Started Me Looking For Pumpkin Carving Stencils
I never really thought much about pumpkin carving or using pumpkin carving stencils before, until I took a ride one night and saw a town-generated display of almost 400 pumpkins lining the banks of a local river. It was amazing to say the least!
Nearly every family in the town had contributed at least one pumpkin, carved and lit up. They had chosen just the right spot for the display too. The carved pumpkins were perched on rock formations right on the river bank, so the the reflection of the candles inside created an eerie, yet beautiful distortion on the water.
There were huge pumpkins, tiny pumpkins, and pumpkins of all shapes and sizes in between all sitting precariously on the rocks and lighting up the night sky.
Needless to say, it inspired me!
Sure, some of them were your standard Jack-O-Lantern types, with the triangle eyes and nose and the sinister smile. But there were others, nestled in between that really caught my eye!
These looked like they had been professionally carved by a sculpture artist!
There were carvings of haunted houses, bat caves with bats coming out of it, faces of famous people, carvings of what seemed to be perfect calligraphy, and all sorts of other spooky designs. A few had sports logos and other non-Halloween themes too.
So I wormed my way through the crowd, all here to see the pumpkin carving display, until I found someone who seemed to know what was going on and asked about the pumpkins that had seriously impressed me.
He told me that all the pumpkins had been carved by the local folk but that some had used a stencil to map out their design before carving.
Well that did it for me! I was on a quest to find some of these pumpkin carving stencils to use on my own family pumpkins. I found some at a local craft store which were nice, and I also found some really cool book with sports stencils online. That at least got me started.
Through these stencils I got the basics of how to use them and what to expect a pumpkin would look like. Seemed pretty easy to me, so I kept practicing and I got fairly good at it. Good enough to make a contribution to the scenic pumpkin display anyway.
But then I found another book called Extreme Pumpkin Carving that simply blew me away. It showed me how I could make layers and carve a pumpkin to look like a 3D image. I didn't see anything that sophisticated down by the river for sure and quickly learned to use stencils to add layer after layer!
Now I was really on a roll!
One thing I noticed though, was the more I got into the extreme end of pumpkin carving, the more difficult it was to make the more sensitive cuts with just a carving knife. As I got down into the deeper layers where I didn't want to go all the way through, but still add some depth to the image with just a glimmer of light radiating through, a knife got to be too hard to use.
Lo and behold, I found just the thing!
I had used Dremel tools before to do some modeling and some intricate woodworking, but I never in a million years would have thought that Dremel actually made a tool especially for carving pumpkins. Sure enough, the Dremel Pumpkin Carving Kit includes 6-Volt Minimite Cordless Rotary Tool and 10 Templates for simple to extreme pumpkin carving.
I was ecstatic!
So now you can keep your other holiday displays, because I have my pumpkins all carved and lit up on my lawn. And I owe it all to that one trip too see pumpkins by the river and the availability of all those great pumpkin carving stencils.
Nearly every family in the town had contributed at least one pumpkin, carved and lit up. They had chosen just the right spot for the display too. The carved pumpkins were perched on rock formations right on the river bank, so the the reflection of the candles inside created an eerie, yet beautiful distortion on the water.
There were huge pumpkins, tiny pumpkins, and pumpkins of all shapes and sizes in between all sitting precariously on the rocks and lighting up the night sky.
Needless to say, it inspired me!
Sure, some of them were your standard Jack-O-Lantern types, with the triangle eyes and nose and the sinister smile. But there were others, nestled in between that really caught my eye!
These looked like they had been professionally carved by a sculpture artist!
There were carvings of haunted houses, bat caves with bats coming out of it, faces of famous people, carvings of what seemed to be perfect calligraphy, and all sorts of other spooky designs. A few had sports logos and other non-Halloween themes too.
So I wormed my way through the crowd, all here to see the pumpkin carving display, until I found someone who seemed to know what was going on and asked about the pumpkins that had seriously impressed me.
He told me that all the pumpkins had been carved by the local folk but that some had used a stencil to map out their design before carving.
Well that did it for me! I was on a quest to find some of these pumpkin carving stencils to use on my own family pumpkins. I found some at a local craft store which were nice, and I also found some really cool book with sports stencils online. That at least got me started.
Through these stencils I got the basics of how to use them and what to expect a pumpkin would look like. Seemed pretty easy to me, so I kept practicing and I got fairly good at it. Good enough to make a contribution to the scenic pumpkin display anyway.
But then I found another book called Extreme Pumpkin Carving that simply blew me away. It showed me how I could make layers and carve a pumpkin to look like a 3D image. I didn't see anything that sophisticated down by the river for sure and quickly learned to use stencils to add layer after layer!
Now I was really on a roll!
One thing I noticed though, was the more I got into the extreme end of pumpkin carving, the more difficult it was to make the more sensitive cuts with just a carving knife. As I got down into the deeper layers where I didn't want to go all the way through, but still add some depth to the image with just a glimmer of light radiating through, a knife got to be too hard to use.
Lo and behold, I found just the thing!
I had used Dremel tools before to do some modeling and some intricate woodworking, but I never in a million years would have thought that Dremel actually made a tool especially for carving pumpkins. Sure enough, the Dremel Pumpkin Carving Kit includes 6-Volt Minimite Cordless Rotary Tool and 10 Templates for simple to extreme pumpkin carving.
I was ecstatic!
So now you can keep your other holiday displays, because I have my pumpkins all carved and lit up on my lawn. And I owe it all to that one trip too see pumpkins by the river and the availability of all those great pumpkin carving stencils.
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