How to Carve A Leprechaun -Full Woodcarving Tutorial

Ventriloquist goes into a Irish pub and does a little show on stage and most of his jokes are Irish centered and after about the third or fourth joke they weren't going over well but old Sean O'Reilly stands up and says enough enough of the Irish jokes you're trying to make us all look stupid if I hear one more joke out of you I'm gonna come up there I'm gonna pop you right in there kisser and the ventriloquist is totally caught off guard he's like oh I'm sorry sir he goes oh no I wasn't talking to you I was talking to the wee lass on your lap yeah Ireland St. Patrick's Day when you think of St. Patrick's Day what comes to mind is it the patron saint of Ireland who drove the rats from the country who used the clover as an example of the Trinity and that's where the color green comes from is it all that or is it green drinks and leprechauns well I'm inclined to think it's the latter and that's what we're all about today today we're gonna make a little leprechaun bust just like that it's made from a piece of inch and a half by inch and a half by four and a half inch basswood and yeah that's what we're gonna carve up today so if that's something you want to do stick around and we'll jump right into it all right we've got our block of wood here like I said it's an inch and a half square by four and a half long so let's just mark on the bottom let's go up an inch and a half and mark this around here this is going to be the top of our shoulders right and in this case again we're working from the front point so we're gonna work our nose off of the front point okay so let's just go this is the shoulders here let's give it another 3 8 we'll call that the bottom of the nose all right and then from there we'll give it call it an inch we'll call it an inch because it is an inch okay do another inch here that's the bottom of the hat and the hats gonna have a little taper to the back but we'll work that in after on the corners here let's save a good half inch on the corners this is gonna be our little ear little ear area so that's the bottom of the nose let's just come across a little bit higher all right we'll save that area for the for the ears so we'll run that hat around here yeah and then we'll just drop it a little bit at the back so grabbing our knife here let's just knock these shoulders in on the three sides not on the front side okay like so do the other side this is where an inch and three-quarter knife is nice I can get right across that digger in all right now this is the bottom of the nose so we'll just kind of put a little notch in there it's kind of roughly lay out this whole thing before we lose our measurements I'll make that nice deep good quarter inch to start with all right so we can bring that down too all right let's come up a half inch from the bottom here let's just put a little little cut in there maybe five eighths from the bottom let's make that the bottom of our call that the bottom of our beard all right bottom of the beard bottom of the nose let's get this hat worked in here too take those points off of here cut in that hat okay we can do that all the way around here a little bit lower the sides but I don't want to go see how I attack that one I don't want to go too much down here because I want to save some ear space there so I want to go in a long angle that's a sharp angle and in the back as well just dig that in like I said we're gonna go a little bit lower that's the line I'll drop it down a quarter inch just to give that hat a little bit of a tilt just roughing her all in all right okay there's her bottom of her hat nose that's the let's just block off these ears right now all right I'm gonna round them after just so we know where they are big blocky ears big points off the hat this is we're gonna make a big brim on this hat before we do that we might as well round it a bit good grief I paused for a minute I looked at the camera and didn't look like it was filming oh that would suck all right so we got that hat fairly round and all we really care about the round is the brim my nice round shape dogs are out there and scrapping or loudly playing with each other okay now we're gonna draw this brim of the hat but I'd like to go a little bit heavy on the brim and then we're going to cut it on an angle after just kind of you know what for speed's sake I'm just going to take a v-tool here we'll just run that around I'm giving it a good quarter inch here just like that now I'm just gonna start bringing that down all the way around it was a snow day here today finally we got some snow again kids had no school buses are all canceled but doesn't look like it's gonna last either talking about warmer temps end of the weekend again so crazy winter almost non-existent so I'm just looking trying to get a consistent edge around the hat consistent width now you can see the you can see the angle of the hat here coming down the top has to do the same thing before we get too far let's just start cutting that angle if your knife doesn't make nice shiny smooth cuts on the end grain go back and sharpen it again I just sharpen this baby up or just dropped it up before I started so it's good all right I'm gonna take a big corner off of here too all right now I'm just gonna go from that make some nice long cuts on the top of the hat to the brim give it a real nice shape we still have to add the hat band in the buckle after so I'll give us a little more depth here but we really want that crowned out shape on the hat but it's nice long cuts will be nice all right okay that's looking looking nice now you see how we got the nice wide brim I'm not gonna do it right now but all we're gonna do is go halfway or so up it's gonna angle that oh what the heck let's go all the way around gonna give that nice little angle clean up that little joint there and that will be the top of our hat minus the strap and buckle like so so we gotta undercut that hat more after but in the meantime let's work on this nose area and get the little eyelids set so going a bit of an angle on these nose on these nose on this nose the angle of sides flare them out a bit okay let's give it a good good half inch let's do that I'll just bring that down see how my knife is on the angle like that start working away doing a nice good angle so there's a nice point here going each direction all right bring it down just a little bit more always checking that the we got a line here so we can see that's a you know 5 sixteenths I keep it all centered okay that's not bad for now undercut that had a bit more okay take your pencil now shape this nose up here that's crazy do both sides the same right now we want to go in like that we never want to cut into the nose boys won't be either perfectly straight or on a bit of an angle out all right take the sides off now I can bring that right okay now just shape that nose a bit besides in from the bottom of it take that big point off the bottom round it over okay angle swooping that in right and narrow the top of the nose more too blocky okay let's go up and reset this little eyelet there I don't have a better word for it I call it the eye shelf but that's not what it's called that's center line that's the the point between your eyes center of our nose angled back each way see that angle okay I'll take my V tool here I'm gonna run it up this this line here that we're really gonna fully shape the ears yet but I wanted to have that set I can work into that taking that edge off of there yeah yeah that thins up the head now let's take our pencil here that's the bottom of the beard but it's gonna be in front of the ears is where we're gonna come out so let's get a rough idea where that beard is actually gonna be come right down the edge of that ear now by doing that that's automatically gonna include the sideburns so that's strapped when it comes down it's gonna be like so all right and that will give us our sideburns on the side okay so do the outside here first it's gonna run my knife around there fairly deep this way and then before we do the inside we're gonna have to get those ears all set all right that's where we are right now all right let's get these ears kind of in place here now you can see here as my beard comes up here I want to carry that on a little bit so I'm gonna take my knife here I'm just gonna take that angle there see what the beard and it kind of kind of come up on that angle like that all right just kind of flattening this area out see that how that comes up so it's a the beard sideburn area here is one continuous flow here right same with this side coming right up that one comes in a bit all right all right let's flatten these just kind of scooping that ear out a bit for now we got to cut the shape and the the back off it still but we're free to scoop this out a little bit now my my deep my deep research shows that the leprechaun ear the leprechaun is a relative of elves so they get the old elf ear routine here so I'm gonna come down inside here just give that ear a bit of a point if I can bring this down there we go there's more of our elf okay same on this side okay this is round yeah scoop that out even more I'm taking a hollow out of there yeah I got the little little scoop in there I'm gonna take the back side now see that I cut that just like so now that ear is just gonna pop right out of the head now now it's an ear it's not gonna get carried away with details on the ears just as long as they're there and that point is a visible all right see that if you want to hollow it out a little bit more you can take like a little gouge just kind of go in but I'll do the same thing on the other ear and save some time and come back all right we're back again here's our our ears are all done here see that it's the back sides you can clean that up a little bit after in the backs but that's our basic ear we can see our issue going on the back here we got a around the back of his head up through the hat we also need it cut a little there we also need a hairline so we can show a little bit of neck here and that's gonna start right in here so this is a corner that's actually gonna get cut out and then we need our hair let's make it up here just so that we can see a bit of the bit of neck all right so we have to dig this right in here I'm just gonna make that beard pop a little more here let me just go right around there we go take that corner off the back to the bust doesn't really have the bottom finished too well but gonna have a bit of that shape in the back that's a point still lose that you take a bit of this there start the hair behind the ear proper so I got the hairline coming down across going down across nice sharp hairline here all right you get the point of a neck here behind the ear so we got the ear down the hairline that shoulders working on the bottom of this beard here give it a bit of a angle coming around I think I like to make that a little bit a little bit deeper that's better it's easier when the shoulders are where they belong to now okay let's get that strap in place the old strap beard I'm gonna go a little bit a little bit heavier on the bottom starting on the side let's go in front of the ears I kind of curl it around a little bit a little bit heavier in the bottom maybe for fun I'll take my v-tool just outline it v-tool is handy that's a that's a safe safe way to see if you like the look of something before you stick your knife in there and dig too deep it looks pretty goofy looking but you'll see knife in there and down the other way and there we go now this can all be brought down and rounded into the top of the beard and all these edges off nice and smooth there we go and the same thing with the beard around that edge off getting there not too bad now if you see this guy's eyes here these are full eyes with no no eyelids and so maybe it's a little little too much eye so I'm gonna do this again only we're gonna do eyelids on this one all right so I'm gonna do it the same way it's gonna dig in here come down after the fact we'll do the same thing again with the eyelids all right around okay I cut up underneath that cut the side give you a little extra of the corner a little more depth in there all right I got a little more chip out of the corner all right now we've got a lot of meat left up here do some eyelids doesn't take much just drawing some eyeballs for visual sake all right it's got eyes now let's take your little smile lines here cut them in deep all right I'm gonna cut under the nose gonna slice that right up here to under the nose and slicer in the bottom right up under the nose I'll make some stand out nicely a little goofy goofy little smile it's not a lot of expression all right I'm gonna put my little chip on the end there take a little corner see how that just ends that smile or that look scowl there you go there you go I'm just gonna undercut that lip give it a bit of a bottom lip give him a bit of the bottom lip not it all right all right now if you have a dockyard tool I've got one here so four millimeter I like to stick it under the nose like that little chips up I give a little little snot trough I think my b-tool too and give a little extra line there both sides beside the smile lines a little more a little more character there a little wrinkle all right his nose is pretty big still anyway we'll let it let it go his points on the head here this is a no-no we're gonna round these and like that give it a little three-corner cut in there little little shadow in the forehead corner same on this side there we go I really don't like his nose what can we do let's take it down a bit too much nose actually that's already better with that all right where we at here we can put a little line on each side here like I said I don't want to get carried away with giving them too much on the bottom but this isn't much to do some arms all right okay that's where we're at let's draw a big buckle big buckle on his head hat big big big strap on his hat and we're in the final stretch here so first thing I'm gonna do is gonna cut the the buckle in give it a little prominence before we do the strap we're gonna paint that gold so it's gonna really be a focal point now it doesn't have to be super fancy all I usually do is give it the square like that I'll just draw a little rectangle inside you see that I'll just cut that in that way the the buckle itself will be gold and I'll be the belt color inside that's basically all I do all right now we can just run that belt around there see what I'm doing there I'm just gonna do that all around the hat and clean up that buckle and we're on the home stretch I'll see you when the the hats all done all right there is our headband okay well looking at this guy I think we're ready to just put some whiskers actually no I lied I want to separate the eyeballs for some reason I didn't do that little V cut in there there we go let's just go I'm just gonna put a bunch of V cuts all around and see for the beard here I'll go this way and then I'll go this way and then I'll do the bottom since they're really short there's no can't really get much for squiggles in there we're just gonna do like three parts bottom flat and then into the face all right you get the idea I'm going to finish up I'll do the hair and we'll come back and we'll wet her up and have a good look all right there's our whiskers all done hair in the back of his head but he's looking pretty good but I think I might as well see if we can't get some kind of a eyebrow here something just to do it right all right you can do it do it right I'm gonna dig my knife in here nervously let's roll that up that's all it takes a little roll wasn't so bad there's a couple little nicks with the V tool now we can bring some of that color from his hair over and we did it right we didn't cheap out without doing that all right let me grab my little spray bottle here mist them all up here people always say what do you do that for and it's just a little trick I got from Gene Messer back in the day and it just really shows a finished project and anything that you may want to fix up just gives you some depth and some shadows so I would say this fellas ready for paint let's head on over to the paint table you know just before you go to paint look over your carvings make sure every little cut if you got a little bit got a little bit deeper a nice little sharp edges here there no fuzzies allowed if you're getting fuzzies go sharpen your knife again and you want every cut to be neat and clean with nothing extra no fuzzies all right but that man is ready for paint before we start painting here I wanted to show you my new my new paint rack made myself a little a little painting corner here on the old sewing machine base and I can just slide my chair over and I don't have to keep putting my paint stuff away all the time so yeah that's what I did all right some of the paints I'm going to use I've got white for the eye I've got a citrus green I'm gonna give him a green green eyes black for the pupils and the hat band paprika I like for the the hair give him a red Irish red-haired Irishman I got classic green for the hat and the jacket got some gold here but when I mix this I like to like to mix about eight to eight drops of water to one drop of paint that way it's a really soaking it I'll just give you a little see how that soaks in it's like a it's like a stain all right so I'm gonna go around and I'll show you all the little colors but we won't drag this out and make you watch the whole whole process but as you can see eight drops of water to one drop of paint gives you that nice stain look all right a little bit of white on the eyeballs white is solid no no water down paint here water down paprika for the hair like so a little bit of gold here on the buckle I'm just gonna go over the whole thing with some linseed oil get a little skin tone I should have mentioned before you could have easily just done a real light skin tone paint for the face but I always like to use a little bit linseed oil being very careful with my rags afterwards that I don't leave them laying around I usually burn them in the wood stove but this linseed oil has a little bit of raw sienna in it and that gives a little just a little bit of color but I'll do the whole thing and I'm gonna do a little bit of a super duper watered down red for the cheeks while the linseed oil is on here wet and then I can smudge it around a bit I've got a pre-mix of red here really really watered down I'm just gonna dab it on the lips give it just a little bit of color same thing with the cheeks then I'll do the ears just give it a little bit of a pinkish color to the cheeks nose and ears all right just before grand reveal I just want to give a big shout out to the patreon supporters I appreciate you and you know what it's turned out to be like a nice little encouragement for me so I appreciate it but without further ado let's do the grand reveal of our little leprechaun bust first time I ever did a bust on this channel and I like it it was fun a little bit torn my prototype had a black hat and I could go either way with the hat of black or green but yeah I do like a little bit taller hat for sure so anyway that's our little man and that is our video so thanks for watching guys and I will catch in the next one and who knows what we'll be up to see you later