Glossary of terms used on this site
There are 34 entries in this glossary.All
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| adze |
A roughing out tool with the blade at right angles to the handle. |
| bosting |
The rough shaping of the design. |
| buff |
To polish by rubbing a waxed surface with a cloth. A buff is an electrical machine with a fabric wheel at each end, used to polish metal or wood. |
| burl |
A dome-like growth found on trees, offering beautiful grain patterns, but difficult to carve. |
| caliper |
A hinged two-legged tool used to transfer measurements. |
| cannelled |
Bevelling of tools. Chisels and gouges with the bevel on the back of the blade are 'outer cannelled'; those with the bevel on the inside curve are 'inner cannelled'. |
| check |
The crack or split that occurs in a log, radially from the centre to the bark, as the result of fast drying. |
| chisel |
A single-bevelled cutting tool, used by carpenters. |
| chordal distance |
A chord is the distance between two points on a curve. The chordal distance is shorter that the distance around the curve. |
| concave |
Hollow, curving inwards. |
| convex |
Curving outwards. |
| crotch |
The V-like area of a tree where branch and trunk seperate. An area of unusual grain patterns, difficult but rewarding to carve. |
| custom wood |
Common trade name for medium density fibre board. |
| detailing |
the final stage when all the surface decoration is carved. A very common mistake is for beginners to put in details too early - when they end up in the wrong place and fix the carving to early. They do it because they are thinking 'surface' and feel safe with something 'caught'. However details are never the problem. If the underlying forms are correctly bosted and modelled, trust that details will just fall into place. |
| draw knife |
A sharp knife with a handle at each end that allows it to be pulled towards the worker. |
| firmer |
A flat-bladed, single-bevelled chisel. |
| fluter |
A gouge with a U-shaped cross-section. |
| ground |
The background area of a relief carving. |
| heartwood |
The hard, internal portion of a tree trunk. |
| high relief |
a loose term, as is low relief, without a numerical value: the background in such carving is relatively deep compared with the width of the subject. It would be fair to say a background depth of about a quarter of the subject's width is high relief. As high relief gets deeper so the subject approaches full three dimensions. |
| joggle |
A bend forged in a blade to give greater access for the cutting edge. To enable undercutting, as in high relief carving. |
| low relief |
a shallow, but arbitrary, depth of carving. As with high relief it is not so much the actual physical depth of the background as the relationship of this depth to the subject. A background at say a thirtieth of the subject width would definitely be low relief. A huge Assyrian lion wall relief may be many, many times deeper in actual inches but still be classed as a similar level of low relief because the ratio of depth of background to subject is the same |
| rough out |
To make broad, undetailed cuts (bosting). |
| sapwood |
The softer, usually lighter-coloured wood between the bark and the heartwood. |
| shake |
A radial crack within a log. |
| skew |
A firmer chisel having its cutting edge set at an angle to the tool axis. It is double-bevelled. |
| split |
A crack radiating from the centre of a log. |
| springwood |
The softer wood layers in the tree ring pattern, grown during spring or wet weather. |
| stop cuts |
Cuts made by saw, knife or chisel to avoid splitting when removing excess wood. |
| summerwood |
The harder wood layers in the tree ring pattern, grown during summer or dry seasons. |
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