FrankEV

How are you making the image larger? I use Inkscape. Insert the image, use the trace path command. This creates a SVG that you can resize without loss of details. Line work can be made any width you want. I make mine very thin. This also allows you to change the color of the line work and fill. Worth learning if you want to use images from onine. I also use Inkscape to modify images that need bridges and other modifacations as added to be scrollable. Btw, I'm a Deft Lacquer fan also.

First things first. A big thanks to Barry (flarud) for the inspiration and kindly shared information. I read his post “Jacks” in Bragging Rights of Aug 21 and later his update on Aug 26. I really liked his “Jacks” as he calls them. They are simply a wood box with a Jack-o-Lantern face and the box painted Orange. He lit them up like you do for a Pumpkin Jack-O-Lantern. Boy oh boy are they cute. Just had to make some. I made eight, I call Box-O-Lanterns,using cheap cedar wood fence slats that are a nominal 5 ½” wide by very rough sawn to about 5/8” thick by 6’ long. I ran the slats through my planer, to make them a uniform ½” thick and clean on both sides. The rough sawn was just a little tooooo rough for me. I cut all the parts at one time, but due to a limited quantity of long clamps I had to assemble them one at a time. All cutting, assembly and painting was done in just two days. I purchased two SGV bundles of Faces from Etsy for just a few dollars. I chose eight that I resized, using Inkscape, to a 4 ½” width. This looked proportionally good to me in the 5 ½” wide box I had decided to make. All eight were cut with a Pegas #5 MGT R Blade in one two-hour cutting session. This was a mass production project, and done very quickly, to make my very rustic and rough version. I decided on the size and started cutting the wood before having the chance to contact Barry and find out what his sizes were. His are much smaller. My box is 5 ½” square using mitered corners, 10 ½” tall. The top and bottom are 6 ½’ square, glued up from a 5 ½” and a 1” piece. On top of the Top is a 4 ½” square piece I beveled just for looks, again, like what Barry had done on his. On top of that piece, I added a scroll cut “pumpkin” stem that is painted green. After assembly, just using glue, I rough sanded the entire assembly with 150 grit paper in my palm sander just to clean up glue squeeze out and to get rid of the pencil lines I made for glue-up. I used my small torch to add some burn marks and then lightly spray painted everything (except the stem) Pumpkin Orange, allowing the grain and torch marks to show. I went the cheap way for lights also. I purchased from Amazon two 4 packs of Accessory Cords that have a candelabra socket on one end (with a holder for a 1 ¼” hole mounting), an inline switch and a plug on the other end. These are like what is used in plastic decorations sold in stores. I also bought a package of twenty-five equivalent 7W Orange LED bulbs. I’ll have extras for a long time to come. This was a fun project. I did not make an overall pattern. The only patterns were the faces I chose to use, appropriately located in a 5 ½” x 10 ½´retangle, for positioning purposes. Had to take the following pic outside as they are to many for my photo booth. Daytime After dark. One up close. Hope you enjoy. Comments and critiques alwasys welcome. Thansk again Barry, I know you will be viewing this post soon.

Very, VERY, nicely done. I guess if you ae able to cut the pieces out cleanly, like you did, painting them and putting them back together must be a cinch. What kind of paints did you use? And, did you protect the entire panel with a clear coat of some kind? Details, you gotta give details!!!!!!!!! A nice narrow (3/4"wide), Museum Style Floating frame would work well for that image. Easy to make, using only the table saw and a n accurate miter sled.

I think you have the idea of enhancing a project with color down pat. For that hanging ornament, what did you do to the back side. I'm hoping you did the same coloring on the reverse side as well. That cutting, as colored, would look wonderful mounted on an appropriate colored backer and presented framed as an art panel. If yoou want to improve your coloration, look up pic of real subjects to get a better idea of what colors to use. Using real life colors is where the true art is.

OK, I did a little review of Steves project. If you cut these directly from his pattern, they are close to being 10" +/- wide. I did not realize how large they are and, beleive it or not, when I looked at your cutting and Steeves Pics, my eyes (brain) did not see the "Flower" pattern in the Wings. I just saw another well cut intricate Butterfly. After I realized what Steve had designed and you made, I really feel that you need to do something to HIGHLIGHT the pattern to make it visually stand out or it is just another Butterfly. I'm assuming you are not planning to raise the cut panel off the backer like steve suggested, then yes, the light wood cutting needs a dark background. I would probably mask off the area on the backer where the Butterfly will be attached and spray paint the surounding area with a dark color (any dark color you like would work). I might suggest you consider making the backer 11x14 so you could mount it in a nice stock size store bought frame (or make your own) when complete. In the pattern I NOW see Flowers, Leafs and Stems. If it was me, I would chose three or four colors (simple acrylic craft paint from Wallmart will work fine) Green for the leafs, brown or black for the stems and any color you might like (Red, Yellow, Pink, Blue, etc) for the flower petals. The cut-out in the center of the flowers could be a contrasting 4th color if you want to take that far (something like Blue Petals with a Yellow center). Then, using paper copies of the pattern I would cut away the areas of common color on each to create stencils. When cutting, cut the areas slightly larger that then the lines of the pattern to make sure the ares under the panel get full coverage. Use each stencil to paint the three colors being careful to register the stencils to match the cut panel. Allow dry time between each color. After you are happy you have got all the open areas painted, just glue the butterfly to the backer as you normally would. You could apply your finish to the cut panel before attaching to the backer, but I would not. I would now just apply a coat of Clear Gloss Lacquer or Polyacrylic to the entire assembled panel and mount in a nice frame. Note: When you use paper stencils, you need to be careful not to let paint get under the paper by applying the paint by dabbing with a stubble type brush and not by bruching the paint towards the paper. If you try these suggestions , please let us see the end result. I'm sure it will be outstanding.

These projects are not as much work as they might appear. Yes, the scroll saw images are delicate, but stack cutting makes the cutting time rather quick. Esch pattern was stack cut in one sitting in under 3 hours. The use of spiral blades does speed up the cutting also. The table saw work and assembly needs to be carefully done and in the corrrect order to avoid errors in the fit up. Strap clamps make the glue-up easy, but glue drying takes time...but not much work. If the wood is presanded, final sanding is minimal and a lacquer finish is easy-peasy...spray/dry/spray/dry, repeat as needed to get a nice smooth finish. Sanding between coats is unnecessary. So, these Night Light projects are a little time consuming, but, really, not much work.

Beautiful, very well done. I may just have to find that SG pattern. 250 is small number of holes for me. And, it looks like they need a colorful backer.

Yep, maybe Maple or Aspen! I liked the Lilsc Plexi, but there are many other colors. A bright Pink might be a good choice. Don't forget, if the Plexi is transparent, you need to apply the drawing velum to the inside face, or you are able to see the light bulb and socket.

I don't think allowing light through the top works for me. Half inch material would probably eliminate the warping also but may look too heavy. I'm thinking a decorative pinnacle that has a similar curved pattern to the botton added like a cross (+) to the 1/4" top would stop any warp. I need to play with the idea on the computer. It is not to late to add something on these lamp tops if it looks good.

While I live in Florida, my son lives in North Carolina and my daughter lives on Long Island, New York. So, visits, or getting together for Holidays, do not happen often. I will see my son In October for Biketoberfest and my daughter in Joining us on a cruise to the Caribbean this November. I decided I wanted to make them Xmas gifts I could package up for them to take home with them. I thought a version of a ‘Night Light Lamp’, similar to lamps I have made in the past, would be a good gift for both families. My box style construction technique that I have used previously is simple and straight forward. Other than the Scroll pattern, all parts are cut and/or mitered on the Table Saw. The scroll patterns were stack cut using Pegas #3 and #5 MGT R blades as well as Pegas #2/0 and #0 Spiral blades. Rounding corners was done on my bench belt sander while most finish sanding was done using my Palm sanders and hand sanding as needed. The Lamps were finished with multiple coats of Deft Clear Gloss Lacquer. I decided to make these lamps shorter than those I made previously, only 6 inches tall, with a simple scrolled base that is formed by the walls. My design is based on a 5 1/2” square box with mitered corners, since 1/4” Red Oak from Lowes is available this exact width. I did purchase some Bolivian Rosewood (from Ocooch) for the lamp I made for my son as a dark wood lamp will be more appropriate with their bedroom furniture while the Red Oak will work for my daughter. The Bolivian Rosewood is beautiful wood! Both Lamps have a loose, 1/4” thick Matching Top with an underside “stopper” that keeps the top in place. I chose to use 1/4" BB ply, stained to match, as the interior bottom piece for both strength and not wanting to waste the costly hardwood. The plans to make shorter lamps made the task of finding suitable patterns for these lamps a difficult task as, you all know, cutting any kind of intricate pattern at a reduced scale is a challenge. Also, the pattern must be a self-framed positive image that allows the light to glow through the frosted Plexi behind the large open areas of the image. My daughter-in-law is a fanatic about Dragon Flies. I had previously found a very suitable Dragonfly image I had converted into a Scroll Saw Pattern and had saved for a future project. This Pattern became the initial motive to make Night Light Lamps in the first place. Now just I needed to find something that worked for the lamp for my daughter. After a lot of searching on-line, I found a very suitable stock image of a ‘Butterfly in a Garden’ that I purchased. I was able to insert the round images into a the square spaces by adding the cut-out corners. For these (and future) lamps I purchased ‘MakerStock’ two-packs of 1/8” x 12” x 24” Transparent Orange Acrylic sheet and Frosted Lilac Acrylic sheet, from Amazon. For the Transparent Orange, I glue Drawing Velum to the interior face to make it translucent (appears frosted). I think the Orange worked well with the Bolivian Rosewood and the Frosted Lilac worked well with the Red Oak. An important note here. I found if I sized and mitered the Acrylic pieces to fit the interior box dimensions snugly, the pieces held themselves together and did not require any adhesive to keep them in place. And, of course, a lamp requires the electrical lamp parts, which I chose to purchase locally at Lowes. However, for anyone that may choose to make these (or similar) lamps, I might suggest you search on-line (Amazon) to get better pricing. You can find the patterns for these two lamps in Pattern Exchange. I hope you may have enjoyed reading my detailed story above and, hopefully, did not get too bored. Here are the pic of the Lamps and, as always, comments and critiques are welcome. This pic was taken in dark with no extra lighting. Fairly close to what they will look like when use as a night light. If still too bright, the equivalent 7W LEDbulb can be replaced with an equalent 3W LED bulb. As seen, the Orange is brighter than the Lilac. PS: Boy, close up photos reveal things you don't see in person. Although I glued the stopper cross grain, there is still some warp in the Rosewood top. Also, the corner joints of the Red Oak appear to be open slightly, but they realy aren't.

There are a number of ways to fix "oops". You will find AC Glue to be your friend. However, if the "oops" ,is bad enough, what so bad about having to start over. If you can't afford t o throw it away, you might want to find a different hobby. I've completely cut many a pattern that never gets diplayed for many reasons and they wind up in the fire box. It is only wood! I personally like the thinner cut panel with a backer. In your pics I can not really tell a difference in color. If the imsge had more details in the butterflys and girl, then maybe color would be appropriate. If you have seen any of my work, you may know that I will often add color, but for this case I like the simplicity of the B&W effect. Hope you plan to apply a good protective coating like Lacquer or such and find, or make, a nice Frame to realy make it an outstanding piece. BTW, very well done!

Oh oh, you may have opened pandoras box. If other buyers get wind of the gift they will want one if they buy as well. Very nice and very well done.

Yep. That is what it looks like.

A short while ago I received a Steve Good email containing his Butterfly Box (bflybox2023 - good.pdf). Needing another tabletop item in my collection, I thought that this project looked like a nice project that would fill the bill. My solid wood resource is limited, and I was only able to find enough ¼” and ¾” Hard Maple and some ¼” Red Oak to build the box out of. I did enlarge his pattern to 6 ½” x 8”. I feel this made the box size a little more useful. I did stack cut the two ¾” pieces that make up the vertical walls of the box. I did the cutting using Pegas #5 MGT R blade. I should have glued the two boards together before cutting, as he suggested, rather than after. This would have eliminated glue squeeze-out and reduced the amount of sanding needed. I should have also stacked the ¼” thick stopper (his Layer 3) when cutting the inside of the walls, which would have produced a much more precise fit. Stack cutting the two ¾” layers of the Hard Maple was a very slow cut. I did not burn the wood, but the walls did not remain their natural white and became streaky dark. I was able to remove the glue squeeze-out by sanding, but sanding did not eliminate the dark discoloration. I also stack cut the top and bottom Oak Layers. I used the previously cut wall to act as a template to guide the blade while cutting. This was a little tricky, but worked out well so there was minimal sanding required to have all edges flush with the walls. I did darken the Red Oak with Minwax Aged Oak for a better contrast between the walls and the top and Bottom. The ¼” thick Hard Maple Butterfly applique for the top was a very easy cut using Pegas #3 MGT R blades. During the final sanding of the Butterfly, I profiled all the top edges to give it a slightly rounded-over look and feel as the top will be handled during use. And yes, I did have to make the project different by using Artist Acrylic Air Brush Paints to add color to the Butterfly. The assembled Box and Cover was finished with multiple coats of Deft Clear Gloss Lacquer.

I'm happy with my 21" Pegas. If buying today, I might consider the 30". If you buy one definately get the stand also. Great stable setup. Also needs a good separate min 5x mag light as the saw does not come with any attached light like some other saws do. Mount on a separate structure, not the saw, for best ease of use. The Pegas blade clamps and tensioning system work well, although I find the lower clamp a PITA to find the slot when doing it just by feel, especially for the spiral blades I mainly use. From what I've read herein, many use Pegas and are very happy with them.

Not too loose in the stand. Too loose to stand up like a sculpture by itself. Also the pattern does not have a flat bottom to stand on.

I'm not a puzzle maker. However, I found a nice Puzzle of an Elephant that I thought would be nice to make for my soon-to-be-born Great-Grandson. His nursery is all decked out in Elephant's on his crib blankets, a hanging mobile etc. I did not have any nice solid wood, so I decided to cut it in a piece of 3/4" thick premium pine, since I plan to paint the puzzle pieces anyway... Airbrush Elephant Grey of course using Artist Acrylic paint with a Polycrylic protective coating. Thinking I needed a wide kerf I used a Pegas #1 spiral blade. This proved to be the wrong choice. Although it goes together easily it is very loose and the cut edges are not very smooth. I have since found out, from replies to my Q&A, I should have used a standard blade. I had used a drill hole to start the perimeter cut which left a solid boarder. I added a backer to the border, mounted the boarder - tilted back about 12 degrees - to a base and I’m able to use it to display the puzzle that won’t stand up by itself. I stained the Pine stand with Minwax Sedona Red and finished it with multiple coats of Clear Gloss Lacquer. Although I did not do things the best way and the results could have been better, I think the finish project came out OK. Comments and Critiques always welcome.

You should be happy, very well done! Just an FYI, "Bragging Rights" would be the more appropriate forum for this post.

Very well done. Great pattern. I'm curious, would you define many hours? Also, spiral blades I presume?

Dick, Very well done. That image is popular. I'v seen it many times and I think I may have it downloaded it into my patterns library already. The Sky Blue backer color works nicely. You know my style...I would have added color to the cutting itself, but that is just me. OK...here is the big question: Where is the Frame? JFI, when I do a cutting like this I would enlarge the Image and reduce the border to no more than 3/16" all around. When mounted in a frame, with a 1/4" rabbet, the cut frame disapears and it image fills the fulll opening of the actual frame I use. I find that kind of presentation is much more plesant to view. But again, that is just me.

Go to Pattern Exchange

Found this image on-line and just could not resist converting it into a Scroll Saw Pattern. The cut panel is 5/32” x 11” x 17” solid core Birch Ply mounted to a 1/4” x 11” x 17” BB Ply Backer. Both the Backer and cut panel are Hand Painted mainly using an Air Brush and Artist Acrylic Air Brush Paints. A little regular Artist Acrylic Paints and brush work was used for some details and the gold belt buckle. The painting work was quite difficult and time consuming due to the many colors and the necessary drying time between colors so adjacent areas could be masked with tape. I’m feeling good about how well II was able to use the Air Brush. You will notice I was even able to get some light blue shading in the eyes and light gray shading in the white fur of the coat and hat. Pretty close match to the original color image I was attempting to duplicate. Cutting was done with Pegas #2/0 Spiral blades. The assembled panel was protected with multiple coats of Clear Gloss Acrylic Finish. The frame is my typical 1 3/4" wide Premium Pine, primed and painted bright Red (It is a Christmas Piece, you know!). If this fun piece does not sell quickly, it will hang in in my home for the holidays. Comments and Critiques always welcome. I put the Pattern in Pattern Exchange

Nicely done! I like it a lot. At first glance it was a little hard to see the image in the photo (probably more obvious in real life). Took me a little while, after looking more closely, to understand what you had created. To gain a little more contrast, if you do something like this again you might consider beaching the body before finishing. A soft wood like pine will whiten considerably.

Wow. Great work! Old scool Scrolling! How many hours? What Blade? What are yoiu going to do with it - sell, keep, donate? Im not afraid of the number of holes or even of the detailed assenbly, but If I were to make one like this, I would have no place to display it in my small home.

That is some FINE cutting - pun intened but true. Great job on the coloring also.