Nine months ago I decided to buy the Bauer 22in Scroll saw to help expand the type of art that I was making in my wood shop. I loved the Segmentation pieces that Wild Woods Creative and Pear & Pine and wanted to make similar items. From the moment I got the tension dialed in right, the Scroll saw, I named Jack Bauer, became my favorite tool hands down! After I made three or four animal patterns out of an Intarsia magazine, I decided to jump off the deep end and try an Animal portrait, (the Wolf Portrait photographed below). I knew then and there these types of creations were the things I wanted to make. I burned through pattern after pattern and changed mediums from cedar to MDF when I started messing around with color. I don’t know exactly when I saw a post on facebook about Dopamine decor, but I loved how the colors jumped off the art and I knew I wanted to try something like that. That eventually led me to the creations of this piece I titled, Golden Hour. It’s the first piece that I made that makes me feel like I have achieved proficiency with this tool and process.
I started off applying the stencil to 3/4 MDF with clear transfer paper, 3m adhesive spray, and clear packing tape. I used a Flying Dutchman #5 Ultra Reverse blade to cut out the 300+ pieces, while taking great care to not lose track of where each piece went. I then used a belt sander and Dremel tool with a 40 grit drum to shape each piece by rounding off every visible edge. Once the shaping was done, I sanded each piece to 220 grit to remove any belt marks and prep for priming. (I found sanding to 220 grit works best with the primer to get even layers. At 400 grit the primer doesn’t stick to the MDF as well, and at 120 grit, you see elevation changes and divots easier.) I then used Automotive Filler Primer to cover all visible parts, then sand the high spots down with 400 grit. (Using this type of primer is key to having a polished paintable surface.) From there I used a mixture of spray paint and acrylic paints through my airbrush to apply the color. When the paint dried, I glued everything to the 1/2in OSB backer board and applied three coats of satin polyurethane for the finish. In total I have 71 hours into the project and 30 hours of that involved sanded of some sort.
I really hope some of y’all out there see this post, decide to try a scroll saw, and fall in love with the tool as much as I have! Thank you for reading and checking out my work. Have a great weekend!