How do I woodburn? #1: Can someone help me learn to woodburn?

Because woodburning is basically like drawing with a pencil it would be very difficult to “teach” or tell you how to do it. If you have drawing ability you should be able to do it. My suggestion is to start with scap wood and either a pyrography book or a relief carving book like Lora S Irish’s “wildlife in relief”. She has pictures in the book that are perfect for burning. You will need to copy your design and transfer it to your scrap piece with carbon paper. The next step is to basically trace it with the burner and then just start shading and texturing. I’m sorry I can’t help you more but I’m sure theres plenty of guys and gals here that can. Look up wood burning or pyrography in the tags to get an idea of who does this type of work here. Good luck and make sure to post your projects when they are complete.

-- ~ Inspiring those who inspire me ~

The most important tip I can give you on burning is when you cross the grains, your burner will slow down and speed up as it travels depending what part of the grain you are trying to pass.. It is very difficult to control the speed and therefore color and widths. practice can help. But unless the wood and grain are exact duplicates of each other, you will only learn how careful you must be. Each new piece of scrap or project piece will burn differently.

-- What do you mean it's square? How did that happen?

Thank you for your kind comment on my English Setter. Where do you live? What kind of burner do you have?

Cheryl Dow offers a two set DVD showing you how to burn…
http://www.cherylddow.com/DVD-1.htm
She also offers a free lesson on her website showing you step by step how to burn a raccoon.
http://www.cherylddow.com/Raccoon%20Lesson.htm

Check out Nedra Denison’s website for all sorts of great information and tutorials…
http://www.nedraspyrography.com/Pyrography101.htm

Also check out Sue Walter’s site: for great tips and sign up for her newsletter…
http://www.suewalters.com/PyroSchool.html

This should get you started in the right direction. Good luck to you and if you should have any other questions feel free to ask me. Danette

“Keep burning and learning © ™”

Danette (aka Dannie) Smith
Pyrographic Artist and Instructor

http://www.geocitiescom/dangee1/index.html
http://www.geocities.com/dangee1/framesforsale.html
http://community.webshots.com/user/dangee

-- Dangee's Pyrography by Artist Danette Smith - http://www.dangeespyrography.com