He selected a 3D Roughing toolpath with a 1/4" ball nose end mill. This would strip away the bulk of the wood, leaving a "stair-step" version of his art.
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The hawk looked like a balloon, not a bird. Elias needed the texture of feathers and the grit of the knotwork. He selected a 3D Roughing toolpath with a
Elias uploaded the G-code to his router. He clamped the cherry wood tight and hit "Cycle Start." The hawk looked like a balloon, not a bird
He navigated to the Art Texture library. He selected a "cellular" pattern, scaling it down until it mimicked the layered look of flight feathers.
For the fine detail, he chose an Art Finishing toolpath . He swapped the tool for a tiny 1/16" tapered carver.
The smell of ozone and cutting fluid filled Elias’s small workshop, a sanctuary of humming machinery and stacks of seasoned cherry wood. For years, Elias had been a master of the manual lathe, but the digital age had finally arrived at his door in the form of a dusty, second-hand CNC router and a legacy copy of Mastercam X2