Woodcarving

Many of you were very helpful when I asked to test a video a week or so ago. It was really a spontaneous thing with a video that wasn’t at all suited for the web. It had a bitrate about 100 times bigger than normal web bandwidth. Those of you who know I live in NY also know that we don’t have palm trees here. I was in a beautiful tropical area with only an Android tablet and no serious web development tools.

THANK YOU! I really appreciate all of your helpful comments. They gave me some leads into a more serious adventure.

Now, I’m back at home and come begging again. This time, more organized and for a very specific reason. Some of you might have seen that the great woodcarver,  Mary May, has plans for an online video woodcarving school. I’m helping wrestle through some of the geeky web aspects and am sorting out how to get videos to play in the widest ranges of browsers and devices. It sure is handy to carry a tablet computer to the workshop and watch instruction at the bench!

We will very much appreciate your help with video testing again. I’ve set up 4 test blogs to try different players and different formats. Please try as few or as many as you can and let us know how they work, or don’t. Please START HERE.

Now defunct.

Many of you responded. Your remarks helped tremendously, and we appreciate your help.

THANK YOU!

 

Sámara is a very small costal town on the Guanacoste peninsula of Costa Rica. Tourists are attracted to Sámara by a south facing protected cove on the Pacific which harbors modest surf, perfect for people learning to surf. An attraction even more important to some than the beautiful Pacific cove is a first rate Spanish language school that has a prominent spot right on the beach. Students ranging from college age through all adult ages make the school the center of the little town’s economy.

While in a gorgeous location, where the morning wake up call is a chorous of howler monkey “conversations” an delightful songs from sparkling yellow great kiskadees, the town is definitely not a “tony” tourist destination. It is a simple place where many of the 70 or so native families can trace their lineage to a family of 9 children (the “seven sisters” and 2 brothers) who settled and started the village about a century ago. Today, many of those families offer rooms for students at the school. There is little visible wealth, just a little town with one booming business, a few modest hotels and restaurants, a couple of grocery stores and laundries, and a lot of simple, practical housing. One of the reasons it is still small and relatively undiscovered is because it had no access by paved roads until only a few years ago. In fact many of the vehicles in town are rugged old land cruisers that date from the pre-paved roads era.

It is a simple place. There is little ornamention, except at the Catholic church. One can imagine that quite a collection must have been gathered to have the entrance doors decorated with carvings. An image of Jesus with a lamb decorates the door on the right, with Mary and infant on the door on the left. The carvings cover a large part of each door, probably 4 feet tall and are low relief. Whether one appreciates the style or not, one thing is readily apparent. In a place where there is scant evidence of artisan talent, or the wealth to afford artisan talent, these doors were carved by someone well practiced in carving. Note the crisp shadow lines, the well developed linen folds, and the background stipling. The work is on what appears to be oak or a very near relative.

In a place with little other ornamentation, these doors tell us the value people place on their church. The doors are special.

A young scout was awarded his third rank a few evenings ago, the Wolf. The occassion needed a new neckerchief slide. Carved in basswood. Finished with acrylic colors topped with satin poly.

Young lad, enjoy being a wolf. Learn well.