I just bought one of those magnifier lights that someone posted the other day....and now I can't carve! It makes everything look so huge I feel like I'm messing everything up. The tool looks huge, the lines that are supposed to be really fine look huge and wrong.

I need help and advice. Are there any tricks to this? How long does it take to get used to it?

I've lost all confidence and need guidance.

Do you have any scraps lying around that you can fiddle with? Try some new techniques and see how they go? I have a feeling you'll need some time to play around till you get the feel for it. Keep it slow and steady.

I had the same experience the first week or so when getting used to a 3x magnifier, now I don't carve without one!

Take Peachfaced's advice and practice on scraps until the vertigo and myopia adjust. Do this in increments of small moments of time until you feel more and more comfortable. You'll get there, then the sky is the limit for level of detail you can carve.

I just bought one of those magnifier lights that someone posted the other day....and now I can't carve! It makes everything look so huge I feel like I'm messing everything up.

Most of the time I hold the material close under the light so that I can see well. With a brighter light you don't need as large of an aperture to get a sharper image. It's why a pinhole camera works; it has a very small aperture so it doesn't even need a lens. So a brighter light will let you see better without magnification.

I only use the lens if I need to do something really precise. If I need to do even more precise carving I use the jewelers loupe. I've found that the more magnification I use the quicker my eyes tire. That's why I only use magnification when I really need to do so. The first time I used the jewelers loupe was to carve a rope belt, and it turned out well.

The more you practice the more you will learn when to use magnification. And a wire knife will help when you use magnification.

How often does Kirbert use magnification? His carves are very precise.

How often does Kirbert use magnification? His carves are very precise.

I am old enough that I cannot see what's in my fully outstretched hand without glasses, even though my distance vision is actually pretty good. I always use magnification when carving, and it's always the same setup: My +2.00 prescription reading glasses with a pair of +2.25 clip-on readers on top. I dunno if the magnification simply adds to a total of +4.25; it might be like decibels or something and not simply add, I dunno.

I have a 10X magnifier, and I keep it in my carving toolkit. I don't use it when carving simply because I can't hold the stamp, the wire knife, and the magnifier at the same time. I do use it all the time for checking the tips of tools I am sharpening, and I use it on rare occasions to look at stamps to see if the details I'm carving look like they're working out right.

I do think I could use stronger magnification when carving, but not a lot more. I'm already carving close to the level of detail that ink and rubber can reproduce on paper. Finer cuts would just fill up with ink and disappear.

Does anyone make/sell wire knives for those of us without the equipment or ability to do it ourselves? 😊

Thanks for the advice everyone. Sounds like practice is the key.

I had to buy 3 different magnifying lights before i found one that did not distort the image so much that I found it useful. The one i have i an OTT light that has a seperate magnifier amd light. Both are on flexible arms that reach down at ANY angle, to the table. Thus makes a huge differemce. I cam aim the light how i want, and get down low enough so it does t bend the image much. To carve, i focus only on the spot I am carving.

Item number PL7972

However, i agree, a pair of 3.00 cheaters and a strong desk light is usually enough.

With microscopes the magnification of the eyepiece and of the lens multiply (4x eyepiece and 10x lens = 40x magnification). So I suspect that the same principal works with your glasses. 2 x 2.25 = 4.5.

I carve with a 10-20x variable power microscope. It makes a tiny v-groove carving tool look like something used in woodworking. It just takes some getting used to.

How do you fit the carve and gouge under the lens?

It must be a dissecting microscope and not a compound microscope which is probably what you are picturing.
Dissecting microscopes look like this:
http://microscopy.duke.edu/sz61.jpg

Does anyone make/sell wire knives

Do yourself favor, go to a vet supply or farm store and get the biggest hypodermic needle they have. It will work much better than a pointy piece of wire.

Shiloh

I have purchased wire knives from Stampeze in the past. All you get is the blades though you need to get a good handle to mount them on.

Do yourself favor, go to a vet supply or farm store and get the biggest hypodermic needle they have. It will work much better than a pointy piece of wire.

I've tried that. I haven't got the hang of it. You don't treat it like a gouge but like a curved blade. That doesn't work for the way that I carve.

Dissecting microscopes look like this:
http://microscopy.duke.edu/sz61.jpg

It looks very similar to that however it is mounted onto an articulated arm that is clamped to the edge of my table so I can swing it out of the way when not in use.

PI Joe

... go to a vet supply or farm store and get the biggest hypodermic needle they have. It will work much better than a pointy piece of wire. (shiloh)

I have purchased wire knives from Stampeze in the past. (BBStacker)

What is the purpose/advantage of a wire knife?

Would grinding down and rounding off the backside of an X-acto 11 Knife?
http://www.atlasquest.com/gallery/viewalbum.html?gAlbumId=4489

Interesting! Hadn't seen that idea before. Dunno why it wouldn't work, but I suspect the effect would be somewhat different than a wire knife because you're still left with a long cutting edge here. If you cut the front of the X-acto #11 back to 1/8" away from the original back edge, it'd be closer to working the same as a wire knife. If you cut both the front and back down so what was left was a straight protrusion from the centerline of the handle out to a 1/8" cutting edge, that'd essentially be exactly what a wire knife is.

The odd thing is, I have a difficult time explaining the advantages of a wire knife myself -- and I invented the contraption. In theory, a dead stock X-Acto #11 should work just as well -- but it doesn't, at least not for me. Using a #11 feels like carving with a meat cleaver after I've been using my wire knife for a while.

When I devised the wire knife, I expected it to be a details-only tool, the cutter you drag outta the toolkit when you need to get the shine on that eye in the image just right. It came as a surprise to me that I use it for everything, even the long straight cuts along a rectangular border around an image. Just about the only thing I use a #11 for any more is slicing a big slab of rubber off a corner or a side.

The odd thing is, I have a difficult time explaining the advantages of a wire knife myself -- and I invented the contraption.

Think about it for a while. It will come to you out of the blue. Then you can tell us.

It came as a surprise to me that I use it for everything, even the long straight cuts along a rectangular border around an image.

I can't even get a straight line as straight as I want when I'm using a #11 blade. I use the straight edge to line up the point with the line by making the edge of the blade as close to parallel to the material as possible while still cutting. So, imaging the point in the material and very little distance between the cutting material and the edge of the blade. I line this up with the straight edge of the line I'm supposed to get but I still get some slight waviness. Am I just too picky, or can no one else carve as well as Kirbert?

I've seen an actual Kirbert stamp, not just the image, so I know I don't carve as well as he does. I've read his tutorials too. I just need more practice. I guess we all do.

I can't get a straight edge to work. Even when I get it close to working, there's something about the results that just doesn't look right to me. Too mechanical-looking, or something. Straight lines, even border frame rectangles, I cut freehand, trusting that the transfer has provided me a straight line to follow. I not only have to concentrate on keeping the cut straight, but I also have to make sure the width of the line remains consistent when I'm cutting both sides of a narrow straight line. On very rare occasions I mess it up badly enough that I have to get out a tiny Dremel bit with a narrow stone tip and carefully rub one side of one of those narrow ridges to narrow it slightly or clean up some waviness.

I not only have to concentrate on keeping the cut straight, but I also have to make sure the width of the line remains consistent when I'm cutting both sides of a narrow straight line.

Assume you're working under a magnifier lamp, so can imagine that using a narrow V-gouge is more difficult to maintain a consistent line width of a rectangle/square/triangle than possible with an X-Acto knife or a wire knife.

Does your knife preference have anything to do with pushing (gouge) vs pulling (knife) of the cutting edge? Besides its advantage for carving a narrow (rectangle/square/triangle) line with sharp corners what other advantage does a wire knife have over an X-Acto 11 blade?

Is it fair to say that using a Staedler narrow V-gouge at a lower working angle and pushing instead of pulling offers less control than a knife held at a higher working angle and pulling toward you instead of pushing away from you? Perhaps this is why most Japanese Youtubes show rubber stamp carvers using an X-Acto knife instead of a V-gouge.

Is it fair to say that Americans, generally being in more of a hurry-up mode, prefer using a V-gouge as it takes less time to carve a stamp than learning to carve a stamp even more precisely using an X-Acto knife (and/or a wire knife).

I have learned to carve with either gouge or knife, but I prefer the knife. For one thing, I am not in a hurry; this is a hobby, I'm not being paid by the hour. A gouge is faster, to be sure; knife carving is a two-step process, first slicing around the image and then coming back and removing material, while gouge carving is a single step.

The biggest reason for my preference for the knife, though, has nothing to do with speed. It has to do with style. Gouge carving is an excellent method for carving nature scenes, animals, etc. -- with a few cuts, you can easily create the impression of fur, feathers, leaves, things like that. It's also perhaps the method of choice for an "arteest" -- the person who is being creative, generating details "on the fly" until the image looks the way they want it to. As anyone who has found one of my aircraft or car stamps knows, that's not me. I prepare an image of a mechanical creation down to the finest detail on the computer, and carving is a process of precisely replicating this image in rubber.

And nobody who's watched that video of the Japanese girl carving with a boxcutter can claim Americans are trying to work faster. It was amazing enough she was using a boxcutter, but even more astounding how fast she was working.

BTW, in general, I'm pushing the knife away from me when cutting. I have a little bit of a problem with cuts that bend tightly to the right, as the line I'm cutting along tends to get hidden behind the knife tip. Still, it's very rare I turn it around and cut back towards me.

It was amazing enough she was using a boxcutter, but even more astounding how fast she was working.

Here's another Japanese youtube using a mini-boxcutter knife (recorded in real time) ...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P72KksaL3ao

Here's one of Kao Hanco's "astounding fast" youtubes (recorded in digital time lapse?)
Can she really carve that fast with an X-Acto knife in real time ...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkoWpHLC8Nc

Here's one of atelierterkepi's youtubes using a Rabby Circle Chisel (narrow U gouge yellow handle) to remove larger interior portions.
All precise outline carving is first accomplished using an X-Acto knife ...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5aWG-xGXCHc

This custom knife may have once been a chisel. In the hands of a skilled carver this quality steel razor sharp knife may never need resharpening ...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=01tO7wE02bc

After watching several of these Japanese/Asian youtubes it becomes apparent that a knife (e.g. X-Acto) is the preferred tool of choice for precise rubber stamp carving. Wish i would've learned this long ago saving me much frustration instead of thinking the Speedball #1 V-gouge should be my primary tool of choice.

CONCLUSION: Better to first learn how to carve an erasure stamp with an X-Acto knife as the primary tool of choice and the use of Speedball V/U gouge nibs as secondary tools of choice. I once mistakenly thought that Kirbert's carving knife technique was kind of an anomaly. Now i realize that his rubber stamp carving preference (knife) should be a first-choice common practice for elite rubber stamp carvers as well as beginners.