I am going to argue one point :) I like to use wood folks are throwing away, bringing life back into a scrap piece of ply wood can look great. But we can agree to differ as I get what you are saying and thanks for your tips
I'm actually going to agree with you lol. I made this video months ago and since then I've learned a lot more. Using scrap wood can be so beautiful because it's character.
You have a very watchable personality.. So pleased I stumbled across your advice. I've only done one small signage price, so far, but will do more once I sourse some interesting wood. Love watching you on here.
This is very much needed and appreciated, I decided I wanted to get into woodburning and I've seen a lot of pieces by different artists and I'm an amateur artist and I've been wanting to try something completely different for a while now. So I will definitely use these tips once I get started.
Can I offer some advice as an aromatherapist? Get a little bottle of lavender oil! It’s use on skin burns is the most & practical thing to use on minor burns, you’ll know if you need to go to a hospital if it’s a really bad burn but if it’s a minor one get the lavender oil on it, it takes a lot of the heat/pain away & is great at preventing burn marks/scars too.
Thank you so much for these tips! The mini tea strainer is a game changer! I have the same one. So much better than sandpaper and wet sponge. Cheers from Pennsylvania USA.
Hello pal. I love you enthusiasm and passion for you work. I'm just starting out as a 58 yr old trying to find a "clos" (glega term) for my creative side which has been stifled for toooo long. Thanks
Thank you I’m a newborn in this art. But have been painting for a long time. I’m feeling board in continuous commissions. Feeling like I want tp paint what I want to paint. SO I’m trying my hand at wood burning 😃. Thanks for the pointers
I am doing a wood burning project on this guitar pedal board I made from an old pallet that’s made from pine. I thought it was kinda funny that that was the exact wood you recommended (not) using. I don’t know much about wood in general but the pine’s lightweight is ideal for this project, so I’m going to just roll with it. Although, I understand what you mean by it being soft/hard and not being ideal. I appreciate the video and tips you’ve given, thank you 👊
Thank you man, I always wanted to start full in this gig. Every time I start it I never finish it. I do one drawing and then I stop for months. I'm thinking in going hard and make some side money. Motivation it's always a factor that it always goes away for me. Thank you for does tips.
This happens to me too. You're not alone. Sometimes I lose my motivation. But when you finally do finish you feel amazing. Also sometimes the best works take the longest.
Hey, I dabble in electronics and I clean my soldering iron tips in Flux (plumber's Flux). I wonder if that would also work for these tips. I also use an ammonia block - hot soldering iron on it cleans the tip. I am thinking by scratching the tip you could be scratching off any factory finish - - Protective Coating, and shortening the lifespan. Maybe I am wrong though ::
Plywood shouldn't be used for wood burning at all, since it has glue in it that can release harmful fumes when burned. Same goes for the different "finishes" you mentioned in your first point (1:04) Never burn on anything else than raw wood unless you have a protective gas mask!
It depends on the heat of your tool. If you take care, work in a well ventilated area you should be fine. Also, with a 45 degree sanding on the edges it reveals the plys and when varnished can really punch.
I would have to agree! Your videos have been very helpful. I have been dabbling in pyrography now on and off for about two years. I have gotten better from my starting point but am just now getting to the point where I am starting to obtain more realism. I have yet to really start selling any of the pieces but am slowly working on it. Thanks again for the helpful information!
Spare Time With Scott thank you for your words. Selling can be tricky. I've had a lot of success with custom jobs but selling personal pieces isn't so easy. When I figure out the best way I'll make a video 😊
Hey dude, just wanted to say you can also check google for local saw mills. They'll usually have a lot of nice wood for burning and can even cut it to whatever size you want. Not sure how many there are in your country but check it out!
I will definitely try these tips. LoL. I’m new to this. But my heart wants to do this. So I’ll let you know how things go. Anyway, God bless you. Thanks again for the tips. 🙏
great tips! i discovered using the same tip for everything, and working from black and white images when i first started.... definitely helpful beginning knowledge. i have been following you on instagram for ages, love your work. happy i have now found your youtube, working my way through the videos x
In Australia we aren't allowed to put nails in the wall to hang things while renting. I work on ply and on hard woods to diversify my market and allow new art enthusiasts to still enjoy my art while not having to damage the rental they are currently in. I do sell them cheaper than my hard wood art works but it makes it more accessible and I find I get more commissions and positive word of mouth feed back/ referrals. Loving the channel!
jack visser haha yeah some places won't even let you have removable hooks. So I wanted a lite wood for apartments and I use the big stuff for galleries.
I did on plywood, it doesn’t look cheap, it’s more of how do you treat your wood to make it look sophisticated because, what does it matters when you use the most luxurious things but, we’re not taught how to treat them with the best care you could, for them..? Gives them the best and they will shine like the rest of the luxuries. :)
What would you suggest for beginners using wood to start? Everyone has different ideas but I wanna know what worked best for you in the beginning? Thank you!
I started with pine. Because it was cheap and plentiful but I realised that pine is possibly the worst kind of wood to use. But I guess when you start with it, you kind of learn how a bad piece of wood feels compared to good wood like sycamore or birch. I think you could start with pine to see if you can pull something half decent out of it even tho pine fights with you the entire time. If you can make something decent with pine then once you hit the hardwoods (except from oak) you will cruise.
you have beautiful art work your exceptionaly talented.I showed someone your work. may I ask a qùestiòñ .? is your pen 30 watts or higher or does it just take along time for wood to burn and like you said patience, I was given a pen but , am clueless in this field of work , maybe ill go to the michelangelo of wood, buring to ask.thank you jack.
Hi Paul. It sounds like your using pine. Typically pine is the first for burning as it has an inconsistent texture. The wood is soft and become hard wherever the grain is. If you try out some other woods (preferably hardwoods) like sycamore, birch or poplar, you will see a huge improvement in your work. Ps. Avoid oak too
Dunno man, i agree with all of these except your one tip theory....while yes i can do everything with the universal tip, its so much easier and faster to use the tapered pointed tip for the extreme details and shading- universal tip (triangle pointy one you spoke of) for thick lines and mini universal for fine lines...if your main reason is tool preservation, i just have 3 pens each with their own assigned tips so i dont have to worry about breaking the pens or waiting for heat to die down....like just seems silly to use the universal point to shade when the tapered is built specifically to make that easier for you....if there were no more tapered tips in the world sure id use universal but they are there and cheap allow me to create so much more fluidly - faster and more efficient
thank you for those great tips Jack and also the video on the dremel tips you use. Can you tell me which one you use on the whiskers on the leopard you did, those all look a bit thick for doing whiskers?
Hi Jack, great tips really useful thanks. I am wanting to upgrade my Pyrography kit, I have just got a £30 pen atvthe moment, I have a £70 budget, can you please advise as I am not sure what is the best to buy. Thanks Barry
I honestly couldnt tell you a definite answer as I've stuck with my same pen for everything. But I'm sure if you buy a pen for around £70 you wont be disappointed. My pen only cost between 40 - 50 I think and I've never been disappointed.
I can't seem to shade on a slab of wood from a tree. I've tried the shading tips and universal tips..and they get stuck on the woodgrain is there anything I could do
This sounds like an issue with the type of wood you're using. You get this problem with oak and pine mostly. Try to stick to woods such as sycamore, silver birch, poplar. These are perfect for burning.
Thank you Jack. I just started wood burning and my mother gave me some pieces of wood from a tree and the wood grain is pretty bumpy. I appreciate the tips brother! I will follow your RU-vid channel ;)
Me, too cheap to get anything other than those little pine wood blank boxes and stuff from craft stores: “oh no, pine is bad? Yikes.” To be fair, it’s a challenge to keep the lines nice on pine, but yeah, I can see why it’s not considered great for this medium, I had some real big issues with it on my last piece. It still came out nice (for a beginner pyrography artist) but it’d be nice to not have to deal with... pine being pine, I guess. 😂 great tips, though, I’m totally going to repurpose a tea strainer!
I tried so hard to listen for the tips.... but I heard nothing Jon snow!.... damn. I’ll have to watch several more times... now I love pyrography so much more...
I noticed on most burnings that the lines left behind from the wood planer shows up and make the burn look unprofessional.......I would think that a very heavy sanding to remove them before starting would appeal to the discerning critic
I got a question about the back ground bro. I'm doing a piece right now and im trying to darken up my back ground with a torch. Problem is I totally messed up a piece by over burning too close but was inspired by your Lion
Ayyye Brooo I've done that a couple of times. If you watch my whiskers video. You'll see the tool I'm using. I use that tool to bring back some detail around the edges if I burn too close.
the machine i bought seems dangerous.the pen handle gets really hot and uncomfortable to hold,the wires get hot too.one pen started crackling,and actually melted a hole in itself.....stupid question,but is that normal?
@@toppertruthio is it one of the cheap ones with a red plastic handle? I got on like that once just to see if I could recommend it as a cheap option and it worked for only one burn then stopped working
1) That little tea strainer WILL cause damage to your tips. Tiny micro scratches that you might not see right away, but they will add up over time. If your tips are polished, you will notice the scratches a tea strainer will put into them. Probably won't see any difference on a stamped out Chinese made brass tip. HINT: Polish the working surfaces to a mirror finish, get it hot to get a patina on it, and then see how nice it works (smooth). 2) One tip can NOT do everything. You can't shade with a knife/skew tip, just as you can't print letters with a shading tip... Yes, NEVER take a hot tip off of a soldering iron type of burner, it will strip the threads and ruin it. Wait for it to cool down. Otherwise, get a wire tip burner with fixed tips to begin with, and stop fooling around with the amateur hour tools. 3) Yep, grayscale or duo-tone is even better. 4) Yep, crap wood is much harder to work on. The sap in pine is even acidic, so it will eat your metal tips. Basically you want a wood where the hard grain is not much harder than the soft grain. So Oak, pine, elm, or just knotty wood in general are off of the menu. 5) Or use the "adjust values" to fix it in photoshop. !!!PRO TIP ALERT!!! This works best if you have soldering iron type burner that has a variable control box... Wrap some aluminum foil around the heating element (about 3 layers), and then use a piece of steel wire (like from a bread tie) to hold it in place. The aluminum foil will act as a thermal insulator, because its emissivity is very low (means that it does not absorb or emit infrared radiation very will), so each layer will transmit less & less heat to the next layer. This will also tend to cut down on the convection that normally goes on too (your hand should stay much cooler after this tweak). Now this will make your tool heat up much faster, AND get much hotter with the same amount of power being used. You DO NOT want to run your soldering iron type burner at full output in this configuration, as you are likely to burn out the heating element then. Hence the reason it is best if you have variable control (basically a light dimmer), so that you can turn it down a little bit.
Thanks for your additional advice. I posted this video a long time ago and have since discovered a lot more to the craft. However I disagree that one tip can't do everything. I've used the same knife tip since I began and can do pretty much anything with it including shading. I agree about the tea strainer now tho. I now use a scrap piece of glass paper while I'm burning to get excess carbon off the tip.
@@jackvisserphotography What is "glass paper"? I'm guessing that's some sort of fine sandpaper like stuff? Try polishing your tips to a mirror finish, get a patina on them, and then see how nice they work. You'll also notice that they don't carbon up as easily then too (less surface area to stick to). I can use a hammer to put a screw in, or even take one out, but a screwdriver works so much better.
@@BobSmith-br8om basically yeah. I think I might be mixing up the name. Just Googled it. The stuff I use is called emery paper. Very very very fine grit
@@jackvisserphotography Okay, yeah "glass paper" is basically "sand paper". Emery paper/cloth, is just "sandpaper" by another name, which you might be able to find it up to 3000 grit. Aluminum oxide polishing compound starts at something like 12,000 grit, and just gets finer from there. I'm used to wire tipped pens, which work much better with a polished tip surface, as the carbon doesn't hardly want to stick then. They also heat up (and cool down) much quicker, and the end of the tips are a lot closer to your fingertips (easier to use, as you have way more control).
Lmao lowkey hating on the fact u said plywood makes ur artwork look "cheap" for one most art beside woodburning using old odd and end stuff and for "cheap wood" some of us don't got the money so we go to free piles and pick up what we can or find cool pieces in the woods don't call it cheap when it's just recycling or reusing and turning something that's nothing into something gorgeous. And yes I understand some woods are better than others ofc but sometimes u don't got the money or whatever. And just cause a studio won't take it don't mean it isn't worth money and plywood can be used if u know how to burn and it don't look any different at least to me
I gave you a thumbs down because as an artist it doesn't matter if you have a cheap wood burner or a professional pyrography burner or good wood or bad wood you always adapt ..... I can burn on paper and it still looks good but I give you props on the tea strainer I didnt know about that
@@jackvisserphotography Not if you know where to buy it from! What if I told you I get half a transit load of green oak boards for £30.00 and allow it to season for a year? I have just finished hand carving a solid oak fire surround panel using some of the boards this week, ten days of carving, just the sanding and finishing left! Lol.😆
