Oh well I guess it's three pods.
I drew the pods and used sweep to rails to created the lumps for the peas. then created a flat raised relief of the outline of the letter then added a domed relief of the letter "P" to the raised flat relief.

Q has some techniques  I've wanted to try for a while now I used the texture magic bitmap for the log end background.
I then shaped the outline of the letter using a faded bitmap.
This bitmap is black and fades to white and back to black, when you apply the bitmap to a relief the hieght you give it basically leves the black alone and raises the white by the amount you set for the hieght, the greys taper from black to white. In this case I gave it a drastic hieght and the result was a pretty dramatic wave apperance.

I Made my life difficult with this little guy.
The basic design was fairly simple.
 The frame was artwork that I was able to import from "Smart Art Sign Layouts".
 Then I tweeked it a bit and whala. The problem "I" created was I should have worked the reliefs more. I didn't give myself many good sharp raised edges to paint to so the painting process was very Tedious.
Oh Well Live & Learn.

Being Smack dab in the middle of my "alphabet wall" may be the reason this one is the most popular?
Up to this point when picking colors my first thought is Contrast, Here I went a little suttler and the result seams to work and work well.

How to make an "O" interesting?
The font here is an Old English Font.
The Base relief is the weave texture from Dan Sawatzky's texture magic collection, applied to a slightly domed relief.
The "O" was sloped using a fadded bitmap also From Dan's Collection.
It's hard to pick up in this photo but look close and you'll see that the "O" is thicker on the right than the left.

Here's the deal with this guy.
The darker paint for the background and the raised domed rim is a Modern Masters metals Collection (iron Paint)
You apply two coats , let dry and spray with a rust activator, let that dry overnight and presto rust!  If you do it right you would swear it was actually rusted metal.
This paint actually has metal in it and you can tell by the weight, it is heavier than all the other paints.

Here I did a flat relief of about 3/8" tall that was the outline of the letter, then created the letter relief using the create bevel relief tool in "Enroute".
I applied a texture to the beveled letter to give it the modeled surface, then moved the letter relief into position vertically, once happy with the position I "merged highest" the two reliefs and erased the letter vector after it was merged and the two reliefs were now one relief.
 If you don't erase the letter vector, when you tool path the piece you would end up cutting the edge of the the letter and loose the outline or base relief.

The finish for these pieces is again a "Modern Masters" product "Pharoughs Gold", About as close to gold leaf as you can get in a paint. It Doesn't cover very well but usually two coats will do if applied to a light or yellow base coat.

In The case of the "H" I created my own letter just by drawing it in Enroute.
and placed it on a domed rerlief that had a texture Magic bitmap applied. This is the same bit map I used for the "B" but I resized it so I was only using a small portion of the bitmap.

Again I created my own letter and subtracted it from a refief giving it the recessed section. A vine bitmap was used here.

I just couldn't resist having a little fun here.

This guy consists of 6 reliefs and 3 bitmaps.

The F uses the rope trick available in Enroute.
You basically draw four overlapping circles,and erase all the lines that are inside the perimeter and end up with something that looks like a four leaf clover without the stem.
Then you tell that shape to follow a line and rotate as it goes around and whala you have a rope.
Just one of the features in Enroute.

The "G" I've put a woodgrained texture on a depressed domed relief, then applied the letter outline and the letter reliefs to that scooped shape.
The finishing of the back ground for the "F" &"G" have glazes applied.

I like the way the wood behind the "G" turned out.

The letters A to E are somewhat basic in design. As this progresses so do my abbilities. That's why I'm doing This.

These are flat reliefs with bitmap textures applied working with different hieghts etc. The letters are reliefs themselves and in most cases these are placed on a flat relief just a tad bit larger than the letter as an outline, This outline makes the painting much easier by giving you a crisp edge to paint to.
The C,D & E Add additional releifs around the outside.
 The C uses two bitmaps One for the background that the letter sits on and a weave pattern bitmap around the perimeter.
 The bit maps I'm using are from Dan Sawatzky's Texture magic collection.
  I should also mention that these letters are all done Using High Density Urethane Sign Foam, Then the Majority of the finishes are from the Modern Masters line of metalic paints.

Only 21 more to Go u-all come back now ya here.

Well now with the the "Z" cut and then the  finish complete on the last group of letters I can officially put a close to the alphbet project. 

The Process was a long one but every bit worth the effort.Each letter is utilzing some different Enroute tools to build the files. Then once built and sent to the Router The process of finishing each piece brought it's own set of techniques.
Over the next couple of blogs I'll be explaining some of the techniques and Enroute tools used to create each piece.
 As You Might notice I mixed in a few other little gems in with the ABC project.

These examples show that what ever you can dream up you can create.


More Too Come !

While recovering from rotator cuff sugery I've been trying to put the down time to good use.
One of the projects is to work on the fundamentals of Enroute software.
I've taken a chapter out of Dan Sawatzky's play book, (I recommend this practice to any one using Enroute).
In This project I'm making letters from A-Z , these are approximately 8"x8"
and all cut from "High Density Urethane Foam" (sign foam).
To Build each letter I'm using different techniques starting with the design process to the finishes.

I started this project prior to starting this blog so I'll try to recreate the process as best I can.


As I write this first installment to this catagory (A to Z),
I have actually just completed cutting the last letter  Z.


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