This is what I got out of his picture he brought back from a vacation. I think it was a vacation?

I realize not everyone sees the same thing even when looking at the same thing.... So this in not even close to the picture but what I see in it.

  He posted the picture and at first I thought it was a terrible job of carving but then thinking back to the time it was carved I am sure most of those people had to make their own tools to use. And no graph paper to get one side to match the other.... So I set about making my own version of what I saw or see in that picture...

 Fred, thanks for posting this picture..

Its all maple so I used a tad of color just to high light a few places before I added the top coats of clear.  

 I understand he uses carving knives and I only use power tools..the older I get the lazier I get.

 I scroll sawed the picture in to 6 different pieces before I started working on it. 

The original piece is made with a 3 D type carving and I am happy just to get a frontal view.

Nice work. Quick, too.

I am so glad you are here and active. It amazes me what you do, and how you approach your projects. I consider you an artist.

Yes, very nice

Nicely done 

Artie that was about as close as I could get to that picture. Fred is the whiz with the carving ability. Just wait till he finishes and I'll have to burn my pile of sticks, or logs or what ever.

 My young life I started out being a furniture refinisher.

 I read about a grandma who was 98 before she started painting and she was so good she was hired by a police dept to draw a likeness of people who done the crimes by what the witnesses told her what the crooks looked like.. but they finally let her go for in just a few days they had half the city population behind bars. 

Funny how that don't even enter in to what's going on here.

I just think that you have a unique view of what you want to do, and how to do it. The finished projects are pieces of art. You may even inspire me to try and think a little out of the box.

Beautiful work!!

While the carving is rather different than the picture, both are absolutely works of art.  To modify your piece to what you did is just as good looking as the picture.  Like Artie so well said, what you do is art.  

Another work of art Jess, beautiful