August workbench

it's pretty handy to have someone painting for me. I still do a little painting, but very little. I do all the carving, design, and customization as well as most of the flocking, then it goes to his shop for a few days. I probably should keep track of how many decoys we are making, about the only guess I have is I'm about ready to order more eyes, Cabochons, which means I've gone through over 300 eyes in 7 weeks. Feels like busy.
 
thank you. Caleb does good work with the airbrush. whenever I make a group like this I like to have everyone of them a different pose. I'm up to 42 poses now with just one basic pattern. It's kind of a challenge to see what all can be made.
 
Teal getting done just under the radar for early teal season. Messed up and grabbed my standard sized head with oversized body on the way out the door 😖 but we’re going to roll with it anyway

After the eyes cure tonight getting sealed with boiled linseed oil in the morning
(Accidentally posted in July vs this month)
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it looks good, I'm not so sure the head is too small.

I rarely know what day of the week it is, much less the day of the month, good thing I don't write checks anymore.
 
We've been carving lots of mallards lately, but got a few black ducks mixed in. These have the first run of IQ keels, or what Caleb and I call them Rein a keels. William Reinicke and I have been collaborating on all things decoy for close to a couple of years now. I gave him the specifications for my river keel and asked him to see what he could come up with. The design is absolutely superb and covers all the bases as far as self righting and swimming in current, it also fits in our slot bags where my old river keel design wouldn't . Caleb does nearly all the painting now.

With basic blocks of foam we can come up with all kinds of poses by carving and sculpting.

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Don Mintz said:
We've been carving lots of mallards lately, but got a few black ducks mixed in. These have the first run of IQ keels, or what Caleb and I call them Rein a keels. William Reinicke and I have been collaborating on all things decoy for close to a couple of years now. I gave him the specifications for my river keel and asked him to see what he could come up with. The design is absolutely superb and covers all the bases as far as self righting and swimming in current, it also fits in our slot bags where my old river keel design wouldn't . Caleb does nearly all the painting now.

With basic blocks of foam we can come up with all kinds of poses by carving and sculpting.

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Those are fantastic. I'm need to figure out how to get in line.
 
I'm really happy to have him painting again. He had quit painting after a couple of critiques on another forum nearly a decade ago, of course who knows what kind of painting those knot heads were capable of, for all I know those two characters are 16 year old girls just causing trouble.

I have lots of trouble with arthritis these days, I can only paint a few hours a week. Without Caleb, I would be back to a dozen decoys a month. I had to modify the button on my airbrush, my fingers are curving away from the pad. Getting old sucks. Fortunately I can still carve foam without pain, wood not so much, I've about given up on that.
 
Caleb’s got some serious talent and I love the attitudes you put into your carving. I’m not much of a carver or painter but then I don’t really need to be to make a decent gunning bird. I look at my stuff as tools and not high art.
 
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Mark Belknap said:
Caleb’s got some serious talent and I love the attitudes you put into your carving. I’m not much of a carver or painter but then I don’t really need to be to make a decent gunning bird. I look at my stuff as tools and not high art.
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Id gun every bird from don's shop lol. Built to do just that. you'd be doing his birds a disservice by sitting on a shelf collecting dust.
 
Mark and William, I don't think of my decoys as artwork, kind of flattered that some folks do. Caleb gets real irritated at me sometimes because I have a hard time finding a stopping point. It's what I enjoy and I do what I consider artwork at times, but nearly always in wood and not a decoy, something flying or a caribou running, or a fish jumping out of a splash. That said, we make our decoys to hunt, dealing with durability, colorfast quality, effectiveness at bringing birds in, the fancy stuff is just the enjoyment of the process.

All of us have a different level of "Best", or the best you can do. That often increases over time and the the best gets better. My dad ingrained in me that you should always do your best, not the least you could get away with. I love carving, sculpting, hand painting and airbrushing, they just happen to all meet at the place where my decoys are made. I was a multimedia sculptor and painter long before I ever carved a decoy. All the talk about killing birds over clorox bottles just doesn't satisfy my creativity, at least you could flock those bottle black, paint an ear of corn on the top, lol.

Everyone has a different approach, a different desired result, I just like them all, do what you do, there are no rules. Most times between me an William it's a large volume of crazy ideas how to bring in more ducks.

Dax, that reminds me, I have two doves to make, designs for a company, right after I finish their two pigeons. I think this will be the 10th and 11th time I've designed pigeons. Tanglefree, Soar no More, and Final Approach were some of the companies I've made pigeons for. I'm starting to feel like the pigeon guy,
 
When I went through my fire academy, the only thing I remember through all the beatings and physical nonsense was... "put your stamp on it". Basically dont do anything half ass or something you wouldnt be proud of, and do it in a way that people would remember your stamp of approval. Probably why get along so well in our approach around this craziness and always pushing the limits. You sir.... well... you just push it to a whole new level all the time. Its fun to watch for sure.
 
Your decoys are beautiful. Love seeing what other carvers produce. Pushes me beyond just the basics even though I tend to gravitate towards the older styles of where I grew up
 
I think most of the initial interest decoy wise came through the refuge, I know that's where tanglefree found me. After that I suppose word just got around. Doves were way down the list, I did most of the duck species before I ever did doves or pigeons. I have around 80 designs out there right now for decoys of various types. I've only done one dove design that I can remember, lots of pigeons.

You just got to keep putting your work out there until someone notices. I've been a mold maker and designer for over 45 years now and have a working knowledge of what types of designs will work in various molding formats. Not very many of the designs I've done were wood, nearly all the duck decoy designs I've sold have been made of foam. Here is a little design I did that had a good run, we sold over 100,000 of these ceramic salt and pepper shakers over the course of 14 years, made in a two car garage start to finish back in the 90s. These days I'm constantly making molds for a variety of projects, William and I are constantly innovating the possibilities, not partners but a trusted friend.

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