I designed several simple chip carving patterns that are suitable for making fridge magnets, various ornaments, or incorporating them into chip carving compositions. These free patterns are part of my “Dozen Chips or So” collection, as most of them combine just 10-15 chips. Despite the small number of chips, these patterns still look good and balanced. The fewer chips make these projects quick to carve. These simple, scalable, printable, and free patterns are suitable for carvers of all levels, including beginners.
Since a larger board is easier to hold during chip carving, I usually carve several projects on the same basswood board and then cut the board using a scroll saw. I typically carve on one side of a board that is 1/4“ (6 mm) thick; choose a thicker board, especially if you plan to carve on both sides.
You can see a wood burned and painted decoration on the Christmas tree ornament as well as the rare-earth magnets inserted and glued into other pieces.
If you would like to learn more about chip carving and see my chip carving knife, consider reading other chip carving articles on my website: Chip Carving Practice Board and Chip Carving Coasters. You can review all my articles about chip carving by browsing the “Chip Carving” category.
Free Chip Carving Pattern: Fir
The Fir chip carving pattern consists of 11 chips, including a rectangular chip for the trunk. I designed this pattern in 2016 and am glad to share it with everyone. I share this chip carving pattern in the public domain — feel free to use and share! Download the Fir chip carving pattern’s PDF file using the button below.
This scalable chip carving pattern is interesting to carve, as the significant difference between the largest and smallest chips makes it a bit challenging. I recommend placing the pattern so that the wood grain direction runs from side to side. It would be more difficult to chip carve the fir if the grain runs vertically.
I use this printable chip carving pattern to carve Christmas tree ornaments. Additionally, I combine this pattern with others to design scenes. For example, check out this Chip Carving Coaster Design: Forest.
Free Chip Carving Patterns: Air Balloon
Here is the Air Balloon chip carving pattern. It consists of only 13 three-corner chips. Combining a simple rosette and the diamond patterns makes a new recognizable object – an Air Balloon. The carving may be left unpainted but if you decide to paint your chip carved balloon avoid too watery paint – it can bleed into the neighbor chips.
Free Chip Carving Pattern: Packman
I haven’t played Packman for decades but with this recent chip carving I can’t say that anymore. The “Packman” free chip carving pattern is easy to carve — it has only 9 three-corner chips. The chip carved diamonds are the smallest separate carvings I have done so far.
Free Chip Carving Patterns: Water Wheel
I call this printable chip carving pattern “Water wheel”. It consists of only 12 chips and has two versions: right and left. The center rosette may be left uncarved so that area can be decorated differently.
Chip Carving Pattern: Real Diamond
This diamond chip carving project is only six chips away. Try to experiment with the grain direction for this free chip carving pattern; transfer the diamond chip carving pattern horizontally, vertically, or diagonal to the wood grain direction.
You may see more free chip carving patterns on the READ N TRY Pinterest board. If you tried any of these free chip carving patterns please send me a picture of your carving.
Happy carving,
Roman
Update 2017-01-29:
I painted fir trees using different shades of green. I unexpectedly achieved an interesting effect on the dark green tree when some wood dust stuck to the “branches” during the final sanding (see the picture below). I also like a tree without any painting. Here is my little forest:
The painting is challenging as it is important to keep the paint from bleeding outside of the chips. I use a small, flat, skew type of brush — I found it suits well reaching deep, sharp corners.
I got another idea: next time I carve this tree pattern I am going to carve the branches first, paint the entire tree on all sides, and then carve and paint/shade the trunk. This way painting should be very fast. I wonder how would it look.
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