Knife Technique - One Sure Fire Way To Cut Yourself!

This photo is called an attention getter!


Thinking back to cutting myself while whittling,  each time involved the same mistake in knife technique.  The mistake was when the knife blade came off the edge of the wood, and into the hand or finger holding the wood.  A lot of this occurred when making a stop cut edge to edge, across the face of the wood.  A good example is when making a stop cut that separates the bottom of Santa's hat from his face, or when making a stop cut at the bottom of pants legs.

This photo depicts this common mistake in making the stop cut across the piece of wood, from one edge to the other.  In this case the knife is "pulled" down, where the blade will finish by going off the bottom edge of the piece of wood.
Notice what is under the bottom edge of the piece of wood.   A finger!

This photo illustrates a much safer method of making the same stop cut as above.  Start the knife at the top corner on the piece of wood, and "rock" it down to the opposite corner, following the stop cut line.
With this knife technique there is no way the knife blade will come off the stop cut at the bottom of the piece of wood.  Even if it did, I've moved my finger out of the way.
.....or making deep stop cuts that define the side of a nose, or the arch of an eye area.

This method does require a very sharp knife, because you are "slicing" to achieve the stop cut.  But then we're supposed to be whittling with a sharp knife anyway!  A wider piece of wood would require a longer knife blade, or a different technique.