The maquette was modelled in clay and is only 260mm high but was surprisingly accurate to work from, scaling up using enlarging or proportional calipers

The important thing is the feel, movement, balance, rhythm and control of centre lines of the head and backbone

I tend to leave the maquettes surface loose so I can have fun in the stone improving and tweaking as I go

Note the points or holes where I have pushed in a nail, these are relatively easy points to find by measuring up, along and in with calipers. I use a spirit level or square for the vertical plane, and vertical centre lines on the clay to measure from

I tend to hedge my bets when I start in the stone by leaving everything say 12mm full, and then working from these found points I get the shape going and warmed up, sorting out where the big masses are, breathing a bit of life in.

Then I go back in within say 4mm this time and increase the focus or resolution of the carving and then repeat again and again getting closer all the time

At some point I realise I have gone from relying on pure measurement from the maquettes to instinct, sometimes it is a difficult transition, but you get there, it sort of flows and carves itself, a bit like using the force from star wars !