When we first carve watermelon of any kinds, I always have to level the bottom of the watermelon by just using a long knife and make a straight cut at the bottom. The reason I do this because when I carve, the watermelon will be stable when you make it as a centerpiece.
After we level this watermelon then I would use rotary plate to help me work it better. This rotary plate is not necessary. If you don’t have it, don’t worry about it. It’s just to make your work easier.
So now I put this watermelon on the plate then I will make a foundation. This knife is a very special knife, very thin and durable, very sharp inside, we can call it bird’s beak knife. So when we use this knife in carving, you can hold it the way you hold your pencil when you are writing. Have those two fingers on the side of the knife and have the middle finger on the other side. Make sure that your middle finger is away from the tip as the length—the distance from the tip to your finger is about—is the depth that you would let the knife into the watermelon.
So this foundation will help support the watermelon by cutting about one third from the bottom. After we make a cut then I will have to—I place my knife where the cut that I had originally made and then slanting my knife upward a little bit, press my knife in the same depth that I did on the first cut. By this way, by making a parallel cut, I’d be able to make—cut a strip off then you will see the line. We do this all the way. When you see the line, this part will be your supporting foundation but I will peel off the top part.
You may use any paring knife that you have in your kitchen to peel this part because any knife could do the work. When you peel the watermelon, I would always peel that I would leave some white part dry of the watermelon on. So when I make the flowers, this white part will be the tip of the flowers, makes it much more better look in contrast of the color. You will have green, white, and red in your flowers.
You may roughly peel the watermelon without thinking that it had to be perfect one because we’d be able to go back and thin it out again to make it look smooth and evenly colored.
After you peel off roughly, then I always thin it very nicely so I will have the white part evenly around, all over the watermelon. A touch up and a detail at this part are very crucial. I spend more time of doing this part of the carving, more than when I’m making the flowers.
Once you make it look nice, like this one that I already prepared, I would start to make a center of the watermelon first. I will hold a knife like I’m holding a pencil again, and I will make a circular cut by placing a knife into the watermelon, only a quarter of the inch, and then make a circular cut by rotating the plate.
Once the line is two then you will slant in your knife inside of the cut, and then make a parallel cut. After this is another shape obtained, so we will shape this one up as a little dome in the middle of the watermelon, also spend more time doing this ‘coz the flowers will look nice of the shape of the dome that we are carving.
When I shape up the dome then I will shape up the outer by just thin off the sharp edge of the watermelon then another touch up by making a dome-shape into the bottom. Once the dome-shape have been touched up and looks nice, then we will start to carve the petal. The reason that I have to carve the middle part first is because once the knife finished the bottom, then I don’t have to risk ruining the petal at the bottom.
Right now, I can do anything outside and touch the watermelon the way I want ‘coz there is no petal for me to worry about. When I carve that centerpiece, I will hold a knife perpendicular towards the bottom of the dome, place the knife in, then make a sawing motion in and out around the curve of the dome, lift the knife up, then you slant in your knife outward. You will skin off some watermelon underneath of the cut. By this way, you will see the petal showing up.
Again on the next petal, I will make a nice touch up on the dome, so you will see the surface of the dome. This area will be lower than the petal that I just made. I’ll make the second petal by placing a knife, the tip of the knife perpendicular toward the dome, about one fourth of the previous petal. Then I make a sawing motion of the knife in and out around the corner. Again, placing the knife, slanting your knife, the tip outward, skin off underneath of the cut that you just made. You will see the petal stand out. You would do this on and on onto the center of the dome.
On the second layer of the petal, I always alternate it by placing the first petal of the second layer in the middle of the two petal outside. Again, this is a sawing motion, don’t just push your knife to the right hand side. By that way, you may be risk of cutting off the petal. When you do a sawing motion, once you stop, the knife will stop, you’ll not cut further than you are expecting.
The dome part of the watermelon is always taking more time because it’s the centerpiece, it’s a delicate look, and if you take more time into making the petal thin and spiral inside the centerpiece without cutting it off, then this part will show, will make you look like you’re an expert of making watermelon.
When you get close to the center, the petal will be smaller and smaller and it’s more tight to work with, but this is the part that you have to pay more concentration on. In the center, you will see that I would no longer make the petal but I will make a spiral cut by placing a knife and push it against the outer part along one curve, then I skin off a little bit underneath.
Continuing where I left off, go along the curve then I skin off. You will that it will be a flower bud at the middle of the flowers. Since the centerpiece is done, we can make the petal cut around the rim of the dome and then work it out to the bottom of the Watermelon.
Since we’re going to make a V-shape cut and it’s simple, just like this. Hold the knife just like you are comfortable with it and then make a V-shape cut off. Then place a knife on the edge of this, the surface that you had just cut, stop at the middle, and then make another cut on your right hand side. Then the next one lies next to each other.
At this spot of carving, you will see that we have space left. We’ll try to manage it to make it fit right next to each other. So we’ll try to make sure that the size of the petal, two of them will fit in to this part.
Now we’ve finished one row, the first row of the petal. On the second row, on the second layer, I would go right in the middle of the two petals of both by making a V-shape cut and then the petal. If you cannot make it one cut off then make a repeated cut again to make it deeper. By this way, you will be able to cut off underneath.
Sometimes when the petal is very deep and my short knife doesn’t do the work good as I would like it to be anymore, I will change the knife to a longer blade which will have the same shape, and inside is sharp. Make sure that your knife is very sharp. Hold the knife the same way. Do the same thing that you would at the knife.
The most important thing of cutting these kinds of cut is mean precisely cut. Once you place the knife in, make a swing motion toward the middle of the cut then stop. So you flip your knife over and do the same thing, make a swing motion and then stop right where you left off. By this way, the petal will be one piece and will not cut off. A lot of practice will help.
As you can see that I barely touched the watermelon, I would try to touch at the green part on the bottom. By this way, I will not have a risk to ruin the petal of the watermelon that I just make. You will see that sometimes when the knife is not—did not go deep enough, you will some piece left there, we can correct by making another repeat cut off.
When you hold a knife, make sure that you are comfortable with the knife that you are holding. Don’t hold a knife too tight. By this way, you’ll not be able to turn your knife to the spot that you would like it to be.
Now we are finished with the second layer. The third layer, we will repeat the same thing by placing the—we cut off in the middle of the two petal that we just made above.
A nice sharp cut is a must to carve a nice watermelon ‘coz when you do not cut—a sharp cut off, then the watermelon would look like it’s been ruined.
We finished the third layer. You can see now on the fourth layer, I will run in to the limited space on the side of the watermelon. The way I solve this problem by making a whole flower few after space, I will ignore this part, not to cut it. We’ll keep continuing making this—the petal on the space that is allowed.
You may have to lift the watermelon if it is necessary for you, then you will have a nice cut toward that difficult space. When the petal is bigger, then it would be deeply as well. Sometimes when pushed off the knife may do not do the work. Again make a repeated cut so it will be a clean cut underneath.
Now that you can see that I don’t have to go all the way around anymore, I just cut where the space allow me to cut right in the middle of the two petal or both.
A lot of people had asked me the question about the tools that they saw in the market, the V-cut shaped tools because they think it’s easier, and is very utilized to do the V-cut shape. I never recommend it, as you can see that each petal have a different size. It depends on the space; it depends on the size of the flowers that you are making. So if you use those tools, then you will end up with one-size petal. It will not make you a flower that looks natural. And also, that kind of tool is not sharp enough to make a clean cut of the petal so go back to the simple step, using your knife, and make sure that your knife is sharp.
You will make the petal right in between of the two petals above. Whatever space allows you to do it. Now we are at the bottom of it. I would try to fill in whatever space that I have.
Now that I had filled up all the petal that I have no space left to make any petal, what I would do in order to make the last layer petal, stand up—stand out, so I would just skin off underneath of it by placing my knife.
If it’s possible, I always like to work with seedless watermelon but sometimes, it’s not that convenient if you have those kinds of watermelon. You will see there is some seed on that and but you don’t see a lot of them because we don’t carve into that deep to find the seed. Sometimes you see the seed, you can ignore it or you can just try to get it out.
Now that all the petal had been carved and stand out, and we finished the first lesson of Chrysanthemum, now that the last layer of the petals have been skinned off underneath and all the petal on the last layer are standing out, so we’re done with the lesson number one, Chrysanthemum.
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