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I felt this was a mediocre video, especially given Bosch's design brilliance, woodworking skills, and prominence nationally. Too much time was spent superficially reviewing a wide range of wood carving, sanding, and shaping tools, and how Bosch has organized his own professional shop. He demonstrated two different approaches to shaping wood off the lathe, but the instructional content was slim, with not enough coverage of either design or techniques. This was basically, a "Watch how I do this," video.
This is an excellent video with a lot of instructional value for both visual learners and more analytical and technically minded learners. Ellsworth explains in detail his techniques and then demonstrates them in clear, close up shots that show his signature gouge in action. This is worth a look, more than once!
This two DVD set is a mix of strong positives and negatives that result for me in an overall average rating. On the good side, Darlow is an undisputed expert and he has produced a comprehensive, if not overblown, treatment of sharpening theory and practice. His comprehensive approach is most valuable to a beginner who has not yet invested in any one approach or system. If you already have a sharpening method, say an 8” grinder with handle-end jigs, or 10” wet grinder, or a horizontal glass wheel, etc., most of this video will be irrelevant because it does not apply to your method and equipment. On a positive note, Darlow pokes holes in some cherished sharpening beliefs. He says, for example that the exact angle of the bevel on most tools does not matter. The biggest variable by far is the user, not the tool. Users adjust to differences in cutting angles instantly and intuitively. He states that for woodturning tools, for example, it does not matter if the bevel differs by 2, 3, or 5 degrees or more, as long as it is sharp. He does advocate keeping approximately the same bevel once a tool has been sharpened, however. That being said, he goes on to demo dozens of self-named “Darlow” templates to set exact bevel angles for grinding. Wait a minute, I thought exact angle did not matter. It matters only the first time you sharpen a tool, or if you regrind a new angle on an old tool…plus he may have wanted to come up something he could name after himself. It may be Darlow’s personal style to be very slow and deliberate, but at times this video drags and it is too often just a talking head. My advice: play at a fast speed making Darlow sound like a chipmunk, and get through both DVDs in 20 minutes.
