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13 Levels of Pumpkin Carving: Easy to Complex

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How do you cut a classic jack-o-lantern? How do you level it up a dozen more times, creating an artful and incredibly complex design? This Wired video documents 13 Levels of Pumpkin Carving: Easy to Complex with professional pumpkin carver James Hall.

In his interpretation of the challenge, level two is an embellishment of the classic Halloween jack-o-lantern.

Level three jumps into creating a representation of an image, in this case, the profile of a dragon head. Hall adds a background for the dragon in level four, and more details for level five. Level six gets harder with back carving inside the pumpkin. This allows light to come through.

levels one and two
levels three and five
Levels seven through 12 of pumpkin carving turns the pumpkin into a three-dimensional sculpture with a background, small added pieces, accent lights, larger pieces from multiple pumpkins, and air brushing.

Hall describes the tools, techniques, and tricks that he uses to make his award-winning jack-o-lanterns as he carves.

adding light to a carved pumpkin
Level 13 is about pushing the limits. See more of James Hall’s creations on his site and on Instagram.


Watch more pumpkin carving on TKSST, including:
β€’Β How to make Halloween jack-o-lanterns with scary teeth
β€’ Carving a scary goblin face, a 3D pumpkin time lapse
β€’ Ray Villafane turns pumpkins into artfully carved Jack-o’-lanterns
β€’Β Oh My Gourd, a Halloween stop motion pumpkin carving experiment

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