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I was starting to work a piece of Rainey Buttes from North Dakota and decided it would be a nice specimen for a demo steps in from Stone to Art. I have mostly spauled this piece down from a misfigured piece with as always convexities, concavities and square edges. In the descriptions below I failed to take images of these important issues. I will remember that! I hope you enjoy the sequence as much as I enjoy making these Stone tools.

Spaul ready for reduction, very nice solid piece of stone.Im licking my chops about now!!


Here is the piece after a few strikes to remove some mass, Notice I first started on the ends to remove as much as possible to save the width. Always remove mass first, when possible. I took 3 nice thick flakes by removing one from each side leaving a nice thick ridge down the center where you see the last flake removed. Pay attention to videos and you will see them do this but not tell you. Great tip!





Now a few strikes down the side to remove some thickness but most of all to gain a little control with convexity of the piece.



Here is the beauty taking shape maybe 15 more flakes taken on the opposite side.



This shows how smooth it can be with the Deltas removed with small pressure flaking to build convexity for another pass of thinning flakes.





Opposite side ready for a flute. Nipple made and Im ready to hand flute another one! Lets see how many piece in one shot we can make!!
You can also see I havent finished the tip end at all. I personally like to keep it thick as the base. This keeps the shock wave the same down the blade as you strike the end. As a wave goes down the point and starts to be confined to the tip it speeds up! This is where it breaks at, look at yours next time if you shape the tips.



Closeup of the Nipple I made. Try and make it as close to center line as you can so the Basal flute has a really nice taper to a razor edge!







This image shows a few pressure flakes to smooth out the base of the flute.



Here it shows the 3rd Nipple! Yeah I'm pushing my luck again! It was still thick, so another small flute stike was needed. I knew it wouldnt go far with a deep flute so I just made a small downward strike.



Well here is the final images of the Piece of Rainey Buttes from Curtis Smith. Great piece of stone and now a beautiful piece of Art that will certianly outlive me!

Clovis point is 5.5" x 1.75", triple fluted and sharp! The Clovis man sure had a great thing going while the slow moving Mastadons were around.





We gripe and complain about prices of food when these humans developed weaponry, tracked, stalked and harvested food for their families by hand and stone!

I hope you have enjoyed reading and seeing images of steps taken to produce the Clovis point. Maybe you can gain one piece of technique that will help you make that Clovis Point!

Thanks again

Steve Holloway