Hello all.. I have a princess doll cake order for the coming week and have been looking around for a tutorial on how to carve the skirt/gown of the doll with cake. I do not want to go and buy a ball shaped pan since I am not really fond of the idea(However if i cant get the carving right i may just buy the pan) I have seen a lot of tutorials on carving a ball shaped cake but it looks very unnatural when the decoration is done since it looks like a doll sitting on a ball.. I am really interested in getting a shape like the image below. Please guide me on how to carve this shape out. If there are any tutes out there please do post a link for me to check out. Thank you all.

AThis is done with a dolly varden tin. Not a ball tin. The ball tin is too round and short.

http://www.somethingforcake.com.au/store/pc/Dolly-Varden-Cake-Tin-p290.htm

If you are hand carving its about 6" high and 7-8" at the base. Well that's about the size of mine. Good luck :)

AI made one once and used a pudding steamer as the pan. It worked out okay.

Hello.. Thank you all for the quick response. Looks like I may have to buy a pan and work on the shape and not try carving it freehand since it looks like a risky proposition.

Kristyaaa: I live in india so it might not be that easy to pick this pan and it surely isnt gonna reach me on time even if i ordered it online. however thank you for identifying the pan cos i never knew some of these pans actually had names too.. Good to know. :)

Howsweet : Unfortunately this seems to be boggling my mind equally. I dint mean for anyone to search for any tutorials for me. I already have found a whole lot on how to do a doll cake but since all of them had a ball shaped pan being used I was looking for any tutorial on carving this particular shape. Since I dint find any tutorials myself I asked if someone could help out with some links in case they already knew of some existing ones. :)

Faradaye I plan to use a pudding bowl too.. We get the pyrex ones here and it looks like that's what i may have to buy.

Thank you all..