Cutting forces in ball-end milling of slanted surfaces are calculated. The cutting area is determined from the Z-map of the surface geometry and current cutter location. The obtained cutting area is projected onto the cutter plane normal to the Z-axis and compared with cutting edge element location. Cutting force is calculated by integration of elemental cutting forces of engaged cutting edge elements. Experiments with various slanted angles were performed to verify the proposed cutting force estimation model. It is shown that the proposed method predicts cutting force effectively for any geometry including sculptured surfaces with cusp marks and surfaces with pockets and holes.