Zero experience

[Cloak]

I'm currently making an skeleton for a sculpture that I'm doing. As usual the skeleton is made of whires, and tinfoil. However, I have 0 experience with skulpey. What I really want to know is what are the things that I should or have to do to it while I work or before I start working with it. More importantly, what are the things that I should never do with it. Also, what's the difference between all the types of sculpey, and which one should I be using?

[alexvez]

first of all, read the smellybug maquet tutorial.
is a sticky at the top of this forum.
the best thing to use its super sculpey, dont use sculpey or sculpey III.
its not necessary to mix it with fimo or premo as smellybug do but its better for the view and work the material before use it make it softer.
for smooth SS, use rubing alchool or tupernoide, i personally preffer tupernoide caus its stronger.
and dont forget to have a good, a verry good armature, strong enough and with the good proportion caus trying to repare it when its full of SS its a pain in the a**

so, if you have other question, ask them and post pict of your work when it will be finished !

[Cloak]

but whats the difference between the sculpies?

[KoBold]

Sculpey and SculpeyIII are worthless for real sculpting. They are both way too soft and when baked are very fragile.

It IS worth adding Premo to Super Sculpey since it both deminishes the translucency, making it easier to see details while sculpting, and gives strength when baked(you can get by with adding SculpeyIII but may actually make SS weaker). Super Sculpey is stronger then the other sculpeys but Premo is significantly stronger.

Also try Premo and Kato Polyclay. Premo is an excellent clay but I feel it has too much spring back making it difficult to get good details. However, Kato Polyclay is a wonderful clay and my clay of choice.

For smooth flat surfaces, use water and flat tools. Use chemicals to help "melt" rough surfaces. the amout of "melting" is based on application, tools and chemical quantity.

http://www.glassattic.com/
http://www.theclubhouse1.net/forums/viewforum.php?f=9

[Cloak]

I see, but what are the ratio that I should be using to make the gray colour, and the right softness to work with? at smelly bugs tutorial i know that he added sculpey III to super sculpey, but I might have missed the part where he added the premo

[Cloak]

Here I'm premixing my sculpey to achieve an opaque grey color. In this case, I want the material to photograph for the tuturial, so eliminating the translucency of the original color will do that. In addition, it's helpful to tint the material a color that is fairly close to the base color of the final product. Not only does it help visualize as you are working, but it helps the painting process as well.
The ratio I used here was:

1 box Sculpey
1 block white Sculpey III
1/2 block black Sculpey III

Keeping the ratios simple like this allows me to make more anytime I need it and the colors will match.

Just run it through the press over and over, flattening, folding and shredding and repeating until the color is solid. Same thing if you're doing it by hand. Takes a while, but it's worth it.

http://www.conceptart.org/peteySculptTut/mixing.jpg

The only ratio that i can find in the tutorial is this post... but it doesn't indicate supersculpey....

[KoBold]

The green box in the back ground is Super Sculpey. No way was plain sculpey used.

In addition, there is no wrong ratio. It's all just the preferences of the artist.

Go here (http://www.theclubhouse1.net/forums/viewforum.php?f=9) and do a search on "mix grey super sculpey" setting "Search for all terms" and forum = "The Sculptors Forum".
Then, when you have other questions you might as well do further searchs there or post to that forum.

[Cloak]

hey guys i've got some pics of it in progress...
The Concept
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v293/Cloak3126/DSC01944.jpg

Work in progress
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v293/Cloak3126/DSC01936.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v293/Cloak3126/DSC01932.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v293/Cloak3126/DSC01933.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v293/Cloak3126/DSC01935.jpg

I know that its right leg is pretty messed up, I will be fixing that soon; also, I found that the legs of the armatures started to bend from its original shap from the weight of the clay, something i have to imporve next time.
I apologize for the quality of the photos. but please some advice...

[gray_]

I would recomend mounting that sucker on a wooden board. just drill four holes and loop your armature though that. tends to keep it from moving around too much.
about the leg collapsing: you can try padding the armature with tin foil so you don't have to build so much clay on top of your armature. or use heavier guage wire.

[Cloak]

yeah, ill probably nail it down to a board, and in fact, it is already backed with tin foil, lol. but other than that, is there anything elses i need to change or improve upon?

Also, how did smelly bug get from this stage which is still quite rough.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v293/Cloak3126/blocking10.jpg

to this stage
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v293/Cloak3126/webbing1.jpg

the webbing was the update following the previous picture, so im just wondering what did he do off camera that had made the sculpture look so different

[gray_]

just a guess:
Rough to fine.
start smoothing your masses roughly, then use finer and finer combs/what nots until you are satisfied, then brush it up with some isopropal(if you are using a polymer clay) or whatever solvent is appropriate.

Good luck.

[Cloak]

im using sculpies, and would the sculpy clay softening have the same effect as turpernoid

[gray_]

Uh.
I would never use turps on a polymer clay because isopropal alcahol is so much cheaper.
That's what I have used in the past.

[ColdKodiak]

the webbing was the update following the previous picture, so im just wondering what did he do off camera that had made the sculpture look so different

raking and smoothing.

[Cloak]

hey guys right now im workingon the head and the gas mask of the sculpture. but the problem is that the clay itself is too soft and often gets mushed up. so i decided to bake a part of the head first so i wouldh have something hard and easier to work with. im just wondering would i encounter any kind of problems when i stick the whole thing and bake it in the oven again when its finished?

[KoBold]

No problems with multi-baking, in fact a lot of people do it.

http://www.glassattic.com/polymer/baking.htm (click Multiple baking, partial baking at top of page)

Also, if the clay is too soft for your liking you can leech it.

http://www.glassattic.com/polymer/Conditioning.htm (click leeching at top of page)

[Cloak]

i stoped working on this quite a while ago so that i could study for the exams, now I am able to get back on task. I think i've finished most of it and I'm ready for smoothing. but all I have is the sculpy softener, does that work?

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v293/Cloak3126/DSCF3008.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v293/Cloak3126/DSCF3007.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v293/Cloak3126/DSCF3006.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v293/Cloak3126/DSCF3002.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v293/Cloak3126/DSCF3001.jpg

anything that i should do before i start smoothing?

[Cloak]

this is roughly the size of it, how long should i bake it for?

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v293/Cloak3126/DSCF3010.jpg