Posts Tagged ‘Working with Polymer Clay’
Two Polymer Clay Hints
There are some wonderful tools available for the Polymer Clay artist. One of these that I have used quite extensively in my projects involving fairies is the flexible mold.
You can purchase them at your craft store. There will be a wide variety of molds for you to use, everything from feet, emblems, leafs, flowers, hands, faces, even body molds. These molds are made of a flexible rubberized material. However, I have learned there are some tricks to using these molds to your advantage.
First if you have never worked with Polymer Clay the first thing you should learn is to condition it. That means take a small amount of clay off of the block and knead it with your fingers until it becomes very pliable.
Next pick the mold you would like to use and measure out the conditioned clay to approximate size of the shape you are trying to mold. In the case of a face, pinch a very small end for the impression of the nose. Press your clay into the mold. Remove any excess clay around the impression. You want the clay to be level with the mold do not want it to overlap on the outer mold surface.
To release the clay from the mold, gently rub clay off the edge of the mold toward the center of the molded piece. This will give you a nice clean edge on your molded piece. The mold is flexible so if you are careful you can release your piece by gently pressing opposite sides and your piece should release from the mold.
