Big Old Mould

I gave myself the morning off on Saturday to have a little doodle an and play about with some animation.

I made this guy run!


Here's a link to my other vine videos, lots of silliness goes on there :D http://seenive.com/u/907625454071062528

And I also had some fun drawing up my own Joker

So, puppet wise, I've been making a huge mould!

I find the first half of mould making a bit stressful as its something I've taught myself how to do by studying pictures and videos of other peoples moulds. So I'm never really 100% confidant that all will go well.

I start with a big base of plasticine, or sometimes a water based clay,  for the sculpture to lie in.

I then carve away the basic shape so I don't have so much to build up around the sculpt.

I've seen behind the scenes pictures of the certain stop mo studios using what I believe to be locators for holding the armatures in place when casting. I wanted to give this a go as I think its great way to ensure your armature is placed precisely in the mould. I made mine out of super sculpy.

Closing the gaps around the sculpture

The finished half with all the trimmings

I use Coroplast, or Correx as its known over here in the UK, a corrugated plastic I use for the mould walls. It's great stuff as you can make a whole wall out of one strip.

I have used a Ali-Fastcast to make this mould as it is a very, very strong material compared to the usual Crystacal R plaster I use. Basically it's a prefilled fastcast resin that is filled with an aluminium filler to add extra strength to the mould. Very easy to work with.

Here is the first half done, its just needs a good few layers of mould release and new correx wall then the last pour.

Here is the finished mould. I needed to do a quick test cast to set my mind at ease that everything has worked ok. I made a very basic wire armature covered it in cloth tape and poured in some Dragon Skin FX pro.

The waiting game... Also note that this thing is bloody huuuge! I'm sure it weights the same as a small child! And also another note that the edges on it were ridiculously sharp. I have a few rather large gashes on my hands due to this. Nothing a good filing down didn't solve though!