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Thursday, November 15, 2012

Between a rock and a hard place: using real rocks for sculpting...



It's gonna be a crazy day today, so bear with me.  I have a two part post here showing how I use real rocks to get rock texture.  I started out years ago trying to use tools to create various rock textures.  This was time consuming and not always the result I wanted.  

Fortunately, Cathy came up with the idea of pressing real rocks into unbaked sculpey to get a wide variety of textures... slate, lava, etc.  All we had to do was find the type of rock that we needed to create!  We began collecting "stray" landscaping rocks that would invariably find their way out onto the sidewalk.

These were collected over the years as we walked the dog around the neighborhood.  The stones above will  be used with some apoxy sculpt to create a rock and crystal base.  The tin foil will be explained later...


To make the crystals, I use a very sharp, pristine exacto blade, and slice away at chunks of baked sculpey.  This is done to make the facets.  There will be times where they crack or break in an unexpected place, so be prepared.


I cut large and small pieces...



In this process, those crystals had to be ready in advance.  The rocks you see here...


Were used to create the textures you see here...


I am working on another 80 mm insert here, so this thing is pretty big.  To use less clay and provide some structural support, I fashioned pieces of tin foil into a rough shape.  This will allow me to wrap the apoxy sculpt around it like this...


Here I am placing my sheets of clay around the tin foil pieces.  It's OK if there are irregularities, since these are rocks, after all!


The first piece is completely covered and attached to the insert.  Now the next piece is attached and more clay wrapped around that one.


Almost there.  I am trying to be aware of the final shape.  I am trying to balance a place for the big figure to stand, but also a few 'levels' of rocks...


Stay tuned for the exciting conclusion tomorrow!


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