Polymer Clay Sculpting and Casting WIP: Lab Scientist Cat

I didn't know what to do next, but I decided on a cartoonish cat in a lab coat. I'm using a mix of cernit polymer clay mixed with sculpey living doll clay. I used a wire armature underneath and started with the face. I didn't think this was going to amount to anything so this is the earliest sculpting pictures that I took. Sometimes I just want to relax and sculpt on the couch with a lap desk. 

 This one was sculpted in 3D from the beginning instead of doing front half flat like the mushroom girl. 

I like the face. I started working on this sculpture mid-August and it lasted from October. Actual sculpting time isnt longer than a few hours but life was happening and there just wasn't alot of time. 

I baked the face and upper body first and then I started to add clay to the lower body. I use a stand alone Deni convention oven for my polymer clay baking. I don't think they make the specific model I have anymore, but it’s the type that is a clear glass bowl. 

The idea is that it’s a humanoid cat dressed as a scientist. So I was going for a business suit underneath the lab coat. I also thought I could have sculpted him in scrubs too. 

The side and back views. 

At this point, I used Let’s resin silicone putty and made a mold of the body. I figured that the mold is more simple without involving the arms. The idea is to make different poses from this master that I’m doing now. It saves time from sculpting from scratch each time and each piece would still be unique. 

Here is what the mold looks like. I said before but the Let’s resin silicone brand putty is extremely oily. So if I added on a 2nd layer of putty, it will not stick to the first layer. I have only tried right after the first layer was cured enough to pull the master from. It’s possible after the silicone fully cured that subsequent silicone would stick to it. But rh point of using the putty vs the liquid type is its ease of use and short project completion time. If I had to wait days to get a strong mold it doesn’t make sense to use it. Of course I could just use a thicker application in one go but the way I press the putty onto the master, there will be thin spots most of the time. 

So I will be pouring plaster to have a stronger mold shell. 

I am using up very old plaster that I had left over from other projects. To me the end results is alright. 

Here the two mold halves are separated and the master survived intact. In the past I did not have great luck making a full plaster mold, so that’s why I use the silicone for the first layer. 

 I continued on working on the original sculpture now, adding the arms and lab coat. 

So the idea was to have him holding a loop and streaking an agar plate. But the toothpick us too fat really and I need something better to make the plate. He looks like a vampire hunter too. 

The light blue polymer clay is a mix of cernit and living doll, but the white coat is fimo. Fimo is just too hard for me. Sculpey III consistency is easier to work with for me but it is not as strong as fimo. I have a bunch of different colors of the sample packs of fimo but I’ll probably mix them with other polymer clay in the future. I figured since the coat was going to be white, why not use white clay but I couldn’t blend it as well. 

There are the first castings that I made from the armless cat mold I showed above. The one with the messed up nose will become a faun statue that I will post next. These were made using premier air dry

The blue cat is from the same mold but using polymer clay. It is also the cernit/ living doll mix but more cernit. 

I added the coat to the sitting cat, this time just using the same clay. 

Here is the original cat standing and all the casts I made from the same mold. Each one looks different. None of them are ready for sale yet though. I kept on jumping from project to project instead of finishing them one at a time.