Thursday, December 10, 2009

Bought meself some air dry clay

I wanted to try doing some little sculpture awhile back, but was a bit disappointed at the cost of polymer clay (P700, Deovir). A friend of mine suggested I use Air Dry Clay instead. You don't need to bake it, just let it dry under the sun or overnight. So I bought 1 kilo (P38, Deovir), and tonight I pulled a chunkful to make trial little sculptures.

So while they're drying (a lamp is hung overhead, turned on), I'm making this post. Here are some things I noticed while using this type of clay:

1. It's gray. Ugly gray. The saleslady said I can paint acrylic over it, so clay color doesn't matter.

2. You need to put water on the clay to make it malleable. I was adviced to mash it first before using (I think this is an SOP on clay substances. I'm not sure though).

3. Putting too much water will make it a slippery gunk of mud.

4. Mold it in any way you want when the clay is just moist.

5. When your done, you can coat it with water to make the outside smoother.

So far I have made what I call a "Cat Set:"

1. Cartoony cat. At least one inch in height.

2. Two bowls, one for food and one for milk/water.

3. Fish

4. Cat food (I don't know what it looks like, and I don't really care, so I got an unused pen, and stabbed the surface with it to make it...chunky)

5. Toy mouse

6. A ball of yarn.

It is also important, and I reiterate IMPORTANT to put plastic over your workspace. Although they can clean off easily, the clay is still pretty messy.

I'll post pictures when I'm done (or I can find the opportunity to transfer picture files from my cellphone).

1 comment:

  1. Why don't you try DaisyClay sometime. It is the ideal air-dry clay to make flowers an small figurines. It is a white polymer clay and can be colored with water color from a tube to create vivid colors, it does not stain and is non toxic. I dries in hours to a solid yet flexible form.
    www.daisyclay.com
    www.thaiflowerart.com

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