I'm a member of UFO Sweden, an organization researching strange anomalies encountered and reported by people. UFO Sweden is led by the indefatigable Clas Svahn, journalist and author. We publish one magazine for the general public, and one for the investigators. Several years back I drew a comic for the internally published magazine, portraying Clas and his colleague Håkan as Men in Black. The comic was called “The Y Files”, and made fun (rather innocently, I thought) of the sometimes very weird and crazy UFO movement. Some loved it and some hated it bitterly, arguing that this single jest undermined the whole purpose of our organization. Eventually I grew tired of the crybabies and put the comic to rest.
I decided to give Clas a surprise Christmas gift this years, and sculpted a figurine of his “Y Files” alter ego, about to be grabbed by a stalky-eyed alien.
I created both characters in Chavant clay, and built up silicone molds around each figure separately.
The finished figurines were cast in SmoothCast 325, my favorite plastic, and painted with acrylic airbrush paints.
Clas had a really bad Christmas. Both his mom and his father in law passed away within a few days of each other. I hope my little gift gave him cause to smile a bit, and I think it did.
I also made a small sculpture of my uncle Ingvar as a gnome, since he’s interested in folklore and old traditions, but not least because he’s actually seen one!
When I make my silicone molds, I just build up a clay wall as closely to the sculpture as I can, so no excess silicone will be wasted. Also, I don’t want the molds to be too thick. If there’s a good enough thinness, without making the molds to soft and wobbly, I don’t have to make many, or any, cuts in the silicone to remove the sculpture, and later, the castings.
The camera wouldn’t give us any sharp images today, but I hope you get the general idea.
Very interesting! On the gnome mold did you make a mother mold to support the silicone mold? Or is the silicone rigid enough on its own?
ReplyDeleteIn this case, I didn't make any mother mold. I got the thickness of the silicone just right to have it support itself.
ReplyDeleteHi, great blog. Just wondering how you de-moulded? Did you destroy the silicone mould, was it a glove mould or a multipart? I have made a small series of chavant figurines similar to yours and I want to cast them in plaster. Not sure of it's possible though as there are loads of undercuts are a few of the models. Any help much appreciated : )
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