Guidelines for stop-motion
I’ll expand a little here on what you saw in the video above. You haven’t watched the video above? What more need be said? Please press play..
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Latex
This was the first time I’d used latex, and I learnt heaps. It’s very tempting to try and coat it on thickly, but in the end this is false economy. The first coat you apply really needs to be your best coat. That is:
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•thin
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•smooth, and
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•dried correctly.
Correct drying involves a well ventilated room- latex goes moldy very quickly (no pun intended) so keep the room as dry as possible, and when you’re done, keep the finished latex mold as dry as possible. It seems to me also that prolonged sunlight is a bit of a no-no.
When slicing your clay model (if indeed you are making a mold of clay) it can be a good idea to *very* gently heat the cut side of each half with a hot air gun or a hairdryer. This helps form a perfect seal around the edges of the halves, preventing the latex from seeping underneath.
The basic steps I took:
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1.I brushed thin latex onto both halves of the original head, allowing it dry well in between each coat. I repeated this at least 20 times.
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2. I made a “mother mold”, which is designed to support the flexible latex mold when it comes time to cast the clay. The mother mold is poured over the top of the latex mold; I used a large pipe section to retain the plaster whilst it set.
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3. I removed the mother mold from the plaster, and then the original clay from the latex. The latex sometimes requires a bit of tidying up at this point.
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4.I placed the latex mold back into the plaster mold, and then pressed small pieces of clay into the latex. When I was finished, I joined the two halves of the clay together, and smoothed the join, as well as refining other features. A tip here is to use small pieces of clay, warming them with your hands so that they find their way into the nooks and crannies of the latex mold.
