Igor (Part 4) – Morezmore Humanly Posable Puppet

Continues from Part 3.

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Silicone face made out of PlatSil Gel 10 Silicone.
Recipe below

The face took a number of tries and I finally figured it out.

The photos below experimental, not a step-by-step tutorial, just to show what is possible.

Hard clay head (Super Sculpey Living Doll Polymer Clay).
Lego Molding Box
Mold Star silicone for flexible mold.
Igor’s head has too many undercuts. I tried to make hard Ultracal mold a couple times, then gave up and made a soft mold. Will try again on next puppet.
In order to press 2 parts together, I used 2 pieces of stiff cardboard with the mold sandwiched inside, held together with strong rubber bands.

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Delrin Ball Bearings for eyes, drilled. For details how to make eyes out of delrin bearings, please read here.

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Eyes are held inside the mold with two sharp end pieces of sewing pins.

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The face armature.
My attempts to use wire did not work. One try – the wire was not strong enough, second time it just broke after a few movements.

So here is this monstrosity. The levers are pointing into the chin and nose, eyebrows and cheeks.
It is basically a 36-hole perforated plate, with 3 joints attached to it by a 1mm aluminum wire, mounted on a head stand and wrapped with silicone tape. Silicone tape adheres to itself and to the new silicone of the head. The movement of the joint pulls the whole area of silicone inside the head in the right direction instead of tearing through. The joints are strong enough to sustain this tension. It works pretty well, although not very elegant and fussy as hell.

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The recipe I used for the silicone mixture:

Measure off 10 parts of Part B PlatSil Gel 10 Silicone (start with Part B, it is harder to mix). For example 10 gram of Part B.
Add 1 part of acrylic paint fleshtone (I used M01470 Decoart Natural Beige Flesh paint). For example 1 gram of paint.
Mix until uniform color – take your time, scraping the sides of the container.
Add 1 part of naphtha, mix well – it will make more runny. For example 1 gram of naphtha.
Add 10 parts of Part A PlatSil Gel 10 Silicone (THE 6 MINUTES CLOCK STARTS AT THIS POINT). For example 10 gram of Part B.

Mix well, use immediately, you will have about 10-15 minutes, so make small batches not to waste silicone.
Do not throw away unused cured silicone – there are ways to use it.

Igor’s head – 42 g of silicone
Igor’s hands – 17 g of silicone (8.5 g each)
Igor’s feet – 27 g of silicone (13.5 g each)
Tools: small spatulas and plastic spoons, measuring cup, scale

Clean-up: naphtha and orange oil. Orange oil is awesome for instant removal of silicone, plastiline, polymer clay, epoxy and other nasty things from the tools, surfaces and mainly your hands. And it is good for your skin, unlike the rest of the stuff. Put a bit of orange oil on a paper towel and keep it handy to wipe fingers and  tools. A dab lasts for the entire session and will evaporate over the night, leaving a great fragrance in the room.

Here is Igor’s head out of the mold. A few bubbles and blemishes, which I am fixing with a fresh small batch of silicone.

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All done and cured.
As you can see, fresh silicone leaves shiny spots, which I am going to get rid of with NOVOCs silicone finish.

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Take a small brush, dip it into the bottle, picking up a TINY amount of NOVOCs silicone finish.
Brush on the surface lightly, it will quickly evaporate, leaving this white residue. Keep brushing it off with the same brush, until all white is gone, leaving the surface nicely matte. One the photo below (right) left side is matte, right side is not yet – for comparison.

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Next –  body padding, painting and hair…

Thank you.
Continues on Part 5.