Bird mask: Painting and sealing

After priming the mask with a dark brown, I painted it using acrylics. I wanted to re-enforce the fact that this was a mask a bird was wearing as opposed to the face and head of the animal itself, so went for a leathery kind of appearance, with faded marks around the eyes, highlights around the different panels and small white dots showing where the seams are. Overall I'm relatively pleased with the paint job, but feel I should've used a lighter primer, as the colours wouldn't really lift after a dark backing tone was put down.
Once this was dry I used a clear lacquer gloss to seal it and provide a slight shine.

Bird mask: Moulding and casting

1) Seeing as the little bird mask sculpt didn't have a flat back to it, I had to cast it by means of a two part mould. I began this by finding a container that would fit the sculpt whilst still accommodating enough room on every side so the silicone wouldn't be too weak. I then filled half the container, in this case a small ramekin glass, with air dry clay and buried half the sculpt in this making sure it was air tight. Silicone was then poured over the remaining half of the sculpt that was left exposed, and left to set.

2) On taking out this half of the set silicone after the going off time, I accidentally pushed the tool I was using for leverage in getting the mould out of the container, into the sculpt itself. Because of this a little repair work was needed between casting. I also took this opportunity to trim down the silicone to fit back into the same container; it had a rim to it, so needed to be cut back down to size.

3) The second half of the mould after it had been cast: Quite a bad mould really, with a lot of airbubbles, but in no place they couldn't be simply sanded quickly away once the mask piece was cast so I saw no reason to completely re-cast this half. This half of the mould is also a slightly darker green; I put more catalyst in so it would go off a little faster this time.

4) The resin cast straight out of the mould pieces! It worked! My next step will be sanding down the edges that were left where the two mould pieces met.

Bird Mask: Resin casting

1) This first image shows the mould after the silicone was poured in and allowed to set. This is how it looked when I came in to de-mould the following morning.

2) The mould after the plastic wall was stripped off.

3) After peeling off the silicone mould from the base board, the chanvant 'neck' base and air dry clay plugging could be seen. The clay simply crumbled away from the silicone, but I had to cut the mould slightly and dig out the chavant. This was okay though, as the silicone mould would have had to be cut in order to get out the resin casts later on. I then cleaned out the mould, ready for resin.

4) After mixing up the correct ratios of resin, I poured the mixture into the mask cast mould, as well as a little prototype maquette mask I'd been working on previously. This would then dry solidly in the next half hour, ready to be popped out and painted or experimented with.

Bird mask: Mould preparations

1) I began by collecting up the materials I would need to assemble a mould in order to cast the bird mask sculpt. This included a flat piece of MDF, a flexible strip of plastic to form the walls, and a hot glue gun.

2) The next step was securing the sculpt to the MDF surface. The chavant clay stuck to the board itself, but I wanted to be extra careful the sculpt wouldn't come loose while being cast; it could float up through the silicone mid-set and ruin the cast. To secure it I simply smoothed out the 'neck' with some air dry clay. Creating this sloped shape also meant that once the mask was cast it would have a plug-like, spread out base which I could use to stop the head slipping out of the neck hole of the rest of the puppet.

3) Next I created a circular frame for the sculpt, making sure I had at least half a centimetre on every side to ensure a good thickness of mould; if the mould was too thin then there was the potential risk of the silicone breaking. The plastic was taped into place then hot glued to the base, sealing the bottom so no silicone would escape.

4) The last stage of preparation was collecting all equipment needed to begin mould making. This included the two-part silicone, disposable gloves, a set of scales, the sculpt, a mixing pot, a mixing stick and newspaper to protect the surfaces.

Fast Cast casting with Silicone moulds.

This shows the surviving sculpt after been removed from the silicone mould. Resin has been poured into the mould which was cleaned out beforehand.  

Shows the desk area while casting the faces; Essential items where a set of scales, two part resin, pots and stirrers, silicone mould, newspaper to protect the table surface. 

Sculpture Casting.

Once the faces where sculpted out completely and smoothed down, I built small walls around them in MDF to form the walls for the mould. 

I used a simple 1:10 platsil silicone, poured over the sculpts after mixing up and dispersing the air bubbles. The silicone was poured into one empty corner of the mould, held from a height in order to help make sure there where no air bubbles too. I also glued the walls down so they were easily removable afterwards; I wanted to make sure that the silicone mould could be pulled off the top of the sculpt once it had set, in case the mould didn't turn out correct the first time. This way I would have a second chance at getting the mould correct in case it did go wrong, (preparing for the worst case scenario, as my time management would have been strained if I had to resculpt any of these character faces.)