Wrapping up the ghoulies -mini e-class-summerfest 2010

I'm Late! sorry bout that folks- one of the draw backs of being in the middle of no where- is that,

your in the middle of no where. and by no where i mean cable arrived some time in the

past two years- and there is no cell service. As a result i am at the whim of mother nature, who

has been, well let us just say- she has been a bit irritable the past few days- either that or

Thor is auditioning for a new band. This activity results in cable (Internet) intermittent for about

5 minutes every 6 to 8 hours.  But we are back up on line- so here is what i

finally wound up doing.

Once i sat back and looked at my ghoulies, i just wasn't happy with their....ghouliness. so i pulled

out my bucket of molding paste and some cheese cloth and decided to

beef up their ghoul level.

once all the icky stuff was dried up and set i mixed up a concoction of raw umber, quin gold,

gesso and flow release and slathered them up.

 **oh- BIG mention here- make sure you place your

work in a position you want it to stay in before you use the molding paste- it's like putting it in a body cast

and it's mobility drops to about 23% when its dry**

this particular ghoulie wound up carrying a ghost on its back- i happened to have

some dry pumpkin ghosts *the ghosts of pumpkins past* and some cotton fish net in

the same location- you never really know what is going to come together

when you start~

i still have to seal them- a good coat of varnish should do it- and some gloss on their eyes to make

them shine-

i may even give them bases in the form of rocks and gravestones-  possibilities are endless

when you start working with figures.

every one takes on it's own personality- and if you get stuck, have no fear.

sooner or later they will tell you what they want to ; look like, wear,

do or even say. all you have to do listen to them.

"Kootash dai na, aja nilo. "

[translation] "Take my hand and I will spare your friends."

                                                       ~The Mummy

Thank you Juliet! i am glad you enjoyed it!
Kristal-Hey Girl! no worries~gather your supplies! i am going to keep these up for a while- and after that, there will be a direct link on the side, so that you can refer back to them at any time!
Di~ you are the sweetest person on the planet! and i thank you for your kind words. i am speechless at the role model part- i've often been referred to as a bad influence :oP - as for a role model i am honored, and humbled. you are an inspiring work of art yourself- and i am blessed to call you friend.


Have a wonderful week all~ I am in the overwhelmed part of the process here- working to stock a new gallery **the studio is hitting the west coast! formal announcement to come- listen for the squeels of delight*  and trying to stay afloat in the mean time with the rest of you~sometimes the simplest thing we can do to be happy is just smile at the blessings we have~ and i have so many, of which you are included.

live well.
love each other.

SummerFest- Free E-Class Tutorial- Time to Make the Ghoulies Part Three

 I can't believe it's monday already and another week has past!

First thing we need to do is make a pair of boots for our ghoulie

so that he can stand on his own.

all we are going to need is the paperclay, a few tools and  a skewer. by the way- the skewers

come in handy for a multitude of reasons- but the coolest is that they are just a hair larger than the

15 gauge armature wire- which allows all your pieces to fit together just right.

work a piece of clay into a cylinder form.

place on your table and cut in half. one for each foot.

shape into a triangle form and then pull up one side to form a boot- and round

out the front.

take the flat end of the skewer and poke a hole for the leg wire

to go in- once that hole is in there- then you can gently place your ghoulie

into the boots- to make sure you have a good fit, and the wire sits in the boot properly.

i added little buttons for effect.  place them up on a piece of styrofoam to dry-

you can put them anywhere flat really, just not wood (the oils will seep into clay).

i just use a piece of styrofoam because it is clean and "seep free"- nothing in it to come out

and nothing you put on it will seep in.

while they are drying, it is time to rip up some fabric.

i used coffee stained muslin. you may use what ever fabric you choose- just rip

it up into strips that wil fit comfortably around your ghoulie.

and start wrapping.

leave some hangers- ghoulies can be so messy.

gently place in the boots again- to make sure the wrappings don't do down

to far, and the boots dont fit.  once the first wrapping sets, and the boots are dry

glue the boots in place and then give the ghoulie another wrap.

now is the time to start playing with your ghoulie. paint, embellish, give the final

touches.

the finished ghoulie is within sight!

Q&A:

thank you for all of the emails! i will get to everyone of you!

and thank you Elizabeth! that means my goal has been achieved! to take some of the intimidating out of art dolls. This is just a beginning. like i explained- these are your basic, basic steps. but once you start (and you will :O)  you will develop your own style and technique; your work will become more refined and intricate- never worry about watching someone else- that is where inspiration comes from- if one werent to teach another- the "art of" would fade away. 

Allison; The objective is to develope your own style, and not continue to copy someone elses. when your starting out you are mimicking actions- as an artist your talent will shine through and so will your own style. it takes loads of practice. some people think you can just wake up and be good at something- just because someone else is-  what they dont show you are the hours and hours of work it took to get there. it is fun. it is an amazing thing to be able to do, actually- but it is also a great deal of work to perfect.

Ger:  no, you did not miss the steps. i realise i did not go over hands and face painting. that is for a whole other day!:O)  this is for getting the basic armature and form down. just a look to take the scarey out of the whole process.  i had a number of people approach me not understanding or knowing how to begin- my answer to them is this basic step class to get them started on their way.

okay- see you all next week!!

live well.

love each other.

SummerFest- Free E-Class Tutorial- Time to Make the Ghoulies Part Two

Welcome back and Thank you for all the lovely emails!

As we go along (for anyone new joining us) please feel free to drop me an email or leave me a comment with any questions or comments. The comments section has been temporarily placed on moderate- and i will not be posting the comments (for the e-classes only) here on the blog- i have found this makes  people more comfortable, as i want everyone to be confident enough to ask me anything and i will only make reference  by first names- there are no "stupid" questions (Right Alice *wink*) it is "just" art- it won't bite!

Okay then. let's get to it!

...... the Body Armature! (insert scary 'muwahh haa haa' here)

The body armature is actually not as scary or complicated as it may seem. And i will note here that a) i am not the end all, last word on body armatures- like everything, there is more than one way to get it done. b) this is a basic structure, as you go along making dolls and creatures, you will perfect your basic structure and things will get very tricky- but until then, grab two pieces of armature aluminum wire and some masking tape.  yup. that's it.

the length of the wire depends on how "tall" you want your little being to be.

lay your wires next to each other, and start to wrap them together with the masking tape, about 1 to 1.5 inches (2.54cm to 3.81cm) from  the top end of the wires. keep them parallel with one another while wrapping. you want to make as many wraps as you need to keep them securely together. usually about 4 or 5 wraps should do it.

once you have them so they don't "roll" away from each other, and your going

to have to eyeball this one- wrap the length of what would be the distance between

the shoulders and the hips- your basically outlining where the torso will be.

the next step- see photo above- is going to be to bend the two wires apart and

then bend them back again to create, what looks much like a tuning fork, but will

actually become the hips and legs of your little being.

Do NOT glue it on yet, but if you just put your head on the 'neck' you can get a better

feel as to how things are going to look when we are done.

You can keep the head on, because we are going to need it there for placement of the arms,

but for now you can put the head/body aside and grab another piece of armature wire.

the length of the wire is going to be 2x the length of the shoulder to the knee area of your being,

or basically however long you want it to be :o) see that is the beauty of making creatures/dolls-

you can make them look however you want to!

TIP:  armature wire is very... bendy. it is easy to start getting a lot of kinks in it.

here is a super easy way to bend the wire in half  in one shot.

grasp each end of the wire between your thumb and first finger (one in each hand)  so you look

like your ready to conduct an orchestra- and bring your hands down and together and the

wire will follow, so you get this..

now take those two ends again, same position and just ratchet it back and forth in small, fluid

motions. the wire will start to close that camel hump until the two sides just about touch.

give the wire a bit of a flip and bring the two ends back up so it looks

like this...

time to bring back the head/body to the table for a line up:

flip the wire so the hump points down and, giving room for the neck, place the wire behind the body

and Voile'! instant shoulders/arms. now we want to make sure that they

are secure and don't wiggle or fall off- so it's time to bring out the masking tape again

and start wrapping, first the hump to the 'spine' and then up and around both

shoulder parts, and you will see the body start to form up. remember we still

have NOT glued the head into place. it is just rattling around up there, so

be careful not to send it flying while your wrapping with the masking tape.

next, cut another small piece of wire, bend it using the same technique above, only this time

we are placing it around those hips we just made. if you refer to the picture, you will see

one side on top of the body frame, and one side underneath. this is giving the armature some added

support and rigidity- when in doubt- reinforce. you don't want to put all of the hours

into an art doll only to have the main structure fail- a few extra steps in the beginning

will save you a whole lot of swearing in the end!

that being said, what are we going to do? you got it...

wrap him up! masking tape is remarkably strong when used in this

application. it can also be twisted around joints so that the form is strong,

yet still moves freely.

so there you have it. his main body form is almost complete.

now we need to grab some batting...

i like batting, as opposed to fiberfill, because it is easier to wrap and weave around

armature parts when making dolls. it is a personal thing- i don't like lumpy dolls, and the batting

holds itself into place so you don't need additional (insert name of favorite securing

device here) to keep it in place.

so peel off some batting (single layer) and lets get wrapping!

okay. now he's not so skinny! put as much or as little batting as you want to make your

creature as thick or as thin as you like- it's all about your vision when creating art dolls.

me, i'm going to stop here.  i think he is ready for the next step.

we finally get to give him his head!

and i found a pair of hands that were drying and commandeered them

for this project-

make sure you have good air when using your adhesive- it STINKS-

and will give you a headache- so... fresh air!.. lots of it!

i put the wire right into the tube of glue and gob it up good.

i just don't like pieces falling off!

so don't over do it- but use enough adhesive to get the job done.

and if the glue globs over the neck or arms.. no worries- it is going

to be covered up anyway- and at least you know the future owner of your lovely won't

be searching for a hand some day!

ohhhh. creepy, creepy.

okay- so more cute than creepy - we will work on creepy

another day! :o)

okay- remember- shoot me off any questions you may have, next week we will finish these

bad boys up with feet and paint and final wardrobe selection-

have a most excellent week!

live well.

love each other.

SummerFest- Free E-Class Tutorial- Time to Make the Ghoulies Part One

Welcome to Summerfest at the Studio! 

Halloween is around the corner and everyone is working hard to get their muses headed in that direction for the big Halloween sales- so what a better way to kick off Summerfests free E-Classes!

It's time to make the Ghoulies!!

Supplies you will need to complete your project (in no particular order):

 a water spritzer

 aluminum armature wire

 masking tape

 paperclay

 bamboo skewers

 an assortment of clay tools

 acrylic paint in your choice of colors

 gesso

fabric scraps (i will be using muslin but old t-shirts work just fine)

aluminum foil

wire cutters

We will start with making the head.

for this part you will need the paperclay (i exclusively use Creative PaperClay), a wad of aluminum foil, your clay tools, masking tape and a bamboo skewer.

i like to recycle aluminum foil (just throw it in the dishwasher and it comes out clean!) but for this demonstration, i will be using fresh from the roll foil- to make it easier.

take your bamboo skewer and gently scrunch the aluminum foil around the top

of the skewer (the flat end, keep the pointy end down).

once you have it in place, your going to give it a good squeeze and

tighten the foil- while molding into a head like form. you want the

skewer to the top of the head form- but not sticking through the top of it.

don't forget to leave a tad at the bottom for the neck.

when you have the foil firmly squished around the skewer, you want to grasp the

 foil in your hand and give just barely a tug, (to make sure you can remove the skewer later)

and then move it back into position.

take your masking tape and wrap the head till no foil shows through.

this is done so that the clay does not react with the foil and it aids in the

drying process of the clay- you won't have so many cracks (the foil has lots of crevices for

air to get trapped in)

now make a loose wrap around the bottom (the neck). this will allow you additional space for a neck

and by making it loose, while the clay will push it back against the skewer, it will allow for easy

removal of the skewer later.

cover the head with a layer of paperclay. about 1/4 inch thick.

if it is too thin (i.e you can feel the tape through it) it will have a higher rate

of cracking when drying, if it is too thick it will take days to dry properly.

TIP:: use your spritzer!

spritz the taped head before adding the clay.

spritz your hands while working with the clay.

spritz the clay.

paperclay is very finicky depending on your environment, your body temperature

and the humidity of the room you are in. It is not hard to work with,

and is very forgiving- if you just remember to keep it moist. if it doesn't blend to itself with one

rub of the finger- it's time to give it a spritz. If you think you have given it too much water

just wait a minute and let it set- but don't walk away from paperclay! you will return to a lump

of unusable grit if you do. just keep moving and you'll be fine!

pinch off a bit of clay from your block and give it a spritz, roll it between your

fingers to make a fat teardrop and (give the head a spritz) place it in the center of

the face to create a nose.

you can work both sides of the nose into the head with your thumbs (don't forget to spritz!)

if you don't have clay tools i have found that the end of another skewer, or the back end of a pair of tweezers

works well for making a nose. insert your tool (whatever it may be) to the left and then to the right to create nostrils. 

TIP: when creating nostrils, a slight bump upwards before pulling the tool out

helps to create the "flair" of the nostril, with out too much effort. you are pushing the clay up slightly

to "bubble" into a nostril flair.

to make the eyes- first- hold the head, facing up, on the ends of your fingertips

(both hands) place one thumb where the left eye should be, place your other thumb

where the right eye should be, and give a little push- till you indent the clay into

the form of an eye socket.

then, taking the rounded end of your tool, define the eye to a shape you like. again, a popsicle stick

also works well for this part, or the back end of a spoon- look around- you will

be surprised what you can use for clay tools!

here is an example: the left eye has the thumb impression. the right eye

has been defined with the rounded end of a clay tool.

the mouth is simply a split of the clay- i am using a tool in this photo, but

an exacto knife or even a butter knife will work here.

Make sure you are still spritzing your clay! (even the block you are working from

needs a good spritz now and again!)

use two splits on the top, to give the full lip look, and then once you have a bit of an

opening, move below the opening and give the clay a bit of a push in and up

and a bottom lip will appear. you can then define them as you wish.

once you are happy with the basic head and face give it

one more spritz (this slows down the final surface drying)

last step-  smooth under the neck as this is the spot that gets handled the most

and is the most likely spot to get over looked.

give the skewer a twist to make sure it is still loose.

TIP:: Bamboo skewers are great for paper clay.

paperclay dries from the outside in. the bamboo wicks the extra moisture out from the

inside of your piece and is exceptionally helpful when drying hands and feet.

It will take 2 (two) days for the paperclay to dry completely. Do not try to rush it by moving

on to the next step or icky things happen to paperclay that is sealed when there is still

moisture in its core. worst case is mold, best case it's going to crack. in either case,

it is a frustration best left behind.

you can flip the skewer (put the dry end in the piece) after 24 hours- this will

help.

**********************************

it takes a while to master paperclay due to it's squishy need to be wet- but it is well worth the time, and so much fun to work with. the possibilities are endless! and don't worry if you don't have any  or only one or two clay tools to work with. when i started sculpting with paperclay, it took me two years to buy a set of tools and another year to feel comfortable using them. your hands are your own amazing tools when it comes to clay- you will be surprised what you can accomplish with just your thumbs and a bit of household items!

*******************************

 let those heads dry and i will see you back here for part two of e-class summerfest at the studio

the body armature!

remember, if you have any questions, you can either leave a comment and i will address

it at next class or you can email me for a private response.

live well.

love each other.