Mold making

Yesterday I got an impulse.... I wanted to try some Epoxy casting and Mold building.
I had bought a jar of rubber mold builder, at Hobby Lobby, that was already pre-mixed. It's a brush-on kind that one brushes on layer by layer until one reach a thickness of about 8-10 layers. The instructions says to do the first layers thin in order to get the details right and to be careful not to lock in bubbles.


My goal is partly to try to make some clear Epoxy beads and other items, but I wanted to try first before doing some bigger mistakes. Even though I have some pre-made molds I wanted to make a few of my own too.
Mold making is not very expensive and relatively easy to do, but one need to be careful especially with the resin or epoxy casting part of things. I got some really good inspiration from this book>


" The Art of Resin Jewelry" wich includes some hands-on instructions and plenty of projects and inspiration! It comes with a DVD, but I have not watched it yet.


I took my bin out with small bisque fired items out and varnished them so it would seal off. You can see the glossy looking surface on the knob (up in the right hand corner).


I sprayed the pieces I picked out to work with a mold releaser agent.


Below are two smaller items after about 8 layers and 12 hours of drying. It's the spider and the skull from the bin. I used a hairdryer to speed up the drying time between each brushing on each layer. A heat gun would have been to hot! I used a hair dryer on a low heat setting only.


Well it was kind of boring and time-consuming to brush on a layer and then wait 45 minutes before brushing on the next layer, and I wanted to experiment a little.... so I also instead of brushing on layer by layer ( as you are supposed to).... took the Kokopelli guy and just poored over the rubber. I have no clue if that will work but I wanted to try. Worst case scenario.... I have to throw it all out..

Some Internet resources>

http://www.smooth-on.com/Sculpture-and-Art-/c1239/index.html
This web site has tons of videos, instruction, information and general advice!

http://www.hirstarts.com/moldmake/moldmaking.html

http://www.eti-usa.com/consum/castresn/castresn.htm
With the product that I will use tomorrow for some clear casting.