District 9 Bunraku.... cracking the cast

Phew! This was really stressful. Your sculpt may look totally awesome, but if you screw up the cast, you are basically back to square one, and will most likely have to re-sculpt the whole damn thing.
Lucky lucky... the cast opened and there was only minor cosmetic touch-ups to fix.

Gee... I guess adding 1" of plaster casting around a good 50 lb. sculpture was a bit much for my PVC stand.... The thing cracked the second I put it on the floor. Not surprising though, I could barely lift it myself T_T
I dragged/rolled out out of the shed and into the yard.


To aid in splitting the two halves (despite a GENEROUS) amount of Vaseline to the edge, I used a Dremmel to widen the spaces between the sections. I have to thank my hubby for this suggestion... there would have probably been a lot more rage and weeping otherwise.
Mold split and clay removed... I'm going to have to go in with a tool and clean it out better... this is what I could dig out with my fingers....


Fffffff...! A crack in the groin area.... it's okay, fortunately the crack isn't all the way through, so it's merely cosmetic. I can patch it.


Still, all and all, the torso split better than I hoped...

From here, once I clean out the molds better, I will be adding rubber latex in many small coats to the inside of both halves. Then when satisfied with the thickness, I will put the two pieces together and fill the hollow cavity with osft expanding foam to make a huggably squishable prawn. >_<

District 9 Bunraku Cont.... yay casting!

Yay Molding process has begun. It's nice to get this alien torso out of my house T_T
Now to the shed he goes! I am using the super handy playing card method to bisect the torso in half


I'm doing the back first (if I make a mistake, it won't be as easily seen since most of the back will be hidden against my body). One coat of thin plaster... followed by thicker ones... this is stage two... more casting to come. :I

District 9 Bunraku Cont.... did I mention...more sculpting!

More sculpting... Shaping the head has been surprisingly fun. I'm really looking forward to adding the MNU stencil to his head :D


Detailing the clay a bit more around the face... the pock marks were done with 5 toothpicks cut in half and taped together.


Also painted the eyes.. this was the easy part. Two 1-1/2" acrylic cabochons with the backs painted.


I am ready to start casting, but I am hesitant to jump in. I will probably wait a few days and look at him again in case any details pop out that I missed.