Polymeri Online 7.9.14 | Super realistic sculpturing, Phone photographing tips, Key pendants, Wire and sticky tape clay hands and Have a cup of tea

Stan Winstron School of Character Arts posted a preview to a fascinating miniature head sculpturing class. 

In the class Jordu Schell is teaching how to sculpt a hyper realistic miniature head in Super Sculpey. 

There are many classes in Stan’s school. If you are into realistic sculpturing you may find this resource very useful. 

I love the magnifying glasses he is wearing!

https://www.stanwinstonschool.com/tutorials/sculpture-techniques-miniature-head-sculpting-jordu-schell

You may want to check out the freebies area with additional sculpturing classes and many others using different materials or techniques -

https://www.stanwinstonschool.com/search?term=free

Non polymer but not less important!

In this YouTube video you will find online shop photography tips when using an iPhone (or any other phone). 

White background, colorful background, flat/curved shooting, light tips, angle pictures, 3D shooting and many more. 

This guide is great it you’re too lazy to take your huge DSLR camera off its bag ;)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KfcPIBGJT5o#t=26

Kathy Richardson from “Out of Time Designs” took keys to use as pendants! Antiqued, painted and chubby formed – they are so cool!

Kathy is known for her creativity, always taking her knowledge to the next level (she did wonders with the Cosmic Ceramic tutorial) and her flickr gallery is a treat to the eye.

http://www.outoftimedesigns.com

https://www.facebook.com/182430331821727/photos/a.371340219597403.86716.182430331821727/743726912358730/?type=1

https://www.flickr.com/photos/outoftimedesigns/

Wire hands? Victoria Minenko lives in  Kharkov, Ukraine. At the time she graduated from the Kharkov National University specializing in land planning engineering, but this didn’t sparkle enough her creativity. Her next professions included graphic design, makeup, florist and since March 2008 - art dolls.

In this class she is using wire and sticky tape along with clay (paper clay but you can use polymer) to form doll hands.  Fascinating!
http://kuklyspb.ru/Main/handsfromminenko

Last but not least is AnnaOriona with her miniature food and jewelry. In her classes she is going through many techniques and tools. Although in Russian you will definitely learn a lot from her video classes. 

This is her previous feature in Polymeri Online with her hairy cat tutorial.

http://polymerclayfimo.livejournal.com/4989269.html 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_I-EFmiVsdM#t=263a

Polymeri Online 8.2.14 | Earthen polymer spirits, Humpty and Elise clay shoes, Maureen's molds tips and Polymer acrylic faces

This week it's all about faces! (and a winter flower)

Tina's goddess figurines

Tina Raewyn is creating ooak pieces inspired by nature and spirit. She loved all things earthy and her jewellery reflects the female spirit, passionate colourful side, mystery as well as strength and intuitive nature. Tina is using sculpey and sculpey ultra-light that are strong and light weight.
https://www.etsy.com/shop/TRaewyn
https://www.facebook.com/tinaraewyn

polymer clay shoes by Dan

Dan Crowley posted a new pair of shoes in his FB page, "Humpty and Elise". The shoes were made for a collector. He says it was fun trying to figure out how to fit Humpty into a shoe shape.
This Chicago based artist is creating his puppets for years and many of his sculptures are owned by collectors. Aluminium foil and felt are some of the materials he is using.
https://www.facebook.com/DanCrowleyStudio
https://www.etsy.com/shop/DanCrowleyStudio

Maureen's friends and molds

Maureen Carlson with her ever smiling face and pleasant voice, share with us her face mold tricks. She is taking her silicon molds and manipulating them into endless faces and expressions.
I had the pleasure of taking a class with Maureen a couple of years ago at Cabin Fever Clay Festival and it was such a wonderful class.
This 41 minutes video is full of character, don't miss her 2nd video on using her hand molds.
Face molds video - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rdB9TdwFm44
Hands molds video - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQAde4n0kWI

Jordin's faces

Jordin Ispi from Queens, NY is a mix media artist working with polymer clay as well as painting and illustrating. His work appeared in many publications according to his resume and he is influenced by African art, Southeast asian art and Mexican masks. His polymer clay sculpturing were presented worldwide and made of polymer and acrylic paints.
http://jordinisip.com/painting/sculpture/sculp_h1026b_06

Today was such a sunny day that I wore my shorts and went for a walk.
Winter flowers are still around but I'm not sure we'll see much rain in the next months. Summer coming too soon?

Have a great warm weekend!

Polymeri Online 17.5.13 | The Rocky Horror millefiori cane, Plaster mold hollow beads tutorial, Embellished bags and Faux ivory polymer clay art

Polymer clay cane
The Rocky Horror Picture Show

Beverley Start is a polymer clay artist since 2009, after she moved to Ontario, a friend gave her a beautiful pendant made of polymer clay. She was fascinated by the technique and went to goggle about polymer. After watching a few hours of how-to videos on YouTube, she was off to Michaels to buy what she needed to get started.
With background in science and engineering, and years of being a cake decorator, her tip for canning is "think three dimensionally".
Here is her "Frankenfurter" cane from The Rocky Horror Picture Show
http://handmadeartists.com/forum/index.php/topic,6758.0.html


Whinnie Poh is sharing with us some of her unique ways for creating hollow beads using molds and plaster or salt dough.
Her beautiful hollow jewelry pieces require delicate technique which gives such an accurate result.

Hollow beads using plaster molds

More of her work here and here .
She gives special directions, tips and "do's and don't" for working with plaster molding. Translation from Russian to English was a bit complicated to understand, if you'd like to experiment I recommend reading her post several times until you feel confident enough to begin :)
http://yablor.ru/blogs/otminka-zapekaemih-plastikov/2492694

Sun and moon wall art decoration

Lisa Rapp started HiGirls! Designs because she wanted to carry handbags that didn't cost a fortune while making a statement about her personal style.
She learned to work with polymer clay first as a way to make beads, then started to discover new ways to use it for practical items, then it become her obsession! Her trademark has become a polymer clay embellishment for each bag.
This is another one of her polymer clay pieces - Sun and moon wall art decoration, Mexican inspired.
https://www.etsy.com/listing/124311822/sun-and-moon-wall-art-polymer-clay

Faux Ivory polymer clay beads

Speaking of faux techniques (I am still with faux ceramics spinning in my head), here is a beautiful real but faux store for polymer clay art by Selena Wells, her specialty is faux ivory pendants and beads, ancient-seeming, history-archaeology-like.
https://www.etsy.com/shop/selenaannewells
http://www.flickr.com/photos/selenaanne/

In exactly 3 weeks I am flying to Liechtenstein to meet old and new friends and teach 2 of my most popular classes - Skyscraper and INKredible.
Preparations are on my schedule, new jewelry, new samples, I promise to post pictures as soon as they are ready.
Have a great (almost) weekend!

Polymeri Online 11.8.12 | Polymer and mosaics, Silver and polymer, Incense stick holder and Child head tutorial

This week I decided to dig into my list and feature some of the older fav I've bookmarked myself to post here, this list contains all my future posts and is being collected slowly with every polymer piece I see online -

Polymer Clay and Mosaic

Nataly is a mosaic artist born in Russia but currently lives in Israel.
All crafts and mosaics helps her unwind from her work as a neuroscientist in the hospital research laboratory. She started to create as a way to lose weight, because she wasn't able eat in evening as part of her diet. Mosaic helped her.
As a neuroscientist she knows that creating has so many good health effects and this is also part of the reasons to keep doing it.
Nataly's work is usually created using small stones, mosaic/glass tiles but occasionally she uses polymer clay as a free form decoration along with all other tiles.
In this piece - a tree in bloom, she used mosaic tiles, small stones, glass beads and polymer clay. It was made as a 72 birthday present for her mother.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/45526512@N07/4376852162/
Check out her fish clock using organic glass base, decorated with mosaic and air-dry clay.

Polymer Clay and Silver Brooch

Krista Breckman works with silver, copper, metals and.. polymer clay.
Her work with polymer includes techniques like mokume gane and  metal leaf and the addition of silver bordering makes it so elegant.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/kristakile/3044266127/

Polymer Clay Incense Stick Holder - Prince Frog

Italian Leila Bidler made a super cuter incense stick holder for a swap back in 2009, the swap theme was fairy tales and she decided to create a frog prince with a golden ball.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/gom6699/4183808471/
A incense burner is super easy to make, all you have to do is find your main piece and pierce a hole for the stick (make sure it is far enough from the clay to avoid polymer burning).

Glow in the dark Incense Holder

Here is another example by RedPebbleArt (Valerie Marousek) - A lotus burner made with glow in the dark fimo which is great for the total atmosphere.
http://www.etsy.com/listing/80077300/glowing-water-and-lotus-incense-burner

Polymer Clay Tutorial -
Sculpting a Child Head

Sculpturing was never my strong point, therefore I admire every person who has a talent for this part of art, Lewis Goldstein posted a tutorial for sculpturing a polymer clay child head. After taking a look at the photos, I think I can do it too. Looks so easy when you see all the steps - right?
More of his(her?) work and gallery - here
http://www.lewisgoldsteinartanddesign.com/DollTutorial.htm

Have a great weekend!