Dolls

[Unorthodox]

Face off this year had a challenge to turn their model into a monster high doll. 

http://www.syfy.com/faceoff/episodes

[Buster's Uncle]

...Moving the doll crafting here from the Masks and other art thread...



Mom has made three pairs of doll shoes this way, now.  I'll get pics of the others...

[Buster's Uncle]

Here's the three pairs Mom has made with press mold shoe soles...








-I've started something else in a similar line.  Pics soon.

[Rusty Edge]

That shoemaking is cool.

[Buster's Uncle]

Gimme a few minutes, then...

[Buster's Uncle]

See, Barbie has weird feet, like a 100 year-old Chinese noblewoman.



So it doesn't look it without a barefoot comparison shot, but these raw sculpey pumps cover a lot less foot than it appears - it hit me that it might be workable to do a press mold that covers a teeny bit of toe, and less heel, and still hold onto the foot.  Part of the idea is pressing Barbie feet to the inside in the mold to get that part right.  It ought to -maybe- work with a flexible silicone mold, and if Premo baking clay is as flexible as my nets research claims.  The trick will be pulling the Barbie feet back out before baking and leaving the shoe undistorted/intact.  -Maybe a little talcum power.


I've got her in the freezer to help firm up the water-free sculpey -I'm worried about those thin heels holding up to silicone insertion, and I can't bake the shoes on the doll- which is why all these shots show frost or dew.

Barbie feet are usually made partly of the same flexible vinyl that her head is, which is why I hope there's enough flex in her toes to get in and out of the finished shoes.  I'm not satisfied with the match between the two.  Detail work is very difficult at that tiny size.  -So I, dunno, might carve a little on the baked end result and try a second mold - less sculpey than half my pinky tip and two squirts of calk hardly makes for an expensive learning curve...

[Buster's Uncle]

Best guess immediately after molding attempt:  this try's gonna be no good.



I had the Barbie in a doll stand to hold her feet elevated while I worked on them.  I only kneaded the calk in the soapy water for 15 seconds or so, because I wanted it soft and not setting up before I was ready.  I was pinching off small bits of calk and applying to her feet individually, to softly fill the instep first, then the rest of the bottom, then around the top.  It was going great until she came off the stand, both feet contacted the table, and I had to start over - only now the shoes had thawed from the freezer and were covered with dew and the calk didn't want to stick at all and spread right the second time.

I enclosed each foot as well as I could, which may or may not be well enough, and put her back on the stand and pressed her enclosed feet into the base slab - I figure the feet used in any given shoe pressing will be attached to a doll, so the spacing/orientation matters.

Need to let the mold cure overnight before baking the shoes is practical, so I best leave it until then.  The heels probably deformed wildly pressing into the slab, too, so joy joy joy.  We'll see, and updates as developments develop...

[Buster's Uncle]

I've mentioned before that I do a non-trivial portion of my important thinking about my arting while I'm sitting on the porch of Dog City with the cats; for sunset session, I realized that next time, I should skip the spike heels and make what Momma tells me is called a "wedge" - fill in the bottom of the shoe with a much more substantial heel w/ a very modest normal instep.  Mylochka can use them as some sort of 70s shoe that Barbie may be actually able to stand in, or more importantly, glue cloth/vinyl uppers that go down to barely above the instep as if it were a normal-height shoe on a fairly normal foot.  -They'll have a tendency to look like Victorian women's boots unless I build the toe forward enough, but that might look odd in the uncovered version.  Still thinking it over...

[Rusty Edge]

Thanks. Yes, I remember Barbie feet. Wedges would make some sense, or maybe some mod platform shoes. I guess that's up to your doll fashion experts, though.

[Buster's Uncle]

Stay tuned.  Pics processing now...

[Buster's Uncle]

I think the gunk on her left foot is residue from using some tacky weak glue to help hold a shoe on.  They're tough feet to get a shoe to stay on, what with the unnatural tapering of the foot towards the toe end, opposite of human feet.


Note the fairly natural human shape to the footprint that last would make.


-Much as I'd like to stay at it through the other wedge and leaving a mold attempt to cure overnight, I'm well past my bedtime, and lately, I'm gonna wake around seven whether I was asleep 45 minutes ago or not...

[Rusty Edge]

Get your rest.

Now that you mention it, her toes really are compressed, aren't they?

[Buster's Uncle]

It's freaky - and she has no ankles to speak of.

[Buster's Uncle]

Beginning the second shoe, this stage is nothing but the sole of the foot covered on the new one for comparison.





As I said yesterday, getting a shoe to not come out looking like she has Alley Oop feet takes a fair bit of extending at toe and heel.

I've finished since, and gotten both smoothed and matching -she's in the fridge, chillin', as I type; no freezer- to my more-or-less satisfaction.  An artist/craftsman has to either work in a deliberately rough style, or obsessively go over detail after detail -someone will notice at least some of the flaws, otherwise- and it's hard to know when to stop in the quest for perfection, which just isn't possible working on something so small.  I see nothing but flaws when I take and post close-up photos...

[Buster's Uncle]

So a new approach hit me while I was sitting in Dog City after lunch - the mold doesn't need a bottom for the flat bits, and that would simplify making it and allow better forming during fabrication.  So I set her on the stand and put the proto-shoes in firm contact with the base-




The feet on this one are naturally close together posed in a standing position.


Then one squirt of putty, soapy water kneading, carefully pushing a tiny bit under each instep, then surrounding the rest -careful to completely cover the top and go up the ankles, as that's part of the idea for the mold design- and voila!





-In fabrication -if this mold turns out good, and it should- I figure to invert the Barbie and go in from the open bottom of the mold, placing the bits of Premo that go over the toes and hug behind the heels, pull the feet into place and press the rest in.  -Then stand the lot in the fridge for an hour to firm up the clay before extracting the doll and baking.

I need to let the mold sit for at least until this evening before I proceed.


I then had an encouraging experience extracting the Barbie from yesterday's pumps.  Some minor pushing everything back into place in the mold, and the prototypes have baked and are cooling in the toaster oven now.  I'm curious to see if they come out unwarped, though I never expected the originals intact and working.  It's whether the mold is any good that matters...