I have printed Karshan avatar in real size and created the skeleton by it.

I fixed the the skeleton to a base and started sculpturing the body. I wanted to make Karshan flexible, to be able to control his positions. Therefor I did the fixed parts with polymer clay and the joints with sponge, gloing it around the joints and cutting it to fit.

I tried something new here, I smeared liquid Latex on the joints. I thought it will make it more durable but still keep it’s ability to move. It didn’t really work so don’t try it. An important thing is to pay attention to the parts that are not covered with cloths.

Then I colored the body and the shoes(Prada sneakers), Folowing the grafic avatar,the photos and the instructions.

Something I like doing a lot, is to color the cloths with acrylic color and a brush. It gives the dolls an illustrated look and I get exactly what I want  without an endless search of cloths. It is very tricky to find the write cloths, the dolls are small and it is hard to find a cloth that would feet both in thickness and in pattern size.   In this case I had to make a specific jeans with a specific wash color so I found a cloth that is it the write texture and thickens and colored it to the write color.

I sewed (or glued) the clothes, said my goodbyes and sent him away to his new life…

I started with the original Lulu figure, I created this one for personal marketing materials which I presented in “Introducing Lulu”. I fell in love with her and decided to do some more work with the same character.

I used the original head, which was already detachable, to create a mold with Sculpey mold maker material. I needed to copy the original face in order to make a new more generic base, this one had to be only the frontal part and without the hair.

Here is the refinement of this first copy. I completed it and added ears. As you can see it’s flat on the back.

The following picture shows the architecture I decided to work with. I created the back of the head, separate from the front and serving as the base of the figure’s head. The front part with the relevant expression will be fitted on to the back part. I fitted the back with magnets so it could hold on to the frontal part. I also use the same screw as before for the head, but keep the screw with the back/base part. Obviously the front part with the expression will contain inside a metal part to work with the magnet. I use simples nuts to do the job.

Here I’m adding the hair to the base of the head (the back part). I covered the frontal part which is exchangeable with aluminum foil, sculpted the hair on both back and front, baked it and pulled out the front part. Later I discovered this part of the hair is too fragile and in the future I’ll have to change a bit the approach.

Now I have a good workpiece to create a more robust mold. I placed it in a frame and here I’m working with silicon based materials to create the mold. The material is smooth-on liquid rubber rebound 25. This might not be the ideal material from the smooth-on list, but it is what I had in house and it worked for me. A better fit would be a material that is a bit more liquid.

Testing the mold, you see the first results and the success of copying the neutral expression. The copy always needs a bit of work, but my purpose was just to get started with something close to the original, as in any case I’m changing the expression for each one.

And here are a few examples of the output. These are already colored as you can see. It took me about an hour each after everything is set.

I forgot to make the holes in the head for the pony tails, so I used a dremel tool.

If we are already talking about molds, I used the opportunity to create hand molds as the faces and hands need constantly to be updated.

Finaly I’m ready to take some shoots of a new Lulu expression. You can see my improvised photo studio with my beautiful new camera.

And some result in real work, expressions and hands.

After completing the base armature to my satisfaction, I add volume using aluminum foil. This is especially important around the area of the head as otherwise it will be way too heavy and obviously we can’t use foam as we need something a bit more rigid. You can also see how the nut and bolts work for the feet. It makes it possible to attach the armature of a wood base.

Refining the shape with clay on top of the aluminum foil. I also did the shoes from clay and the rigid parts. At this point I place the whole thing in an oven to solidify the clay.

Next I apply foam to create volume where I need flexibility – joints. I glue bulks of foam and then shape with scissors.

I collect scrapes of fabrics always to have a selection at the right time. I also steal clothing from family members and destroy good stuff all too often. It is a bit difficult to find appropriate materials as the fabrics need to be very fine so not to be too coarse when applied to the small proportions of the puppet.

Sometimes I do the pattens first in paper and then cut accordingly, in this instance I did everything free-hand. In this case as the head comes off, I can sew the shirt outside and then place it.

In contrast the stocking I must sew directly on the puppet as I can’t take off the shoes. In this case the fabric is organic cotton, it’s a fabric I use often. Unless there is need for white, I paint on top of it the colors I like. These are scraps from a previous business I was involved in. It’s a bit funny that the puppets are clothed with such high quality product, but it’s also nice that the puppets are “environmentally friendly”.

Like I just mentioned I paint the fabric with acrylics. I really like this method, it gives me a lot of freedom with colors and patterns, but even more important, it gives the product a more illustrated look.

Making the hands. I didn’t place the hands on an armature/wire base in this case which was a mistake. I learnt since how to do this better – I’ll show in a different tutorial.

The puppet is ready with shoes and head painted. It’s possible to install in the correct pose and to shoot the picture

This is the result after some photoshop processing. In photoshop I removed the support jig and added the color splash.

And this is my second failure at publishing a work in the A5 magazine. The theme of this issue was “Sin”. At least this work I am proud to present here, you don’t want to see my previous attempt.

When I first thought of writing this blog it appeared to me chronologically. As if I’ll first write a post introducing myself, and then work my way through describing where I came from, my thoughts, my previous work places and so on. A sort of a resume, working my way to construct a personal history together with the readers. Slowly I came to realize that it doesn’t work that way, not in blogs, not online.
There simply isn’t an audience for histories, for resumes, for the past. There isn’t a point where it makes sense to write that I used to do this and that, that I worked in that place, that I studied in that school. There’s only a place for the present. In some strange and twisted way, it’s the convergence of reality shows with meditation of the here and now – the present.
People are interested in the present, in what’s happening right now. “What happening?” Is the twitter question. In the big brother live cameras showing people in real time (at least the cameras are supposed to be live). No time to process, no time to prepare the presentation – just show the moment as it is, “put yourself out there”.
I can’t say that “putting myself out there” is really my strong side. I’m more of an introvert with self-imposed exposure complex. I never filled up my personal details in online forms. I didn’t enlist to any service that wanted to know about me. I held another email address just to hide. But here I am, writing all my thoughts on a blog, trying to “put myself out there”. It doesn’t come natural, it’s real exposure, it has a price… I hope it’s worth it.

Illustration: I’m using Lulu my clay and fabric sculpted character with a new expression. The expressions (faces) are fitted into one original head support. Camera image bought from stock photo site. Photoshop finishing.

So first you can take a look at the original sketch and the end result. You’ll be the judge on how well I managed to take the 2D to the 3D. I improvise a lot, so there are major modifications I did along the way and I’m quite happy with the result.

First step, making the head in Polymer clay. I started by doing the face. I used Super Sculpey and in this sculpture I also decided to use natural material colors and not to paint the figurine.

More detailed work on the face. I added fimo materials with colors to do the eyes with all details. I used a metal wire to do the mustache. Added some earrings – also metal parts.

This is to show my drawer and to take out any concept you might have of me being organized and planned. This is my surprise drawer full of good stuff. I was looking at this point to build some sort of stand to shape the head on top. I needed something steady, heavy that would allow me to work on all facets. I also needed it to be made of metal or something that would withstand the heat of the oven (I burn the clay while on the stand). Luckily the stand turned out ok and it’s still useful for all the heads I made since.

Here I complete the head by adding the material for the back of the head. Eventually also shaping the hair from black fimo material.

To make the hat, I needed to construct a base steady material. I used a thick metal foil, not sure about materials here. You can cut it with scissors and bend to shape. Here I’m making the shape of the hat. Eventually I’ll add cloth and sew around it the outer layer of the hat.

Next comes the body of the figurine. I made an armature from metal wires with some parts like tubes and nuts and bolts to strengthen it and to create joints. Not the best armature in the world. Many many mistakes, but I’m improving and I’ll share better armatures here in the future.

Around the armature I’m adding foam which I cut to sculpt the right figure.

Completed the foam build. Front view

And back view

Putting it all together. before sewing the cloths on.

This is it for now. If you want to see the final result please use the link – The flea and the professor