Now the casting part, this is where i made most of the mistake, mostly because the lack of experience, but since than, I've made a lot of cosplay props from silicone, i'm still not on the Starpery level, but but i've got better with painting subtle details, and blendeing colours.
Anyhow:
The first mistake was that i've used cheap silicone for the mold, what is not really a problem in itself, because i did not wanted to pour big batches, but what i did not know, is that it shrinks around 4% after it cured.
Meaning i had to stretch and glue her face on the skull, and not just attache it with the silicone plugs going into the skull. Not a huge issue, but i will print 4% bigger next time.
To create the molds, i put polymer clay around the prints to block out nearly half of it, then pour multiple layers of the cheapo silicone on it, this is time consuming because i had to wait to add the next layer, or it just flows down to the clay, and for a good seal, it is advised to add keys into the polymer clay, so your mold fits nicely together and wont move during the cast, but there are a lot of wids on Yt about making multiple part molds. Then i've added medical gypsum fabric, to give it strength, and to keep the mold shape, plus later it helped to clamp the parts together.
After one side was done, i've just let it set for a few hours, removed the polymer clay, sprayed with a release agent so the mold wont stick together, and poured the other side, or sides if needed. For example her chest has a front/back/internal parts, but her face only got 2. Then build up the gypsum cast on the other side too, let it set, remove the original part, cut a hole for the pouring point(s) and thats mostly it.
Now by mostly it, i rather mean building molds like this is a work of art, you hide the seams/pour points, and it has to be almost fully water tight, or the silicone can pour out when you are casting.
During this, i've made my second big mistake, it was cold in the room i casted the mold, so i've put the casts on the radiator, RTV sets a lot faster the hotter it gets, but i did not realized that the hollowed prints still got resin inside, and it cracked the prints, that is why i don't have her legs anymore, the cast was ok, but the 3d print come out in pieces sadly.
Her face cast looks like this:
- 20221122_170318.jpg (3.19 MiB) Viewed 2035 times
- 20221122_170328.jpg (3.44 MiB) Viewed 2035 times
- 20221122_170339.jpg (3.36 MiB) Viewed 2035 times
On the last image, you can see the keys on her eyes so the 2 part stick together and hold place, and the holes, where the face skin has the keys, to attache it to the skull.
Next step:
for anything sturdy, i'm only using Dragonskin, the 10 fast, or 10 medium, and 30 medium here, with added slacker or silicone oil.
The 10 was for the skin, the 30 for the spine (keeping the vertebrals together, along with 2 flexible pipe to somewhat keep the pose).
It is a 2 part rtv silicone, a-b part mixed equally, so i can pre mix the skin colours, and then add the vulcanizer part just before pouring it, this way the colouring will be consistent. But one thing to keep in mind is it will still be a bit transparent, so one can layer it for great details, but it has to be thicker then a few mm, so the skeleton/foam is not see trough.
The slacker make the silicone more skin like, the more you add the more tacky it will be, around 10% it will be a bit softer, then it will be skin like, then it will be gel like around 30% and add more to turn it to snot.
The problem is, the more you add, the thackyer it gets, so after 30-40% you need to layer it, or it will tear very easily, and any and everything will stick into it.
So i had to molds, and the silicon ready, heated up the room to 23c, so it will set around the given time.
Next i cleaned the molds from dust and gypsum particles, sprayed it with release spray, and then added the pre casted tattos (have to be very soft, and pushed down, or it can separate from the surface) to the mold, and poured a tiny bit of silicone on them to set them in place. Then made the painting on the boobas, lips etc with a few brushes, dab the skin with a big brush to add tiny red dots for details, and let it set for a little bit, not fully, just until it sticks to the surface.
Then carefully assembled the mold, and poured a tiny bit of silicone, rotated it around to cover the entire surface, and let the excess drip out. This created the outer layer of her skin. Then let it set until it solidified, and repeated the process. One can add tiny pre casted red/brown blimps to add some detail to the skin. On the harder parts like her calf or knee, i've just filled it with 10% slacker silicone, and thats all.
I mixed 2 batch of 10% and around 35% slacker silicone up, The 10% will be the hard parts, the 35 are the soft, plus i mixed some yellow to the 35% so it resembled fatty tissue.
Then poured the soft one to the stomach/booby/arse parts, let it set for a bit, and filled the rest with 10% mix. I've also added tiny pre made blue veins to achieve some nordic fair skinned looks, but they was too tiny, like a root of a small flower, and did not had much of an effect.
Since then, i've casted a lot of silicone for various mostly not nefarious purposes,like film/cosplay props like zombie arm, and big ass wounds, and had a lot more experience with painting it. I don't think i can achieve Starpery level, but still, i'm more confident that the integrated paint wont be to sharp, and will blend nicely.
Anyway, she is not in a good shape now, since i removed her foam in the stomac. It was giveing her a nice human like back, but it caused the stomac to fold weirdly if she sits or bend forward, but as it turned out, that was a stuctural part holding together the hip/chest part of the skeleton, and now her stomac is all teared up around her waist, and only her spine is holding her together. So i prefer not to publish any pictures until i fix this mess, but i can add a booby image, with her android like bjd attachers for the arms
anyways.
