I was commissioned by the bride, now Mrs. Wong, to create a cake topper of a pair of her favorite birds, the Great Blue Heron. She wanted the birds to look like Great Blue Herons, not a simplified or stylized bird. I intentionally thought of how to display the birds after the wedding so that they can be a keepsake for the couple.
PROCESS
GREAT BLUE HERON CAKE TOPPERS
A mutual friend of mine and Mrs. Wong connected us, and this was what I put together for a pitch and corresponding prices.
I collected references, made an armature, bulked with tinfoil, covered it in oil clay, and proceeded to add and remove clay until it looked like a Great Blue Heron. You can see my back and forth with wings and feathers.
Next came moldmaking. I used Smooth-On brush on silicone, Rebound 25. I only had papier-mache plaster substrate, which did not close or support sufficiently. After visiting Reynolds Materials in Georgia for advice, I picked up Free-Form Air FAST epoxy putty to make a new mother mold. I was able to pour a test mold and learned that the air vent in the beak needed to be strengthened and widened. I cut the original vent off, used a dowel and re-siliconed the vent before making the second mother mold which worked great. I used Alumilite, a snap-cure resin from Micheal's.
Painting was the most straightforward part for me. The dowels for legs were a fun challenge. After removing and leveling the leg spots, I measured and cut untreated wooden dowels, temporarily glued to the flattened spots, and covered with more of the Free-Form Air FAST epoxy putty.
Finally came the sculpted feet and engraved base. After speaking with Mrs. Wong, the base was changed to the natural wood with the bark. This is also how I learned that Free-Form Air FAST epoxy putty is not for sculpting. I had new porcelain clay to play with and made the feet.
Resin casts of an octopus I sculpted to be a trinket and ring holder.
I used dyed translucent resin for the orange and purple trays and a bronze powder mixed with resin for the first few layers, then backfilled with black dyed resin. After the tray was pulled from the block, I buffed select areas with steel wool for the bronze look.
PROCESS
OCTOPUS TRINKET TRAY
I started with a sketch to keep track of contact points and tentacle placement, next is my sculpture in oil clay, glued to a case for EcoFlex 00-10, and my work table while I was porung the orange version.
REINDEER BUST
I was learning how to use SmoothOn Rebound 25 brush-on silicone and creating a mother mold. Needless to say, I made a four-piece mother mold because of the antlers. I had a patient and kind instructor, Morgan Janssen who supported me through this whole endeavor.
Resin cast of my sculpted reindeer with LED lights and broken holiday lights.
PROCESS
Again, huge shout-out to Morgan Janssen for helping and guiding me through this process of self-inflicted antler hell. I learned a lot and would love to try it again, knowing what I do now. My first change? The size.
My first pull from the mold. I used a snap-cure resin that I cannot remember the name for the life of me. It was done in multiple passes. After learning more about molds, looking back, the leaks that I found while pouring the antlers were what helped insure the antlers were pretty bubble free.
Here you can see me on a resin-pouring day. I mixed batches of resin, clogging up new leaks, and added my broken Christmas lights as the translucent resin cured. I wanted a cavity to put working LED lights into, so I took an old, glass, rodent water bottle, covered it in Vaseline, and set it in the resin. The bottle never came out, so I broke it and cleaned the edges as best as I could. I am covering the broken pieces with more resin so nothing else broke or fell out. I learned a lot on this project.
WHO-NOSE
My first custom face prosthetic.
My first attempt at a wearable prosthetic; My very own Who-Nose inspired by Dr. Seuss's How the Grinch Stole Christmas, 2000's Film starring Jim Carey AKA my favorite movie that I can fully quote.
PROCESS
Me, casting a classmate's face, and they cast mine in return. I know that is not the correct paint or application; This was the last project for this class, and I decided to do a combination of acrylic paint and my makeup because I could not get the proper paint in time.
MY FIRST 2-PART MOLD
I'm still proud of this weird piece. It perfectly encapsulates my weird humor.
My first 2-part plaster mold. I had a dead lightbulb and decided to make a 'Social Media Last Supper Lineup' (created in January 2022)
Per my elder-millennial, scene-ior citizen, red-and-black-studded and checkerboard brain, the object holding us back from eternal bliss is the 404 blue error screen of death. Tom from MySpace is OBVIOUSLY Jesus Christ, while Zuckerberg represents Judas. With its electronic halo of lightbulbs, all social media creators (at the time of the piece's creation) were conveniently the same amount as those at the Last Supper.
CONTACT
Do you want to work together? Or maybe you want to share a photo of your pet with someone new? Either way, I'm excited to hear from you!
