Project 2: Experiments in life casting continues

My attempts with the alginate are on hold until I get some more and having not really done anything for a week due to being ill has spurred me on to make up for lost time.  The weather today was rubbish so it seemed a good plan to explore some more ideas. I'm still trying to indicate form with something without it being solid.  I like the idea of using wire and mesh but without quite knowing how to go about it at the moment I also had the idea of using fabric soaked in plaster to indicate form.  Not to wrap around completely but to indicate it, as if it had been blown into an invisible thing and taken its form.  The only readily available form I have to use as a model is myself and my happy to assist partner who is used to my strange requests.

I decided the granny net curtain material, being mesh-like would hold the plaster well. Knowing what a mess I tend to make I covered the bathroom floor in black bags before positioning myself on a small table and anchoring my foot in the towel cupboard, with the idea the fabric would drape down in front of me while catching body contours.  The fabric was soaked in crystacast plaster and draped over before pouring a few more bowl fulls along the length of the fabric until we thought there was enough.  I did ask that warm water was used for the plaster but when it trickles down your back it still feels pretty cold!  (At this point I was wishing I had taken time to find a more comfortable position, whilst also worrying that at some point one of the sproggies would be wanting to come in for the loo).

Normally plaster sets quickly, unless you have cramp in a leg and are getting really cold, so next the hair dryer was employed.  I did think that perhaps the plaster wasn't thick enough but when my leg beccame unbearably painful I no longer cared and the plaster was prised off.   Ouch, ouch!.........mental note to self to rub petroleum jelly on first next time!
Well sadly the plaster was not quite thick enough and the form pretty much collapsed, although at this point I was now busy in the shower using an exfoliating sponge on my skin, trying to rub away the stubbornly adhered plaster which was gradually coming away along with the top layer of me.

Well although not a successful outcome, I think if I do it again (glutton for punishment), there needs to be perhaps an initial layer of mod-roc on me before the plaster fabric is applied and this would possibly give the whole thing a lot more strength and stability.  Anyway, it made for a more interesting rainy sunday.

Project 2: Experiments in life casting

Well following on from my experiments with materials I really need a better form on which to base the material.  The hand casts were not ideal as so small and fiddly, so I thought I really needed a head cast, which by my reckoning would provide a more recogniseable, larger and flatter form for the materials.  I had bought a small packet of alginate a few years back which provided a really successful way of replicating the hand casts and one face cast of a guinea pig friend.  So having recently bought another larger bag of the stuff off of ebay,  I got myself fashionably attired in black plastic bag, and having chickened out of full head cast, instructed partner in the method of face casting, (and drank lots of wine to alleviate fears of panic and claustrophobia). I hate the feeling of being shut in, added to which I have the associative memories from teenhood when I got a friend to cover my face in plaster while I led down.  The straws that were supposed to maintain airways had lots of gaps around them which allowed the plaster to seep up my nose.  Anyway, this wasn't nearly so bad, although the comments, "its a bit lumpy", it's not sticking very well", and, "it's not like the stuff in the video you showed me" should have made me realise all was not well.

"Ah it will be fine", was my optimistic response (before my mouth was sealed shut) and we continued after with the mod-roc application.  This was the only really claustrophobic bit.  This was the bit that made the world become darker and my anxiety begin as I worried about a plaster cast of the inside of my nostrils.

That thankfully didn't happen and all was fine,  but.........when we removed the cast the alginate all came apart in bits.  That wasn't supposed to happen,.......bum!
I have since had more success in mixing the alginate with a blender in that it removes lumps and sets better but subsequent attempts at using it on various body parts has proved that it is a duff bag.  Maybe it's old or something but it wouldn't even replicate my daughter's hand very well so looks like I will have to source some more and put it down to experience. Back to the drawing board, as they say.