Building A Mold For Magnus

I have moved into the next phase of building a stop motion puppet: making the mold. First I lay Magnus on his back, prop up his arms and legs with some water based clay and then work clay all around him.

Next I mix up some kinda goop, (I hope that wasn’t too too technical for you to follow) and slop it all over the top of him.

I keep layering the goop on, mix in a little burlap for strength and work it all up until it’s flat on top.

When that whole mess is dry I flip it over and start digging all that water based clay out.

Ok, all cleaned up and ready to make the back half of the mold. (Looks like this poor guy tripped and took a face plant into wet concrete).

Time to say goodbye to Magnus. I basically repeat the entire process and create the back portion of the mold and, yes, that does look like a coffin.

My clay figurine is now gone… forever. I will destroy it as I pull the mold apart and clean it, but hopefully a newer, better, resurrected version of Magnus will emerge from that coffin and have many fabulous stop motion adventures ahead of him.