Build the Skeleton Structure of your Sculptures
Armatures are vital to strong sculptures. Learn about different methods for building strong armatures. A strong armature can hold polymer clay in virtually any complicated or precarious position, even look like it's floating in air.
Just Getting Started?
If you need a general overview of sculpting with polymer clay and how to get started check out this lens.-
Introduction to Sculpting in Polymer Clay
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I have many lenses here on Squidoo about sculpting in polymer clay but none that really give a good overview of what you need to get started. This lens is about the essential information you need to get started sculpting in polymer clay, then you can...
The Importance of Armatures
The Armature is the Skeleton of your Sculpture
A weak or insufficient armature can ruin an otherwise beautiful sculpture. Take your time and get the foundation of your sculpture right so it will last for years.
Basic Armature Making Tools
1: Wire cutters
2: Needle nose pliers
3: Dremel tool or drill
4: Hammer
5: First Aid Kit (I'm serious, wire is sharp you will cut yourself)
Armature Materials
This is a rundown of common material used to make armatures for polymer clay sculptures.
1: Aluminum armature wire
2: Floral wire
3: Fabric covered floral wire
4: Aluminum foil
5: Floral or Masking Tape
6: Sculpey Ultra-Light
7: Brass or steel rods
8: Apoxie Sculpt or other two-part sculpting epoxy
9: Super glue and/or 2-part epoxy glue
10: Wooden bases (craft plaques work well or you could cut your own from lumber)
Shop Safety
Safety First
Practice proper safety precautions when working with armature materials. Most importantly remember to wear safety glasses, especially when cutting wire or using power tools.
- Safety.com - Protecting Yourself in a Home Workshop
- The National Safety Council reports that about 3.6 million people are injured in home accidents each year, many in workshops.
- OSH Answers: Pliers and Wire Cutters
- What are some safety tips to know when using pliers and wire cutters?
- Assembling a First Aid Kit
- You should make sure that you and your family are prepared to treat common symptoms, injuries, and emergencies. By planning ahead, you can create a well-stocked home first aid kit. Keep all of your supplies in one location so you know exactly where they are when you need them.
- DREMEL TOOL SAFETY TIPS
- How to safely use a dremel tool.
Armature Stands
Build extra supports for your sculptures.
Armature stands are used to give an extra support for a sculpture while you are working on it. They are relatively easy to build and there are many different designs depending on what your needs are.
Since the burning point of wood is much higher than the curing temperature of polymer clay you can put a sculpture in the oven while still mounted on the armature stand.
Typical materials and tools needed are:
1: Wooden plaque or cut piece of lumber.
2: Dowels or threaded steel rods
3: Dremel tool or drill
4: Various bits of hardware, wing nuts, bolts, screws, etc.
Click the images for full sized versions.
Armature stand from 2BitSculptor
Spectrestudios' Stand
From Martian Factory
Armature Stand Links
- Getting Started w/ Figurative Sculpture Episode 1 - Building the Sculpting Stage
- In this first video in a planned series on how to sculpt the human figure, I go through the process of building a sculpting stage with armature brace. It's a step-by-step guide to building a flexible stand that can act as a back brace or hanging support.
- Building an Armature Stand
- Print version of the above tutorial.
- iSculpt.org - Video Tutorial #2 in the Can
- In video tutorial #2, I show you an alternative design for an armature stand that gives you the strength of steel pipes, but maintains some adjustability and re-usability, though it's not as adjustable as the last stand we built.
- Armature Positioning Wheel
- Building and armature positioning wheel. PDF
- Diane_Mcdonnell: Build Your Own Sculpture Stand Easily! (1 of 2)
- Have you been wanting a sculpting stand but don't want to spend a hundred dollars and you're not a carpenter? This is easy enough for anyone to make. You may already have many of the materials in your home. Mine took about an hour to make and only cost about twenty dollars for materials.
Noadi's Armature Jig
To make it I traced the male and female figure onto the board with a black marker in 1/6, 1/8, and 1/12 scale (these are the scales I use most often). Then I drew in the shape of the armatures adding screws to all the major joints where I wanted bends in the wire.
With this jig I can very quickly make consistently sized armatures.
To Make Your Own
Supplies
8"x18" Board (this is an approximate measurement, it can be a little smaller or bigger)
Drill with 1/8" bit
1/8" screws
Screwdriver
Permanent marker
Armature diagrams printed at 1/6, 1/8, and 1/12 scale
Sandpaper (optional)
Clear varnish (optional)
Instructions
1: Sand and varnish the board if desired. It will help keep the marker from bleeding into the wood and the jig will last longer.
2: Trace the armature diagrams onto the board.
3: Drill holes at all the major joints where the diagram shows the wire bending.
4: Insert screw into all the holes.
5: Make armatures!
Armature Diagrams and Jig Links
- MKStudios
- An armature is the skeleton that all sculptures are built on and provide a foundation for the pose and act as a guide for proportions. Armature diagrams and how to build an armature jig.
- Resources for Figure Artists
- This lens has the best reference sources for figure artists as I've found so far, from poses to anatomy to hands and feet. I've compiled it for anyone who loves to create artwork portraying the human figure, whether you draw, sculpt, or paint I hope there's something here to help you out.
- Resources for Animal Artists
- Unlike with humans it can sometimes be impossible to work from life with many animals especially exotic wildlife so reference photos are a must. Also as with all art based on life a good grasp of the anatomy is important. I've compiled a constantly growing list of websites and books to help you out.
Wire Armatures
Click Images for larger versions.
From Wayne "the Dane" Hansen
From 2BitSculptor
From GoreGore
Make your Sculptures Fly
Or dance, do gymnastics, etc.
Wire Armature Links
- Wire Armature Building
- Armature Building An armature is one of the most basic and essential skills in sculpture.
- iSculpt.org - Miniature Sculpting in Epoxy Putty Part I: Preparing to Build the Armature
- Before we get started, I want to show you two alternatives to the method I will be showing in today's post. I'm going to be doing this "the hard way" today, so to speak. Building a soldered wire armature is the most work of any of the various miniature armature methods I know, but it also affords you the most flexibility.
- iSculpt.org - That Armature Tutorial Finally... sorta
- I owe some of you an armature tutorial. This is a long-standing obligation from shortly after I created the armature stand tutorial. Unfortunately, a video tutorial will have to wait, but I hope that today's posting will help some people. It's a step-by-step building of an armature, one that can use the stand I showed you how to build in my first tutorial.
- Making the Armature
- Building an armature for a horse sculpture.
- MF Studios behind the scenes blog: Making a figure armature tutorial....
- In this instalment I'm going to explain how I go about making an armature to use as your frame work for applying clay on the actual sculpture.
Armature Supplies from Dick BLick
*I am an affiliate of Dick Blick Art Materials. I promote their products on my pages because I'm also a customer who appreciates their customer service.
Why Bulk Up an Armature?
Bulking up armatures with aluminum foil or other materials helps reduce the amount of clay needed. It also helps reduce the chance of not curing thick clay all the way through.
Bulking Up a Wire Armature with Foil
Polymer clay more than 1/2 thick is difficult to cure properly, either the outside get over-baked and darkens or the inside doesn't cure completely and the sculpt can break down over time from the effects of still liquid polymer inside. For this reason and to reduce the amount of clay needed most polymer clay sculptors bulk up their armatures in the torso and head areas.The simplest way to do this is just to wrap crumpled aluminum foil around the armature and secure it with tape, glue, or floral wire.
Bulked Armature Links
- Sculpture
- People have asked me how to make a clay sculpture, and it's something I
really have to show you how to do in person. But, barring that, here's
a photographic tutorial. Hopefully it'll have enough information to let
you make your own sculptures. - Smellybugs Maquette Tutorial completed! - ConceptArt.org Forums
- Smellybugs Maquette Tutorial completed! 3D & SCULPTURE
Sound Off About Armatures
Foil Cores
Foil cores are tightly compressed balls of aluminum foil used as an armature. This techniques works best for sculptures with round or egg shaped bodies such as heads and animals like rabbits, mice, or my favorite: cuttlefish!Making foil cores is fairly simple. Crumple aluminum foil up into the general shape you want then pack it in as tightly as possible, I use a hammer to get it really tight. To help the clay adhere better either wrap the core in floral or masking tape or cover it in PVA glue (that's white glue like elmer's or tacky glue) and allow it to dry before adding clay.
Foil Core Links
- Crafts : Figures : Polymer Clay Garden Wall Face Plaque : Home & Garden Television
- Polymer Clay Garden Wall Face Plaque
- The Troll Polyzine May 2001
- Sculpting a troll face is not that difficult, mainly because the proportions don't have to be as accurate as when sculpting a human being. You can make funny faces and big noses, and they still look like that's what they were meant to be. The lesson is a good choice for beginners in 'humanized' claying. I hope you will give it a try.
- Elvenwork Tips and Techniques
- Over the years, Katherine has accumulated a wide array of techniques, some from constant experimentation with the medium, and some from interaction with the community of polymer clay artists. She devotes much of her time developing hands on classes for many of the country's polymer clay guilds, sharing the sculpting techniques she uses; however, that method doesn't reach the numbers of aspiring sculptors she would like to. This page is dedicated to them.
Other Techniques
Epoxy: 2-Part sculpting epoxies such as Apoxie Sculpt and MagicSculpt set rock hard and can make for extremely sturdy armatures when used for bulking and securing wires together. The downside to epoxies are that they set quite quickly so you have a limited working time and is much heavier than alternatives such as foil, paperclay, or sculpey ultralight.
Paperclay: Used much the same as foil for bulking up an armature. Make sure to allow the paperclay to dry fully and apply PVA glue to it before adding polymer clay.
Sculpey Ultralight: A very lightweight porous polymer clay, sculpey ultralight makes for strong lightweight armatures when used for bulking or as a core. You must bake the ultralight armature before adding normal polymer clay.
Wire Mesh: Used as a support for thin structures such as fabric or fins. Wire Mesh is very flexible and easily shaped.
Removable Armature: Sometimes you want a hollow structure and a removable armature is the best way to achieve this. Good removable armatures are disolvable clays like cold porcelain or cornstarch based packing peanuts.
Other Technique Links
- Widow Bryant Originals - Boyz From The Wood & Other Fantasy Sculpture - Armature Tutorial
- Please note that I don't do all my armatures like this. This
is the method I use for the smaller pieces. All my armatures are created according
to the need for strength in the composition. The following represents a simplistic
method of creating an 8" doll, with the absolute correct proportions. - Polymer Clay Tips
- Artist Joshua Burkhardt demonstrates several techniques that he has found to build armatures for his life size iguana and lion fish polymer clay sculptures.
- DISSOLVABLE or SOFTENABLE (removable) armatures/forms
- DISSOLVABLE or SOFTENABLE (removable) armatures/forms
- Claudio Setti Sculpture: Making a figure armature tutorial....
- Claudio Setti: Sculpture Portfolio Monday, April 23, 2007Making a figure armature tutorial....In this instalment I'm going to explain how I go about making an armature to use as your frame work for applying clay on the actual sculpture.
- Cold Porcelain Recipe
- Cold Porcelain Recipe. Non-toxic homemade air dry clay. Dissolves in warm water, can be used as a removable armature.
- polymer clays - sculpey ultralight
- Sculpey UltraLightT is the newest and most versatile member of the Polyform family of clays. UltraLight is lightweight and extremely soft but bakes so hard that it won't crack or break, even in larger pieces. However, UltraLight remains flexible when rolled thin, so it is ideal for paper crafts, especially for personalized embellishments or to duplicate add-ons at a fraction of the cost.
Sculpting Books
Books with good armature advice.
Or check out Noadi's Art Sculpting Books aStore for the full list of sculpting books I recommend.
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- Tipi Tipi Nov 23, 2009 @ 1:28 pm
- Wonderful lens to visit. I picked up some very good ideas for a project.
Thank you for sharing your knowledge and talents.
Blessed by a Squid Angel today!
Best wishes,
Susie
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- AbbasAbedi AbbasAbedi Jun 7, 2009 @ 12:26 pm
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- CaseyShannonStudio CaseyShannonStudio May 3, 2009 @ 1:24 pm
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- micstudio micstudio Oct 21, 2008 @ 3:17 pm
- Wow! I just started sculpting about a year ago and this information will definitely help me. Thank you so much for the hours I won't waste doing this wrong!
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- youhavegottobekidding youhavegottobekidding Jun 30, 2008 @ 8:22 pm
- A very Great and informative Lens. Can't waiot to try it tonight.
thank you Author.
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