I do hope you’ll experiment with these two new slightly-altered paper mache clay recipes if you have access to a few cups of powdered ceramic clay.

The clay I used was ordered from Georgies in Portland. It’s their Wonder White clay. I think any ceramic clay without grog would work the same way. (You probably won’t want to order a whole 50 pounds, but that’s the smallest amount I could get. If you want to play with this, call your local pottery supply store and ask if they have any powdered clay).

I haven’t had a chance to try any of this new paper mache clay on a sculpture yet, but I have used paper mache clay that has wet ceramic clay mixed in, and I haven’t seen it crack when it dries – but it’s always possible that it could crack, as Steve suggested sometime last year. (Anything’s possible, right?) Once more people have a chance to try it out and give us their feedback, we’ll have a better feel for whether it’s worth going to the extra trouble to make this version, or if we should stick with the original paper mache clay.

One important point, though – I don’t think you can mix it with a small hand-held kitchen mixer. I’m pretty sure it would burn out the motor. A really heavy-duty stand mixer with a dough hook might work. But watch carefully, so you don’t lose your expensive equipment. (That would make for a very expensive batch of experimental paper mache clay.) It seemed to work just fine today in my food processor.

The specific proportions I used are below the videos. This first video is the latest one, showing the changes I made to the recipe after receiving your feedback. I really like this version, and the recipe you’ll find down below are for this version. The second video is the one I made a few days ago.

Latest Recipe for Paper Mache Clay with Powdered Clay Used as Filler:

• 3/4 cup Elmer’s Glue-All or Rich’s home made glue
• 1 cup Joint Compound (any brand except Dap)
• 1 tablespoon boiled linseed oil (or substitute glycerin or mineral oil/baby oil, instead)
• 1/2 cup powdered ceramic clay
• approximately 1 1/2 cups damp toilet paper, with as little water left in as possible

I have now decided, after using both of these new recipes, that the version using Elmer’s is “faster” when covering a large area of an armature. It goes on very smooth, is easy to spread, and can be sanded when it’s dry. The version with Rich’s glue, however, can be modeled with extremely fine details, and that’s what I’ll be using for eyes, noses, fingers, etc. The detail you can get are truly amazing. Try both ways, and see what you think.

If you’re wondering if this clay is stiff enough to make a sculpture without an armature, I can’t answer that. I haven’t tried it. It might work, but I’m not sure it would dry all the way through. If you try it, please let us know. If you’re thinking about using it with kids, don’t use the boiled linseed oil – it has chemicals in it. Use mineral oil or glycerin instead.

If you try these new versions of the clay, please let us know how they turn out, and if you like them better than the original recipe for paper mache clay. Do they go on smoother, can you get details easier, did I add enough clay, or too much? Does your clay crack or do any other weird thing that we should know about? Let us know.

Since we’re getting very close to the day when we can add paper mache to our paper mache cat, I thought this would be a good time to do another video about the paper mache clay recipe. There are some very common questions about the clay, and I hope that this video will answer most of them.

If you’re following the lessons for the paper mache cat and you don’t want to use the paper mache clay, you certainly don’t have to. But for those who do want to use the clay, I hope this video will help.

The lesson for the cat’s ears, toes and tail will be added tomorrow.

My cat is getting much closer to the day when I can start adding the paper mache. I really did think I could add the ears, toes and tail in this lesson, in addition to filling out the face, but the video would have taken way too long. Besides, it took me a long time to fill out the face, so I’m sure it will give everyone plenty to do before the next video.

The cat looks really ratty at the moment with tape all over her, and things aren’t as smooth as I would like. I tend to get a little sloppy with the armature ever since I developed the paper mache clay recipe – I know the clay will cover most of the bumps and smooth things out, while also making it easy to model the eyes and fur, so I don’t worry about it much. If you’re going to be using paper strips and paste instead, I’ll show you a trick or two for smoothing out the lumps when we get to that part of the project.

How to Fill Out the Face on the Cat Armature:

By the way, Jessie was very brave this week, and put up her very first video, called “How Kids Change Art.” She still isn’t quite brave enough to let us see her in the video (I made dozens of videos before I allowed myself to actually “star” in any of them, so I know how she feels). I hope you’ll take a moment to go check it out, and give her a bit of encouragement so we can see some more videos from her in the future.

And one last thing, which is sort of related to that last paragraph. I’ve been reading lately about creating a blog network. I confess that I still haven’t read that entire article to see exactly how it works, but I really like the idea of people with similar interests helping each other get traffic. Kind of like I just did when I pointed you to Jessie’s blog in the previous paragraph. If anyone is interested in helping me figure this system out, and if you’d like to help build the network, please let me know. I think it could be a challenging, yet interesting, project.

And now, here are the photos of my cat’s face. Click on the Images to see the full size photos:

Today we start filling out the padding on our paper mache cat. This portion took quite a long time, so I’ll wait and do the head and toes on the next video. As you’ll see in the video, I made a little clay model to make it easier for me to see where all the furry bumps go on the outside of the armature. There’s still a bit of work to do on her, but she’s definitely more cat-like than she was when all we saw was five pieces of flat cardboard.

I’ll post the photos I took down below the video, in case anyone is using the pattern I posted in How to Make a Paper Mache Cat, Lesson 1.

Long-Haired Cat, Side View

Long-Haired Cat, Front View

Those white toes are going to be fun to paint. So – how’s everyone doing? Are you having fun with this project?

This video is a little long, but I wanted you all to have plenty to do until the next one comes out. Please let me know if you have any questions.

If you’ve read my book Make Animal Sculptures With Paper Mache Clay, you’ll notice right away that I didn’t cut the foam blocks into wedges this time, like we needed to do for most of the animals in the book. The reason for the wedges can be seen in this photo of my poor African elephant, who is posing in a very undignified position for the photo. He’s sitting up just like the cat, and his legs are splayed out so that his feet are wider than his legs at the hips.

Paper Mache Elephant, Seen from Below

When I looked at my cat photos, and then checked my cat closely while she sat still for a few seconds, her legs, or I should say the back limbs from the heal to the paw, seemed to be quite straight. And the upper portion of her legs, where the knee sticks up, didn’t seem to be at an angle, either. So we get away with using flat foam squares. If your cat pattern shows a cat in a different position, look closely at your reference photos. The foam pads may need to be narrower towards the tail.

A few days ago I asked if anyone would like me to put together a series of lessons, a “class,” if you will, on how to make a paper mache cat. The response was pretty overwhelming. In fact, there are now over 70 comments on that post, more than I’ve ever received so quickly.

There were so many, in fact, that I haven’t been able to respond personally to everyone, but please be assured that I did read your comments, every single one of them, and I’m taking all your suggestions very seriously.

Several people even suggested other subjects that we might work on in our next class, and I’m putting them all on a list.

I’m hoping that you’ll keep us posted on your progress as you build your own paper mache cat, through your comments on the blog posts. If you have any questions, I’ll be happy to try to answer them. If you want to upload a photo of your paper mache cat as you work on it so we can all see how you’re doing, that would be great.

I know that you’ll give each other encouragement and support as we work through these lessons. In fact, you’ll be doing me a huge favor if you jump in and answer each other’s questions and offer suggestions when needed. That way, I’ll know that everyone in the class is getting the attention they need, even if I don’t have time to respond to every comment right away.

The pattern that I made is down below. If you’d rather not make your own pattern, feel free to print mine out. Then you can use it when we do our next lesson – on transferring the pattern to cardboard, which will then become the armature inside our paper mache cat.

So here we go – lesson #1 in this series, How to Make a Paper Mache Cat:

Click on this image to bring up the full-sized pattern.

To use this pattern, click on the small image to bring up the full-sized pattern. Then save the image to your computer, or print it. You’re welcome to use this pattern for your own paper mache cat, or make your own using the instructions in the video above.

Enjoy!

This is great – Nikki made us a video to show how she builds hollow armatures for her cement sculptures. As she says in the video, these techniques will work just as well for traditional paper mache strips and paste, and, even better, the paper mache clay. Thank you, Nikki!

Joker Mask, Paper Mache Clay

I confess. I haven’t seen the movie. I specifically chose not to see it because of all the photos of Heath in his Joker makeup, and it just looked too creepy. I don’t watch creepy movies.

But this morning I saw an ad for a Joker mask, and something just came over me – I had to make one myself. I don’t understand myself sometimes…

• But before we get to the step-by-step photos, I wanted to mention a very interesting conversation that’s been going on over at a Papier Mache Yahoo group that I belong to. It started with a comment from Lucky Stradley, who mentioned that she went to a doll-making workshop with a Russian dollmaker who uses bone glue in her paper mache dolls. It makes the dolls extremely hard and break-proof. We started talking about the possibility of the bone glue replacing Elmer’s in the clay recipe, to make it a bit more “archival.” If you have any interest at all, go join the group if you haven’t already, and read the posts with “Delamination Solution” or “Bone Glue” in the subject line. It was suggested that the bone glue might make the clay too hard to sand – if you do any experiments, please let us know how it turns out.

OK, back to our regularly scheduled program…

I started the mask with a flattened ball of crumpled paper and masking tape, which I squinched and pressed until it was the general shape of Heath’s heart-shaped head. (I’m sure I’m violating all sorts of copyright laws here – oops.)

Starting the Joker Mask

Then I added the brow bone, cheek bones, nose and mouth with aluminum foil covered with masking tape. Most of the modeling was done with the clay, so I didn’t stress too much about the form. If I took the Joker a bit more seriously, I probably would have spent more time on making the form, but it still came out OK. I’m not a portrait sculptor, not even close, so I was counting on the makeup to cover any mistakes in modeling.

Filling out the Form for the Joker Mask

I applied the paper mache clay, and smoothed it with the flat side of a damp knife blade. I left the eyes open so I can see out when I go trick or treating.

Applying Paper Mache Clay to Joker Mask

I threw the mask in the oven set at 200F and left it for several hours. When it felt firm enough to hold it’s shape, I removed the inner form. The clay next to the masking tape was still wet, so it went back in the oven for a while. If you try this project, be sure you don’t try to remove the backing too quickly, or your mask might warp while it continues to dry.

Joker Mask, Form Removed

It’s a bit rough inside. Again, if I was taking this project seriously, I might line the inside with felt to make a nice soft surface. (I tried it on, and it actually fits.)

When it was completely dry, I covered the clay with a few coats of gesso, made with two parts joint compound, one part Elmer’s Glue-All and a dab of Burt Sienna to give it that “flesh tone,” as the Crayola people used to call their Caucasian pink. Do they still do that?

Adding Gesso to Joker Mask

When the gesso was dry, I smoothed it out a bit with a damp sponge. I didn’t want to smooth it too much, because the texture would help make that creepy makeup effect.

Smoothing the Joker Mask with a Damp Sponge

I brushed on some white “grease paint” over the flesh color, and when it dried I added the black and red patches. I discovered that somebody left the cap off the black paint. Who could that have been? (Why are there never any scapegoats around when you need one?) But I managed to dig out enough.

Adding Makeup to the Joker Mask

Now some hair was added, using some old burlap I had from another project. The burlap was brown and I needed yellow, so I tried to get rid of the brown by running it through the washer with some bleach. It stayed brown. Note to self – burlap should not go in the dryer – next time I’ll remember.

For some reason, gluing the hair onto the flesh-colored bald spot was kind of creepy.

I used some yellow paint to lighten the hair a bit, but it needs more. And I used a glaze made from acrylic glazing liquid and a bit of Burnt Umber to bring out the creases and wrinkles on the Joker’s face.

Adding Hair to the Joker Mask

And he’s done. Hair could use some work.

After spending the day with this guy, I’m starting to think I might watch the movie after all. Maybe.

Joker Mask with Paper Mache Clay

After I was too far along with this mask I found some photos of the Joker with much more interesting expressions. I hope someone else will try this, and maybe use different resource photos. If you do, be sure and let us see how it turns out.

Shrek Head - Pepakura Model + Paper Mache Clay

In my last post I included several photos that showed sculptures made with a paper mache clay skin over an armature created by a computer design program called Pepakura. I mentioned in the post that I would love to know more. Simon, the creator of the sculptures, was kind enough to write a very detailed explanation of how he uses paper mache clay with his models, and I was so impressed with his comments that I asked him if I could use them in a new post. He was kind enough to agree, so the following description is by our guest blogger, Simon Doyon.

Since he included a sentence written in French in one of his recent comments, I’m going to guess that Simon lives in France – I’m sure he’ll let us know if I guessed wrong…

I know many of us, especially those of a certain age like myself, have never even considered the idea of using a computer to help us create the armature for a paper mache sculpture, and much of this tutorial will be over our heads. However there are lots of folks out there who already know how use this design program to create 3D objects. Now, thanks to Simon, they’ll soon know how to make a hard, paint-able shell over their paper sculptures, and turn them into permanent works of art. (For the rest of us, there’s a lot of tutorials on YouTube that explain how to make the models with the Pepakura program).

And now – here’s Simon…

First, you must have a 3D model that you want create in real life. I suggest that this model is under, let’s say, 400 polygones. You can modelized yourself or take a model already made. I prefer modeling myself because I can create it with the Pepakura part in mind…

Second, you need to unfold the model in a software called Pepakura Designer. Basically what this software allow you to unfold or decomposed your 3D model in 2D pieces with reference number.

Third, you have to print, cut and score your 2D pieces in sheet material, in this case cardboard. The more precision you can get on this part (and on the following part) the greater the final model will be.

Fourth, you have to put all the piece together in order to build the real life model. This can be hard and long process (2-5 hours depending pn the complexity of the cpu model).

Fifth. You must prepare the completed model to receive the Pm clay. Since there’s a lot of water in the clay, you have to waterproof the paper. I found out that you can do that even before you cut your pieces, just laminate the sheet of cardboard with clear box tape. But you can apply the clear box tape after building the model, just be carefull to follow all the model’s details and grooves.

Finally, once the model is waterproofed, you can apply the pm clay with a wet knife. Since the cardboard model is a hollow shell, you will perhaps have to temporary fill the interior void with some kind of material to allow you to put some pressure on the shell without bumping/sraping/breaking it. I suggest expandable foam (apply it close to the shell, do not attempt to fill all the void with that, it’s kind of expensive). Let it dry for a couple of days and when the exterior is dry, you can remove all the paper and foam inside since the pm clay do not permanently stick to the box tape. With all the interior stuff removed, the sculpture will completly dry within a few more days.

It took me several months to discover and mastering this technic and it’s workflow. Yet there’s more to experiment. The pm clay recipe was the final touch on this and allow me to give strenght and smooth on my sculpture with reasonably cost. Hope it will help you and give you some ideas. Just ask if you have any question.

I’m done (!).

Simon Doyon

Helmet, Pepakura Model + Paper Mache Clay, in progress

Thanks, Simon! I can’t wait to see what sort of comments and questions we get for this post. By the way, we’ve received a lot of questions about making masks and helmets, and I usually refer them to an old post I wrote about making a ceremonial African mask over a cardboard armature. Simon’s idea of using plastic tape over the cardboard to keep the damp clay from getting the cardboard wet, (which could cause the piece to warp while drying), is an excellent idea to use even if you don’t make your model using a computer aided design program.

Baby Chick

I started this project to test a modification to the paper mache clay recipe that was suggested by Ginny in a comment on our paper mache clay page. Her idea of substituting glycerin for the linseed oil in the recipe started a lot of activity in the comments section, so I just had to do some experiments and see if it would work.

I just received my (larger than requested) order of baby chicks, so I’ve got chickens on the brain. That explains my choice of subject matter. I also wanted to create a bird that stands on two feet, since the balance issue has always been slightly intimidating to me. As it turned out, it really wasn’t as hard as I always thought it would be.

Wire Legs and Feet for Baby Chick Sculpture

I started out by bending some wire into a “U” shape, then adding all four toes. If I did this again, I would not double the wire on the back toes this way – it did make it easy to tape the feet together, but it made the back toe too heavy, as you can see in the photo above.

Baby Chick Legs Covered With Tape

The wire was completely covered with masking tape to prevent rust from migrating through the wet clay and ruining the final finish on the bird. If I make another bird I’ll look for some tape that stretches a bit better than masking tape, so the wire legs and toes will be smoother. I’m considering the tape used for bandages, but that’s for another experiment…

I also padded the thigh area at this point. Since I had some aluminum foil on my work table I decided to use it for padding instead of the usual crumpled paper. Of course, the paper would have worked just fine.

Padding the Baby Chick's Body

I started padding the body, building up the separate parts as I worked. The lower tummy was first, fitted inside the wire that connects the two padded thighs. Then I added the chest and neck, and then filled out some more on the back and added the head and wings. Since I was using aluminum foil, it was easy to pinch a bit on the front of the head to make a beak. All of the foil was completely covered with masking tape. When the body was filled out I bent the legs to make sure the bird would stand up without support.

Adding Paper Mache Clay to Baby Chick

Now I made up a batch of paper mache clay. Instead of the linseed oil in the recipe I used about two tablespoons of glycerin. (I found the glycerin at Rite Aid, next to the hydrogen peroxide. It’s also used in soap-making, and as a laxative suppository. I think I bought the last bottle in town). The clay worked nicely, and I was able to apply it in a very thin layer over the masking tape. Since we’re having very warm weather this week the clay dried very fast.

To make the clay seem more “fuzzy” than smooth, I first spread the thin layer of clay on the baby chick, then dabbed it with the end of a stiff stencil brush. You can see in the photo that it made tiny bumps all over the chick.

Paper Mache Clay on Baby Chick Sculpture

I used the edge of a knife to make tiny feathers on the tip of the chick’s wings. I took a ball-point pen apart and used the end of the ink tube to make the eyes perfectly round. I used extra clay to form the cheeks and beak the way I wanted them. The photo above shows the chick after the clay dried, just before I painted her.

Finished Baby Chick

The photo above is another view of the finished chick. You can clearly see in this photo that the back toe is too thick, as I mentioned earlier. Next time, I’ll do that part differently. Other than that, I think she came out quite well. The body shape and the legs make her a more challenging project than the paper mache bluebirds, but it would be fun to make up a few chicks for Easter decorations.

Naturally, I couldn’t stop myself from setting the “fake” chick in the brooder, just to see what the real chicks would think of her. I don’t think they were fooled:

Baby Chicks