Fimo Professional On My Work Table

GAH!!!! Just got my very first FIMO Professional 85g blocks of clay! Look at that delicious colour! I can't wait to open up these resealable packs of awesome and get creating! 

I spied one of my projects on the FIMO Liquid page of the new STAEDTLER pamphlet. I've been given the go ahead to share the project here with you. So read on and click to see the full instructions for how to create these metal look pieces using FIMO Liquid and FIMO effect clay.

Victorian Metalwork Roses

By: Kellie Mowat

I have been using thinned out FIMO clay to paint with, as a molding gel. It is easier to sculpt some shapes like rose petals, with softer clay and the tip of a paintbrush than it is to use fingertips and hard sculpting tools. Using this soft gel like clay as a painting medium has opened the door to a new way of thinking about creating with clay. I have chosen the look of metal work roses for this piece but cameos of many descriptions can be created using this technique of painting with clay. I encourage you to try this technique using any of FIMO’s highly pigmented clays.

Materials needed:

FIMO soft metallic gold (or silver)

FIMO Effects white sparkle

Liquid FIMO

FIMO Metal powder in gold (or silver)

Various sizes and colours of Mylar glitter

FIMO varnish and mat varnish

Rhinestones

Rubbing alcohol or acetone

Jewellery findings in gold or silver color

Tools needed:

#4 or 5 round sable brush (brush that can withstand oil paint)

Roller or pasta machine used for FIMO not food

Toothpicks or pointed tool

Parchment lined baking sheet

Jewellery pliers

Small spatula or non serrated butter knife

Oven

To make Metallic Liquid FIMO:

Condition gold or silver colored metallic FIMO clay with a small amount of liquid FIMO. Keep adding liquid FIMO in small amounts kneading it into the clay until it is too sticky to handle. Put the sticky clay onto a piece of parchment and add more liquid FIMO by mixing it with the spatula. Stop adding liquid FIMO when the clay is the consistency of thick peanut butter.

Set aside this mixed and thinned out clay.

To make Opal like clay:

Condition the FIMO glitter white clay and roll out to 1/8^th of an inch thick. Sprinkle randomly, three or four sizes, shapes and colors of Mylar sparkles. Fold and roll clay until you have reached the desired look. The glitter white Effects FIMO clay is translucent, and will look much different after it is baked. To test the look of the clay it is advisable to prebake some mixes to determine color in finished piece.

Set aside the mixed clay.

Creating the base pieces:

Roll out the gold (or silver) metallic FIMO clay and the FIMO effects white sparkle and glitter mix clay to 1/8^th of an inch.

Use the templates to cut out two hearts. Cut the larger heart out of the metallic clay and the smaller out of the opal FIMO mix.

Place the smaller heart onto the larger heart making sure it is centered.

Press the edges of the smaller heart down to bevel the heart into the base piece. Use the toothpick or pointed tool to make radiating indents from the smaller heart edge to the larger heart edge.

Make a thin worm of the FIMO metallic clay.  Add the worm to the edge of both the small and the large hearts. Press to secure and smooth out join seam. (The seams can be filled in with liquid metal clay mix and then smoothed with paint brush to make joins in the clay invisible.)

Dip the dry paintbrush into the metal powder and carefully dust the FIMO metallic clay (Don’t forget the back of the piece). Try not to get the metal powder onto the opal FIMO clay mix. If you have to clean the opal heart you can use some rubbing alcohol or acetone on the tip of your brush to pull the powder off before baking.

Insert eye pins where they will be needed to mount chains for hanging. I have two top eye pins and one on the bottom tip of the heart to hang a dangle.

The dangles and earring pieces were created using a teardrop shape of flattened metal coloured clay with a small flattened circle of opal clay near the bottom edge. These teardrop pieces are finished with thin worms of metal clay and roses the same way the hearts were.

Bake piece according to package instructions. Allow to cool.

 

Painting with the Liquid metal clay:

Form and pick up a small ball of the mixed liquid FIMO metal clay using the end of a toothpick. (It is easier to scrape a small bit of clay into a line and then scrape segments of these lines into balls.)

Place this ball of sticky clay onto the inner heart edge by spinning the toothpick against the clay that the ball will be sitting on.

With the tip of the paintbrush, shape the ball into a flower petal shape. With the inner most edge of the petal being thinnest and the outer most edge being thicker. 

There will be three petals forming the outer ring of the flower.

If the clay is sticking to the brush, clean the brush off with acetone or alcohol and use the damp brush to push clay into shape.

Here are the three petals of the outer ring of the flower. Dust these petals gently in metal powder being careful not to distort the petals shape while coating.

Bake piece for three minutes at 230^o 

 Allow to cool.

Add three inner petals using the same technique you used for the outer petals. Dust in metal powder and re-bake for three minutes or set with heat gun and allow to cool as before.

Add one last ball of mixed liquid metal clay into the center of the flower. Push a small bake-able rhinestone into the wet clay, and dust new clay with metal powder.

Add a small ball of mixed liquid metal clay to where ever you would like a leaf. I added three leaves. Use the tip of the paintbrush to pull the ball into a teardrop shape. Dip the brush into the acetone /alcohol and pinch brush tip to shape into a line. Use the shaped brush tip to make veins in the leaves.  Dust each leaf in metal powder and bake and cool as before.

Coat the opal clay with FIMO varnish to bring out the shine, and coat the metallic finishes of the piece with FIMO mat varnish to preserve the piece and keep the metal powder in place.

Add jewellery findings. Chains and earring hardware as desired. I offset the gold color of the FIMO metal powder with a silver chain and used some FIMO silver powder to accent the piece.

Experiment with different shapes and sizes of pieces. Follow the same techniques to make new shapes and designs.