A Simple Sculpture

A Simple Sculpture
Published on Apr 26, 2020 by Jiaolyulu



Soft Robotic class

I have taken the class called “soft robotics” taught by Kari Love and found that doing it at home is relaxing to me. That class is really great and funny. I am sharing some projects I made at home.
Doing silicone casting is interesting. If you have not seen my first blog post about inflatable silicone, here is the link:

Silicone casting tutorial

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What I made

This is a simple trial of combining silicone with clay.

the silicone inflatable thing

Material and cost:

total cost: more than $60


for making the mold for casting
Material Where to buy Price Does ITP have it?
hotglue amazon link $15.99         ITP has
pen I guess you have them at home        ITP has
airdry clay        amazon link $22 ITP doesn’t have
airdry clay        amazon link $22 ITP doesn’t have
sculptex clay        Sculptex Hard $40 ITP doesn’t have



for silicone casting
Material Where to buy Price Does ITP have it?
scale a food scale. If you don’t have that will be fine.       ITP don’t have
air pump anything that can pump air.
The one for bycicle also would work but you have to pump gentlely.
The one I am using: amazon link       
ITP has
smoothon silicone amazon link $44.88        ITP has at soft lab
cups I guess you have them at home        ITP has
an oven I guess you have it at home.
If you don’t. That is OK.       
ITP has
one time gloves         I guess you have it at home.        ITP has
materials





How to make it

First, you need to make the mold. I am making the mold with clay this time. The clay that I used is Sculptex clay, which is sulfur-free. This kind of clay also would not dry in the air. I am making a simple mold today.

the silicone inflatable thing
Then I mix silione and pour silicone into the mold. If you don’t know about silicone casting, you can check my previous tutorial video: previous video. Then I put them into the oven. Remember to set the temperature low at 170 F and even below. Because the sculptex clay would melt in higher temprature and would not be able to be used again.
the silicone inflatable thing
Then make the two part come together by mixing and adding some new silicone in between. We are now done with the silicone part.
the whole silione casting thing
an animation of how it inflates
Then we can start to make the outside thing. I want to make a small house for the silione. I am using air dry clay for the sculpture. However, I used to try to make the inner mold for silicone with this clay, but the silicone that has contact with the clay would never cure. This kind of clay can only be in connection with silicone when the curing is done.

Since we are at home, we can grab everything to shape the clay. I am using knife and one chopstick.
I want to build a window for each air channel.
When you are doing your sculpture, it would be better to put it on a paper so that you can transfer it easily to other places.
the silicone inflatable thing
the silicone inflatable thing
Transfer the whole piece into oven again. I am using the same temperature that is 170 F for speeding up the drying process. The drying time depends. In my case, it took about 2 hours for drying the clay.
the silicone inflatable thing
Then we can try to inflate the silione. The outside sculpture would be a restriction for the silicone.
the silicone inflatable thing
If you inflate it too much, the silicone would defeat the restrictions.
the silicone inflatable thing

Ending

This is just for fun and also a small prototype for my final project of soft robotic. I am trying to build a sculpture combining siliocone and clay together to show my feeling of restriction of material and the freedom of my imagination to encourage myself during this period of time. Our mind is never restricted to a small house or apartment. I should think more than before.