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Essensual Life Sculpture
Joined:
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18-Nov-2005
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Started On : 21-Aug-2006 at 12:00:02 AM, #Views : 5998
Topic Subject : Re: Cotton Batton |
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Sorry I'm a little late in responding to this thread. Better late than never
I guess.
We've had poor results with cheesecloth as a bonding agent between alginate
and plaster. If the cheesecloth fibers are flush with the alginate or below
the surface, then obviously there is nothing for the plaster to adhere to. If
the fibers protrude out of the alginate enough for the plaster to get a hold
of, then there is no significant bond with the alginate. I guess the trick
would be to have ripples in the cheesecloth, with one side of the ripples
embedded in the alginate and the other side embedded in the plaster. Difficult
to pull that off in practice, however.
I've experimented with a number of different materials for this use, and am
not very impressed with cotton either. Even if you get the cotton fibers
embedded into the alginate before it begins to harden, it takes very little
force to pull them out of the alginate when pulling the mold off the model.
The best material I've found for this use is felt, just common ~1/16" thick
felt from a fabric store. If you get it pressed into the alginate before it
hardens, it will provide a 100% effective bond with the alginate. By that I
mean that any attempt to separate the two will tear the alginate long before
the felt will relinquish its death grip.
Ditto with the plaster, but the trick is to not let the alginate soak all the
way through the felt. The plaster from the gauze will penetrate dry felt and
produce a strong bond with it. Maybe not as strong as the bond between the
alginate and felt, but only because the gauze has little plaster to contribute
to the task of saturating the felt. If one was to smear some mixed plaster
into the felt before the gauze goes on, it would make a formidable bond... but
that's not necessary, as the gauze bonds sufficiently well to the felt by itself.
Before beginning a bodymold, we cut felt into strips about 1 1/4" wide x 10"
long. Just before the alginate begins to kick, we press the strips in
beginning with the perimeter of the mold. If nothing else, getting the edges
bonded in this manner will make a big difference when you pull the mold off
the model (no more loose edges). If there's time, we criss-cross the alginate
with more felt in areas that might be likely to pull away from the plaster
during the mold removal. Cotton is faster, and is used between the felt.
When modeling a large area, if one has the luxury of an assistant, they could
help by pre-wetting one side of the felt strips with alginate. This would help
them adhere better if the alginate begins to kick before you're done.
Doug DuBois
aliforum@lifecasting.org wrote:
>
> Hello Essensual Life Sculpture
>
>
> Post Date : Wednesday 19th of July 2006 03:08:36 AM
> Posted by : "Diane Rossong" Diane@lastingimpression.net
>
> Re: RE: Re: Cotton Batton:--
> Thanks for bring that up I have actually been have a little bit of an issue with the cheese cloth. I bit of an imprint of it came out on my last torso casting a couple of weeks ago. I will certainly try the 2 layers like you descibed Bill. I also use the algislo, it does work great.
> Has anyone used both? Cheese cloth vs cotton or mandella wool? Since I do these castings by myself I am wondering if using the cotton/wool would be faster for me to apply?
> I also have a seperate question.
> Does everyone use plaster bandages? The first one I did, I put the cheese cloth on and then put a few layers of fast setting extra hard gypsum. 10 min set up. I think it worked great, it also may have been beginners luck. The castings after that I have put both bandage and then gypsom, it might be overkill. ?? I just figure the extra cement on top would stop it from loosing it's true form.
>
> I have another one in a couple of weeks and would really like to make it go a little smoother and have better results
>
> Thanks
>
> Diane
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