I started the process for making moulds for Sybarite's shoe soles. The first step is to create a master, that is, a model of the sole. I've made a couple of these and this post shows the making of a stiletto heel.
I am making a universal master, a sole that is the same for left and right foot, because this is difficult enough without having to try to make two pieces that are mirror images of each other.
First I carved the heel out of fairly hard wood. I often use balsa wood for making a master, but it was too fragile for this purpose.
Then I made the sole out of several layers of cardboard. The colors do not matter when making a master, only the shape.
Next, I glued the heel in place. I used PVA glue as always and this time there was a good reason to do so, as you will soon see.
I shaped the upper part of the heel using polymer clay. This is why PVA glue is a good idea. As the master consists only of wood, carboard, PVA glue and polymer clay, you can bake it in the oven. I'm not sure what would happen with other kinds of glue, but PVA can take 130 degrees Celsius easily. On the background, you can see a couple of other masters for Sybarite's shoe soles.
Here is the master with a plaster casting of Sybarite's foot. I must say I'm fairly pleased with the result so far. Of course the master still needs painting and light sanding before it is ready. The surface needs to be perfect, or as close to it as possible, because each sole cast with the mould will be an exact copy of the master.
It will take some time before I get to the actual mould making, because I need to make several masters for various dolls before that. Making the moulds is time consuming and a bit messy, so I prefer to do several moulds in a batch.
Currently, I have a couple of masters for Silkstone Barbie and several for Pullip, although they also need painting and sanding. I decided to try these, because all other ways of making soles for Barbie or Pullip shoes are more difficult.
I am going to make some moulds for doll shoe soles. There is some info on my home page, but I'll go into more detail here. Also, I know a lot more now than I did when I wrote those instructions.
First I drew a pattern for the foot. Then I cut one piece of foam core and several layers of cardboard using the pattern.
I glued the cardboard pieces together, cut a heel out of that piece and glued it in place to the foamcore sole.
Then I drew a pattern for the sole in the rest of the multilayer piece, cut out the pieces and glued them to the foam core sole.
When the glue was dry, I painted the sole. I used gloss acrylic paint and applied several coats.
Now I had the model ready and it was time to make a mould. I used Sculpey Mold Maker, because that is what was available. There may be other clays similar to it.
See the instructions in the package for making the mould. I noticed that it is easier to make the mould, if you cool the clay in the fridge for some time (after shaping it to suitable size) before pressing the object into it.
Bake the clay in the oven according to the instructions in the package. When the mould is cool, mist it with water and press a piece of polymer clay into it. As you may guess from the amount of water, I didn't actually mist the mould, I just put it under the tap and then shook off the extra water. It works fine that way.
After making the desired amount of pieces, bake them in the oven. I used red clay to get better pictures. The actual soles are going to be black or brown, but I do have some red leather, so maybe the Baha Cat is going to get red boots as well.
This mould was easy to make. I'm also planning on making moulds for casting plastic soles for Sybarite's shoes, but more about that later.
