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The mold will pick up every detail. I’m not familiar with Monster Clay. Take scraps of your clay and make tool marks on them to experiment with. If your clay is similar to plastilene, it will clean up with a small paint brush (an artists’s brush that you will dedicate to this use and not paint with. I prefer a filbert for this use) and a citrus cleaner like Fast Orange. Put some of ypur cleaner in a small dish and use the paintbrush to go over the tool marks. On plastilene, the surface will melt just a little, enough to smooth out marks and remove crumbs. If your marks are particularly rough, try going over them with a bit of screen mesh (nylon mesh for repairing window screens, just a 1″x 2″ pice works for me). The mesh will show you depressiins that may need to be filled and high spots you may not have noticed were too high. Repair that stuff and then use your brush and Fast Orange. Don’t spray the cleaner on the sculpture, it will be too much and soften your detail.
If your clay is more wax-like, you can try using an alcohol torch on it. This tool has an angled nozxle that directs a tiny flame toward a spot on the sculptire. This is how jewelry originals are smoothed to a glossy finish. Before investing in an alcohol torch, try holding your sample clay in needlenose pliers and just pass the tooled surface across the very tip of the flame of a match or candle. If the surface softens and gets smoother, yay! If not, your clay isn’t wax based.
The only other method I know of is to use finer and finer sandpaper or files to smooth the surface, then Tacky Cloth or something like that to remove the dust. Final finishing might involve rubbing it with alcohol or something else.
Be very careful ising these chemicals. Use them in a well ventilated place, wear a mask so you don’t breathe dust or fumes, and have a fire extinguisher handy or a sturdy metal can with a lid to toss anything that’s burning. The lid should cut off oxygen from the fire. Be sure to put any rags, towels, etc., in such a can as well to avoid spontaneous combustion. Gast Orange isn’t flammable, so no worries there.
Let me know if any of these methods work! Good luck and stay safe! Please share pics of your work, too.
I’ve been using Monster Clay for different projects for the last couple of years and had great success but you have understand the differences between it and the more well known modeling clays out there. First it is sold in three different hardness grades, firm, medium, soft. I suggest getting a sample of all three so you can decide which is best for the project you are doing. When in doubt I use medium. MC is affected by temperature changes greatly, at room temp. it will
be firmer than what you would expect, but warming it will make it as pliable as most other clays. It will return to the original firmness upon cooling. In its cooled state it will take fine detail well and also make it easier for you to finish like you ask about in your post. As with most new products it will take some time to learn its different properties. Don’t give up on it too soon.
Now to answer you question. When I get to a point where I get a piece as far along as I can using my hands, tools etc. I let the piece cool or even refrigerate it to make it as firm as it can get. From this point on I’ll use 3M scouring pads [Lowes, Home Depot] cut to size to fit the project. I’ll start with a dry piece to rub the MC down to start the smoothing. Next I’ll dip the pad in a mixture of 50% lacquer thinner 50% odorless mineral spirits. Lightly repeat smoothing the MC. Use soft artist brushes,Q tips, and soft rag pieces to clean up the detail in the clay. Set the piece aside to allow the thinners to evaporate. With practice you should be able to make your piece mold ready in an hour or two. Also depending on which mold rubber you use to mold it [talk to your rubber supply tech] a coat of sealer/ release will smooth it more. A few more things… about the thinners, For the sake of safety that Linda spoke of, you don’t have to have a quart of it on your table to do a small sculpture like you doing. Use small amounts [ tylenol bottle] at the work area, if tipped over , not a big deal. Also to warm a clay model I use a small hair dryer to warm the area to touch up. Finally::clap:
All I use to warm clay while sculpting a piece, no matter what size is a microwave to heat it and then a heating pad to keep it warm. I actually did a 20% larger than life size Big Horn Sheep project with just those two heating sources. Good luck with your project! VicVic, thanks for adding your advice! I don’t know about Monster Clay, but if you put plastilene in a microwave, the outside will be firm, and there will be LAVA in the center! For plastilene, it’s best to put a light bulb over it inside a Styrofoam or insulated wooden box. A hair dryer works too. Has MC ever given you molten clay in the center of the block when you nuke it?
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