Saturday, April 18, 2009

How to make a plaster stamp?

Since I was making a few moulds today, I remembered that I planned to make a tutorial on how to make a plaster stamp. Plaster stamps are not hard to make and they are great fun to use in your modelling projects. You can use regular stamps too but they are much softer so somtimes it's hard to use them for pressing into clay.

Here is what you need: a rolling pin, a cutter, a stamp and a piece of plasticine.
Plasticine is soft clay made of plastic so when you poor the plaster in there, it will come off very easily afterwards.
Take a piece of plasticine and kneed it a little bit.
Make a flat piece with a rolling pin. Make it about 0,5cm or 0,2inch thick
Press a stamp into the flat piece or plasticine.
Make it nice and round with a cookie cutter.
Roll a flat piece of plasticine and twist it around the stamped piece.
Let the ends cross each other and cut the excess plasticine away with a knife.
Press the plasticine clay firmly together on the bottom so no plaster will be able to escape.
Make some plaster ready. Mostly it is made with 1 part of water and 3 parts of plaster but it depends on the kind of plaster you use.
I always go with the pyramid method: you poor the plaster into the water at the same place and a pyramid will form. When the pyramid doesn't suck any water anymore, it's enough plaster and you can start mixing it with the water.
If you like that the plaster will set quickly, you can use lukewarm water or add a pinch of salt.
Poor the plaster into the plasticine mould.
You can also poor liquid (porcelain) clay in there and fire the stamp.
Let it set for a while and take the plasticine away. Cut away the rough edges with a kitchen knife.
Now you can stamp your heart out in any modelling material. :)

25 comments:

  1. hey, are you making that chic paw stamp for me?????

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  2. Very cool, one could add a little handle too before the plaster sets so you can hold it easily :-D

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  3. another useful tutorial, thanks for sharing it :)

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  4. Now that is really cool. I just need to figure out what I would stamp and what I would stamp it with.

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  5. It looks like a lot of work to me, you are so clever Mitsy!

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  6. I love your tutorials, you're so generous with your knowledge. :)

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  7. oh how wonderful!! thanks Mitsy . bookmarked .. I have all the necessary 'ingredients' and shall give it a go!

    XXX

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  8. I will try this one also with the little one Mitsy, I think we have some plaster from her toys collection!

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  9. wow! Thanks for sharing! I wish I have time to make my own plaster stamp!

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  10. Whenever I visit your blog I feel the strong urge to stard molding and forming and stamping ... :)

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  11. Great tutorial! I think Renovia and I will have to cat fight for the paw print. he he he

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  12. Awesome tutorial! Thank you so much for sharing!

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  13. Thank art!!!!...I may try this..:)

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  14. Hi,

    Thank you for this great idea! I loved it so much, I blogged about it at www.hipnhandmade.com !

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  15. Plaster Stamp"

    Thank for sharing with us,I work with plaster in Boston MA.

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  16. thank you for sharing with such of generosity ! it was a pleasure to visit your blog !i wish you a happy new creative year!

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  17. Why not just use the the wooden original?

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  18. Many thanks for the tutorial, this information was very useful for me to understand how to make a plaster stamp?. Kudos

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