LIQUID CLAY
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LIQUID CLAY. I must say, this is really such a genius invention?????
There's just SO MANY THINGS you can do with liquid clay, and it plays a BIG BIGGG PART for crafting with polymer clay!
These two brands are what I use since I first started out with clay, and I don't really think there are other brands....? I don't know, I've never seen other brands other than FIMO or Sculpey liquid clay 🙃 I've been using the big bottle for so long the I don't even remember when I bought it...so it's definitely more than worth it!
Liquid clay is basically polymer clay in liquid form - it hardens and becomes matte after baking, and it doesn't dry up if you leave it until you bake it! (Isn't this amazing like it's LIQUID but it doesn't dry up BOOMZ)
"Why not just use normal polymer clay then? It becomes hard after baking anyway just use normal polymer clay will do, right?" I HEAR YA so just let me show you how I use them 😉
Firstly, although they both are kinda the same, these two brands are still kind of different and both of them has different uses for me!
You can see how FIMO liquid clay is more transparent than Sculpey liquid clay.
Sculpey liquid clay is also quite viscous and hence takes a bit more practice to get the hang of using it. Look at how it takes so long to "drip" down!
FIMO liquid clay however, is more "watery" and it's easier to control imo!
fig. BAKED AND UNBAKED
Here's how they look like after baking, and I've put a drop of unbaked liquid clay on top so you can compare.
FIMO leans more towards the transparent side, and there's not much difference in colour before and after baking imo, only more transparent. Sculpey however, has more changes before and after baking for both the translucency (more) and colour (less white)!
The translucency does matter for whatever project you're using it for though so it's good to take note 😀
Picking it up so you can compare it with ma fingers!
Even though FIMO is transparent and you can actually see through it, it's not TRUE transparent and it's kinda hazy to me. Some people use it as a varnish and I think it's great considering how matte it becomes, but the fuzziness makes me feel like it'd take away the texture on the craft object so I don't use it as a varnish personally.
LIQUID CLAY AS "GLUE" FOR CLAY
I use liquid clay the most for this method, and I use it ALL THE TIME. You can see it in ALL my videos hahahaha 😂
Sure, you can always use superglue or something, but because liquid clay doesn't "dry up" until you bake it, and I think it's good that you have all the time in the world to slowly attach pieces! (Anyway polymer clay actually doesn't work well with some glue hahaha I'll be talking about that in another article)
I use mostly sculpey liquid clay for this method - I don't know why...I just feel that it sticks better? (There's no proof for this though it's just pure "instinct" and I'm could be (probably) wrong hahaha)
You can do this for raw to raw clay, raw to baked clay, or even baked to baked clay. But I feel like raw to raw clay sticks the best (again, just instinct 🙃)
An example of me trying to blend something without liquid clay. Notice how the piece can fall off or move around easily and it just makes everything a little tougher to do 🙃
Whereas liquid clay can help you "hold" the clay piece better before you blend, or even just "sticking" another clay piece on!
Even though liquid clay doesn't dry up, it does get a little bit firmer if you leave it on for awhile, so that's what I do sometimes if I really want the clay piece to stay put before I blend. (I tried to blend it immediately after I put the liquid clay for this GIF so you still can see the clay piece moving around a little 😂 but it does work!)
Because I'm lazy, I tend to experiment and find out what I can do to make my life easier 😅
In this case, because I use liquid clay to stick clay piece together SO MUCH, I actually tried to find a method of applying the liquid clay on where I want it to be mess-free and fuss-free 😀
fig. DIRTY
Strong liquid clay in a container like this was the first "method" I use. These containers is from a local art store and they can be found near empty pots for paints!
I basically just dip a tool in the container and use it like this!
But I started to get annoyed by it as:
1. I always have to wipe my tools with tissue after I dip the liquid clay. I tried to have a specific tool for it but if I don't wipe it, it gets all over the place if the tool rolls around 😶
2. Because the clay takes time to "pull away" the container itself gets "stained" with liquid clay too (see fig. DIRTY) and it's just messy and sticky and kinda makes me feel icky...
3. Using the tool sometimes gets annoying as I have to keep dipping it in the pot of liquid clay, and it's not like I can get a straight line properly (see fig. COME ON) if I want to (and most of the time I need a line of liquid clay 🙃)
(Lowkey asking you to watch my "Oh No Comic with Polymer Clay" video 😉)
The tool that I started using specifically for liquid clay...a *clean and new* ear pick 😀
I just thought that having a bigger surface area or a spoon type tool would make it easier to pick out more liquid clay or lay it down. But ehhhhhhhhhh it was okay 🙃
I then start to think "hey what if I use a piping bag to use my liquid clay in?". I wouldn't need to wipe any tools and the liquid clay will always flow out from one place!
But I didn't have a piping bag and I think it'd be tough to find a miniature piping bag? So I got this really tiny zip lock bag and trimmed away a corner with a scissors and voila - a piping bag! Albeit a flat one hahaha 😂
Here you can see how easy it is to make a straight lineeeeeeee 😍
Problem was, I can't put too much liquid clay inside as it'd burst out LOL and because it lies flat, I get liquid clay on my work surface too 😶 It worked quite well nonetheless and solved some of the issues I had!
I realised that it's also good to use this as a disposable one for COLOURED liquid clay that I mixed! Like how I did it here in my Hagrid's Birthday Cake tutorial 😊
AND THEN I remembered how I saw the paints that hobbists use to paint miniature sculptures on Youtube kinda have a dropper on the paint container, and I was like HEY I BET THEY SELL EMPTY BOTTLES since artists tend to mix some of their colours AND YES I WAS RIGHT AND I FOUND ITTTTTT.
It came with a cap, but EH I don't need it, liquid clay doesn't dry up woohoooo 😂 one less thing for me to do - unscrewing cap and all hehe (UPDATE: @msparkpark told me that her liquid clay actually kind of dried up! 😱 But she says she put her liquid clay near the sun - and that sometimes bakes the clay so be careful! I'm going to try not capping it and see how it goes)
You need to make sure the bottle is squeezable though - the liquid clay won't really drip down (ok it does but it just takes forever 😀)
Here's how convenient it is! The bottle STANDS UP so I don't get any liquid clay on my work surface, AND I can fit more liquid clay in this bottle so I don't have to keep refilling it 😍
Because the sculpey liquid clay is quite viscous, it actually "sucks back" into the bottle when you release the squeeze, that's why even though the hole for this dropper bottle is relatively big (so I can put a big puddle of liquid clay which is very convenient), I can put tiny dots too 😍
This is really the most perfect tool for this technique hurhurhur.
Before I realised I could control the size of the liquid clay from the dropper itself, I actually just wanted a THIN line of liquid clay so I actually got a precision tip with a tiny hole. But I think because of the resistance from the "viscousness", the cap keeps popping out like this....
This happens too if there's too much liquid clay in the bottle so just fill it up to 3/4 ok! Don't waste clay like me 😟
Sorry I don't have a photo of the precision tip I kinda lost it since I didn't use it 😅 I actually feel that it might work for FIMO liquid clay since it's more watery! I might have another bottle for that in the future hehe. But for now this is PERFECT and satisfys me so much haha! 😀
The empty bottle isn't very expensive but I know it's not very common in art stores as I've never seen them before either. Head to hobby shops instead! And if you still can't find them, the tiny zip lock bag works well too 😊
LIQUID CLAY + POLYMER CLAY
You can also mix liquid clay with polymer clay to make a liquid clay a certain colour!
I tear up the clay into tiny and thin pieces, and pour about the same amount of FIMO liquid clay and mix it like this!
Don't pour too much liquid clay as the polymer clay might move AROUND all that pool of liquid clay and it'd be too difficult to mix them! I recommend putting less liquid clay and add on if needed 😊
I know that it's mixed well when I do this and the liquid clay is smooth like BUTTER with no bits inside! (In this gif there's actually a tiny bit of them inside, so I actually mixed them a bit more - just thought I ought to show you what I mean by "bits".)
You can use this method to make liquid stuff like ketchup, mustard, chocolate sauce etc!
I found out that you can use the end of the rolling pin to mix if you need to make a huge batch like I did for my Hagrid's Birthday Cake. But this is only for the initial mixing, and you'd still have to take bit by bit and mix with the blade from the curved probe tool to make sure there's no bits and pieces!
I use FIMO liquid clay for this technique primarily because the colour doesn't change after baking (see fig. BAKED AND UNBAKED)
On the left is Sculpey and right FIMO.
NOTE: I think I used the wrong brown for FIMO liquid clay so it's a little darker 😭 sorry!)
I also feel that sculpey liquid clay doesn't "settle down" much..which means if you make "streaks" with it, it doesn't "melt" back to a puddle with the rest as well as FIMO liquid clay. Could be useful for certain projects!
Here's how it looks like after baking! Liquid clay becomes matte after baking too, so if you want it to be glossy (especially if you're making sauces), just glaze it with gloss varnish! 😉
Here's a better comparison for a FIMO liquid clay mixed with the same clay colour on that same clay! There's no obvious colour changes so this would be useful for certain things too!
Read about how I use this method to fix cracks here.
LIQUID CLAY + SOFT PASTELS
If you want a more transparent liquid clay, you can use soft pastels to kind of tint it instead!
Just scrape some pastels with an exacto knife,
And mix it in!
If you want a more intense colour, just add more soft pastels! 😊 It's nice to be able to adjust the intensity aye.
I used this method to make my "blood" for my brain pen rests!
I wanted some red tint on the skin colour clay, so that you can see through the blood and see the brain! 😆 There's another secret for ya for how I make the brain pen rest 😉
Also, you can use liquid clay as a varnish if you wish to do so! Read more about it here.
Alright that's all I have for liquid clay! Hopefully this gives you a much better insight on how you can use liquid polymer clay for your crafts hurhur.