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There's many types of clay around, air dry clay, ceramic clay, porcelain clay (handmade air dry clay), plasticine, and of course, polymer clay, which is my main medium 😊

I'll talk about other clays in the next few articles (the ones I've at least tried before), but this article we will be focusing on polymer clay!

If you want to know what polymer clay consists of:
"Polymer Clay is an art medium that is known for its versatility, pliability and simplicity to work with. It is an oven bake modeling material composed of polymers, resins, coloring agents and fillers. Not a natural clay, it is man-made from a plastic, polyvinyl chloride (PVC) base." - polymerclaysuperstore.com

Few things to note about Polymer Clay:

1. Polymer clay is basically plastic that "hardens" in the oven.
2. Hence, it doesn't dry out when you leave it out unlike air dry clay (I dislike air dry clay mainly for that haha)
3. When baked, doesn't change colour or proportions. BUT it becomes matte (as shown in picture above)
4. Different types of polymer clay feels very different when raw, and the durability changes depending on brand.
5. If the baked pieces is thin enough, it should be flexible.
6. Raw clay's softness can be manipulated (you can make it softer if it's too hard/crumbly, and if it's too soft you can "extract out some of the oils" so it becomes harder. Here's the article if you want to know how to do this.
7. Polymer clay tends to be sticky compared to air dry clay - hence it kinda sticks on tools and working surface.

STORAGE

Since it doesn't dry out, storing it wouldn't be much of a problem. You just have to make sure dust doesn't get on the clay (it's a little bit sticky when it's raw, and dust etc might get on it), and I actually got this Drawer Storage Box from Qoo10 quite early on, and it honestly wasn't cheap AND not air tight so sometimes dust still gets in 😅 So I keep the plastics that's used to wrap the clay in, and always make sure that it's wrapped properly before putting them in their own little drawer.

I only like this because the width of the drawer actually fits the clay perfectly! And you can have at least two of those small packs of clay in each drawer - which is more than enough for quite awhile especially when you're working with miniature creations.

I baked little circles of each colour and pasted them at the front so it's easier for me to see which colour is located at where! Very convenient hurhur.

Many people just store them in tupperwares which is perfectly fine too! But I'm lazy and I like compartments so they all have their little house 😂

For storage, keep them away from sunlight and you should be fine! It hardens in oven so even though the sun might not be as hot as a 130 degree oven, it MIGHT make the clay harden a little. And for polymer clay, a little can make your life difficult as you CANNOT "revive" the clay once it's hardened that way (particles are fused together)

There are quite a number of brands for polymer clay, and each of them is different from one another!

They also come in different sizes, so here you can see how huge the bug ones are compared to the smaller packs. I always get colours that I use the most in bigger packs especially WHITE. Mixing colours requires a lot of white so I run through it super quickly!

I myself primarily use Sculpey Premo clay the most, and the clays in the Drawer Storage Box (especially the ones that are marked) is mostly Premo.

Each packet of clay does tell you how much and at what temperature to bake the clay in, and usually it's about 130 degree.

Ovens are very temperamental though, so I'll be writing another article about how to bake your pieces without burning them (which really really suckkkkks especially when you already spent HOURS on it!)

STEADTLER FIMO SOFT

I shall start talking about clays that I NEVER USE like this Staedtler Fimo Soft.

It says SOFT, but usually it's so hard and crumbly and after baking it's not strong either 😅 In Singapore, the only Fimo brands you can find is the SOFT kind, there ARE other series. But I just never use them. (Also, you can only find Fimo products in Popular Bookstores, even their tools etc)

This is the only packet I have, and erm I promptly threw it away after I took a photo HAHA. YES it's SO BAD.

Maybe it's just the popular Bookstores in Singapore that doesn't store the clay properly, but after lots of research, it's actually quite a common issue.

This is what I mean when it's "crumbly". There's just NO WAY to even try to mold the clay together! 😱 Yes, it's possible but it's gonna take so long and ain't nobody got tam for dat.

When I first started, I used Fimo and it took me HOURS to just make the clay soft enough to sculpt or handle (I'm not even mixing colours, mind you, just the clay from the package), and when it finally soften a little, IT WAS TOO SOFT TO SCULPT PROPERLY.

Yes I know it sounds weird, but if the clay is too soft it's hard to handle too! You need the right consistency, and Fimo Soft just doesn't do it for me unfortunately.

I remember feeling frustrated when I was trying to sculpt with this and thank goodness I have the mind to do research and try out other brands instead of giving it up completely! Here's the post I wrote after I tried Fimo clay for the first time: http://handxmade.com/blog/2015/10/14/polymer-clay-first-try-fail

The worse thing about it was that it was my FIRST TIME handling polymer clay and my first experience was with a clay that was virtually unworkable oh my god. Please don't be like me.

ALSO it's more expensive than all the other polymer clay brands what's up with that?! No thank you 🙃

SCULPEY III

Photo from http://blog.metalclaysupply.com/96-new-colors-of-polymer-clay/

Sculpey is actually a company, and it has a few series for polymer clay. It's important, because I labelled this series, Sculpey III, shitty clay. 😶

It's really really smooth and soft, which is gentle for your hands. It's almost like an air dry clay consistency, which means it's good for kids! (Plasticine doesn't harden, so this would be good for kids especially if you want to harden the end product!)

But as you can see.........after baking, it just breaks SO EASILY. I didn't even try very hard and it just snaps 😂

Btw, see how the clay is distorted? It's suppose to be a rectangle (see below) but it got distorted when I was removing it from the tile because it was so softtttttttttt. Hope you can get what I mean. Let me know if you wanna see some gifs examples!

SCULPEY PREMO!

Premo is also under Sculpey company, and yes it's PREMO! with a "!" and NOT PREMOI with an "i" or even PREMOl with an "L" 😂 The font used is QUITE confusing 🙃

You can see from here that the colours that Premo provides is darker in colours than Sculpey III, but I actually prefer this because if you want a lighter colour you can just add white! So you actually get MORE colours out of this if you think about it.

Premo clay's consistency is towards the harder side, and there ARE some cases where the clay isn't stored properly and it's a tad bit TOO hard. Always test your clay before you buy them by giving the packet a gentle squeeze! It should be relatively easy to pressed down on without hurting your fingers.

Usually I will knead Premo clay to a certain consistency before I use them. Kneading the clay basically imparts some of the oils from your fingers to the clay, and that helps the clay to be softer! Heat helps too, and kneading it induces friction = small about of heat that doesn't harden it.

I prefer doing this than having a ridiculously soft clay right from the beginning as I can control the softness I want! When the clay is harder, it's easier to sculpt and the form of the clay STAYS when you work on one side!

I cannot stress how important that is. Soft clays just DEFORMS so easily with a gentle touch it's SUPER FRUSTRATING 😦 I'll have examples of this when I talk about translucent clay so will link accordingly. (Please be patient with me!)

As you can see, it takes quite a bit to break the clay piece, I actually had to use a bit of force! It's definitely much more durable than Sculpey III hhahahaa. (All these clay pieces are same if not similar thickness)

If you want it to be even more unbreakable, you can bake it longer which helps a little!

But to be honest, you can break anything as long as you will yourself to. So it's really hard to "accidentally" break them unless you reaaaally try haha.

This is definitely my go-to clay to use, especially since I can get it in Singapore and it's easy to stock up! With that perfect raw form consistency and durable after baking, PLUS it's cheaper than Fimo clay, really doesn't need much convincing.

DU-KIT

Du-kit clay is a relatively new polymer clay in the market from New Zealand, and unfortunately NO ART STORES IN SINGAPORE SELLS IT 😟

I actually contacted the company to purchase some specifically, and I was lucky that they reduced the minimum purchase and shipping price after awhile and got back to me - it was too expensive when I first got to them.

I got some of them to try out because I read somewhere that it can be UNBREAKABLE if baked correctly! 😱 I've actually seen people BENDING the pieces ALL THE WAY THROUGH AND FRO and it just didn't break omg. (my oven is set for Premo clay, need to test and check the temperature for Du-kit soon)

The raw form of the clay is actually a really good consistency, and it actually blends better than Premo!

Unfortunately, even though I have ALL the colours of Du-kit clay, I'm subconsciously saving them up and ended up not using them as it takes more time to restock and Premo clay being in the drawers right beside me, is just more convenient to grab ☹️

To see a more detailed of durability test, or want to know how I bake my polymer clay, do visit here!

The only experience I have with Du-kit clay is the "skin colour" which consist of translucent clay (will talk about that in another article) and even then I love how easy it is to sculpt on especially when face is very VERY important for figurines! It also gives a very nice translucent and dewy look to my figurine and is one of my biggest secret hahaha.

I do want to try using ONLY Du-kit clay and experiment more with it (TO GET THAT UNBREAKABLE MIRACLE), and even thought about being a reseller for it in Southeast Asia? 🤔 One day, one day....maybe I should revamp my drawers and store dukit clay only hahaha.

Will update when I find out how to make Du-kit clay crazy durable! 😘

SPECIAL COLOURS

One of the amazing things about Du-kit clay is that they actually have such florescent colours! That shade of obnoxious pink only Sculpey III has, but we all know it's shitty so I don't really use it.... (also Sculpey III's one became darker after baking whuuut) and it's so difficult to mix florescent and bright pink unless the clay comes with it?! I still hasn't tried it out as I have no project that need this kind of bright colours yet. But will update if it changes colour after baking too!

Premo clay also has this "Premo Accents" series where there's Gold, Silver, Bronze, and even clay with textures inside! However I never used them and prefer to paint any Gold, Silver parts as the clay just doesn't do. It's basically normal clay with very fine glitter?? IDK, maybe I just never experiment with it enough....

But generally I don't use it and when I try, the outcome just doesn't really satisfy me haha. Good to have I suppose!

Let me know if you want to see a comparison of some of these special clay "colours". I didn't do any as I didn't think it was necessary, but now that I think about it, might be helpful aye? Let me know!

Alright that's all I have for now for polymer clay! This is technically Part 1 as I still have to write about translucent clay (which is also polymer clay haha) I have a lot of thing to say about that so I thought might be better to write another article instead.

Hope this helps! Don't get shitty clay and waste your time, effort and money! 😂

POLYMER CLAY