Next, it is time to start sculpting the hands and feet. I do most of my sculpting with epoxy clay (such as Magic Sculp or Apoxie Sculpt), because it is a very strong clay that cures at room temperature (no need to bake it, as with polymer clay) and sticks to just about anything. This means I can sculpt it directly over wire and fabric. When I need a longer working window (epoxy clay cures in about 3 hours) I’ll use polymer clay, as it stays workable until you bake it.
For the hands, I make smaller wire armatures using florist’s wire (gauge 22 or so – it comes in various gauges). I cut five individual pieces of wire and tape them together at the wrist with electrical tape. Then, I splay them out and cut the ends down to make the thumb and fingers, taping across what would be the palm to hold the fingers evenly spaced. After that, I attach the hand armature to the arm wire with epoxy clay. In this picture you can see I’ve already begun to sculpt the forearms, as well.
After the epoxy clay holding the armature in place has cured, I bend the finger wires into their final poses and sculpt the hand over the armature with more epoxy clay. In sculptures like this, the hands and fingers are often the most fragile part, so sculpting the hands this way makes them stronger and helps prevent breakage.
Because I intend to give my raven men shoes, there is no need to sculpt detailed feet. In fact, when making shoes the way I do, it’s best to sculpt the feet in the shape of the shoe. Then, all you have to do is cover the sculpted foot with your shoe material (I use leather most often) and you’ve got a good looking shoed foot. I want to give them soft-looking shoes that are slightly pointed at the toes, so that’s how I sculpt the feet. I leave little holes in the bottoms of the feet so that I can later stand them on wooden pegs on the base, which makes them more stable and displays them together properly posed.
