You leave plaster out too long and it starts to mold

So we took a mold of our friend's face on Sunday. It took until Monday night for the cast to really dry properly. That was way longer than I thought it would take, but it was also a pretty thick cast. So last night, I decided to mix and pour some plaster. It worked out pretty well. Not too messy at all and it mixed up really nicely. The nice thing is that I'm still using my leftover materials from old projects so I haven't had to bust into my new stuff at all yet. I do want to make a whole-head mold for myself eventually so I need all the practice I can get.

So this morning I got up early and demolded since I was awake anyhow. The piece seems to have worked out pretty well. We've got a good shape and some details, but not as many as I'd like, to be honest. Thankfully with this mask we're covering up all the details so it isn't a big deal. I'm going to take some pics of the base piece and then of me molding the mask on top of it. I'm going to try to get it as close as possible to the game mask, so I'll be using and comparing it to screen shots. I may well even start tonight with some of the basic setup work. Should be fun!

Here are some links to some great sites for information on casting and mold-making:

Smooth-On - This is the premiere source for molding and casting materials. they sell resins, silicone rubbers, expanding foams, brushable plastics, and more. Everything you could ever need to make a mold and then cast into it is here. This link takes you to the media site where they have a ton of videos explaining proper use of their products and showing exactly what you can do. Extremely cool and a great place to start.

DH2 Creations - These guys focus mostly on Star Wars gear but they have a lot of great info about body casting and sculpting in their tutorials.

Bioweapons - Don't let the name fool you. This guy doesn't deal in anthrax, just really awesome costumes made of painted hot glue. Sounds a bit odd I know, but you have to see it to understand. He is big on using low-cost but effective solutions to problems, which I really appreciate. He has some neat info here about body casts, how to sculpt onto a body cast, pulling molds of different parts of your body with different materials, etc.

I'm sure there are others, but these are the ones I keep coming back to again and again for info.