Day One – Fimo Agate Slices
Fimo Agate Slices
Day One – 30 Days of SWAK
Welcome to the first day of our Tour de SWAK. Our first craft is in honor of Agate.
Way to step forward, big guy!
Thanks Jenny for this great tutorial (on the polymer clay central page) – the original post is here: http://polymerclaycentral.com/faux_agate.html. I followed it very closely and recommend taking a look at what was done and then visiting the professional page 😉
The plan was to make earrings that we could wear to appearances and signings. I learned a ton along the way. Below are all the pictures of our progression, but first… our finished product!
What do you think? Personally, I love them 🙂 the magic is in the cutting step. Just like agates, there’s this lumpy log that you slice and… voila! A beautiful agate! It really is pretty amazing.
On to the step-by-step pics and tips:
Step 1 was to make the base colors. The original orange had a “construction zone” thing going for it, so I darkened it down with a tiny pinch of black.
A quarter of a block of translucent and a pea size ball of dark orange…TIP: If I was to do this again, I’d make it a half or quarter of this size. It ended up making a long enough log for more than 100 agate slices (actually, I made 10 and hardly put a dent in it, so I have no idea, but it’s a lot).
I just thought this pic was funny 🙂 Sunny side up!
Here I’ve finally completed step one. Ball of dark orange, ball of translucent orange, and a chunk of white. Base colors check. Into the freezer with them.
Step 2 … grate a quarter block of translucent, a dime size ball of white, and a bit of the translucent colored block. Ok. Done.
Step 4 – The freezing was a step I guess. Here’s a pic of my beautiful marbled ball fresh out of the freezer.
Step 5 is to grate it on the small size now and then freeze the resulting ball again. TIP: Make sure you freeze for a while. The clay softens as you grate.
Step 6 – Here’s the center of my agate!
Step 7 – I don’t have a pasta machine, so we kicked it old school.
Step 8 – this is where you get creative. Make layers on layers on layers. They’re a bit time consuming, but the more the merrier!
TIP: I wish I had made this first dark layer lighter (maybe mixed half dark and half translucent) so the agate would kind of graduate to the outer edge. Looks great anyway, but it’s something I would try next time.
The finished roll
This is step 11 if you’re following the tutorial. Steps 9 and 10 were all that layering.
I don’t have a good picture of step 12, but the final steps are just to rough up the outside – the tutorial suggested a brillo pad (TIP: Make it as rough as you can so it will show up when you slice it) and to SLICE IT! Like I said above, this is where the true magic happens. Take a razor blade and hold it in both hands to steady yourself (here’s another tutorial for you if you haven’t done this before: http://polishorperish.blogspot.com/2010/03/on-slicing-fimo-canes.html) and cut off the end of the log. Then cut yourself a slice no thicker than a dime. Thin to win here, except not too thin either.
And speaking of finishing – I also added a coat of clear nail polish to the earrings for that extra shine and a hole for the hook.
Hold your slice up to the light! Oooo, ahhhhh! I picked out the center of mine with the corner of the razor blade. I felt like it gave it that finishing touch.
See you for day two – felt logos!
Filed under: Crafts, SWAK Publishing
Love the earring. 🙂 What fun.
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