Your Own Molds - Part Two

In yesterday's post I showed you the mold I made of this small vintage ceramic heart pin.

The mold is ready to use in 25 minutes....but it isn't ready for every medium.

For example, I could use it right away to mold a shape out of polymer clay, chocolate or wax.  Those mediums only stay in the mold for a few minutes and then you pop them out.  Envirotex Lite Resin, Easy Cast or Jewelry Resin needs to stay in the mold for 48 hours.  Over that time, the freshly made mold continues to release gas, so you would get lots of bubbles in your finished molded item.  

So for that reason, I think it is best practice to make a mold and just allow it to cure for 24 hours before you use.

After 24 hours, you can use it for anything and as you can see from my finished samples...they are a perfect match to the original object I molded.

 I used EasyCast for these samples.  I coloured the resin with both powders and colorants.  

(I have featured this technique in several posts already and if you look to the side of this blog there is a link called "Colouring Resin.") 

When my pieces were cured I used gold paint to make the heart stand out.

 My original is quite glossy.  I applied a layer of regular varnish to two of my pieces to give them a little more shine and to seal the gold paint.

For the backs, I simple glued on a pin bar like my oroginal peice had.

It is so easy to replicate an object using EasyMold!