Aeliana's First Silicone Tail

[AelianaNympha]

Hey, y'all! I'm gonna try it! I wanted to make this thread for positive and constructive feedback and to hold myself accountable. I can't start this and give up half-way through. Well, I've already started. I can't give up now that I've posted about it.
As i said in my intro thread, I had a homemade fabric tail as a kid (it wasn't even made of a lightweight swimsuit type material - it weighed a ton!), and I loved it. I've been snooping here for over a year and dream-planning my tail since before I even knew about mernetwork. It was always a "maybe-if-I'm-brave-and-have-money-one-day" thing. Well, I graduated, got a job, and got brave! I ordered a new monofin and I've been swimming laps to get my strength back up and to see if I still like it - good news, I do! So I ordered some monster clay and a few tools I didn't already have. I'm picking up a few poster boards tomorrow and sketch out the fluke.
If I can figure out how to post some pics I'll upload my sketches slash sculpts slash etc.

[Luna Dreamtide]

All the best to you! Sounds exciting.

[KaraLenae]

Good luck! I am in the last stages of my first silicone tail. I hope to airbrush next week. (I live in Arizona, so the weather right now is unbearably hot). If you have any questions, I'd be happy to help!! Can't wait to see your progress!

"It's the good girls who keep diaries, the bad ones never have the time." Tallulah Bankhead

[AelianaNympha]

All the best to you! Sounds exciting.

Good luck! I am in the last stages of my first silicone tail. I hope to airbrush next week. (I live in Arizona, so the weather right now is unbearably hot). If you have any questions, I'd be happy to help!! Can't wait to see your progress!

"It's the good girls who keep diaries, the bad ones never have the time." Tallulah Bankhead

Thanks Leina!

Do you have a thread going, KaraLenae? I'd love to see your progress! It's not unbearably hot here yet, but the humidity is CRUSHING. Thanks for the offer - I'm SURE I'll take you up on it!

[AelianaNympha]

Here's some fin-spiration... Oh the puns... They're coming!! First is some color - if my tail were eyeshadow swatches. The bottom two in the middle are interference pigments going to be used as washes over just a few scales here and there.


And the piscine inspiration, the sparkling gourami. I wanted to do a freshwater fish and I kinda dig this little dude. The interference pigments will lend to the "sparkling" effect. And I liked the tail of the paradise fish better.

I'm trying to set my design apart a little bit. I am an artist myself and would never want to be seen as copying someone. I haven't seen a lot of people do that more curved fluke shape without a little dip in the middle. So I'm gonna give it a shot!
This is the sketch I did a few weeks ago. I didn't have pencils or gel pens that accomplish the duo look of the bluish brown pigment. And the bright blue gel pen is supposed to be the interference scales. They'll be more sporadic than the pattern here. Plus I didn't add any lavender to this one (again didn't have the right color at the time). May end up adding a very small dorsal later. We'll see!


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[KaraLenae]

Beautiful sketch! I am an artist too! I work with mixed media, gourds to be exact. Most of my pieces are Mexican inspired as I live in Mazatlan half the year. I should start a thread on my tail. I've taken progress pictures on what feels like a 10 year journey. lol

"It's the good girls who keep diaries, the bad ones never have the time." Tallulah Bankhead

[AelianaNympha]

Beautiful sketch! I am an artist too! I work with mixed media, gourds to be exact. Most of my pieces are Mexican inspired as I live in Mazatlan half the year. I should start a thread on my tail. I've taken progress pictures on what feels like a 10 year journey. lol

"It's the good girls who keep diaries, the bad ones never have the time." Tallulah Bankhead

So cool! I'd love to see some of your gourds too! I did a lot of clay and wax work in high school. Along with drawing and painting. Now I mainly work with pastels and colored pencils, and I knit, macrame, and cross stitch.


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[AelianaNympha]

Okay. So my clay came in and I worked for like five hours straight and this is what I've got. I need to work to make it smoother - although if the lines were consistent I would almost like them as a subtle texture so I may play around with that. I'm adding more detail and thickening up some bits so we'll see how that goes.
I've also played around a bit with scales. I was looking at some images of different kinds of fish scales and came across the shape for shark scales (placoid). I don't think I've seen any mers try this shape before, but it looks kinda BA, so I made a few different sizes as a test. I know they're kinda big and bizarre looking. I'm not worried about drag in the water, cause I'm not gonna be racing anyone, but does anyone know if the shape may cause the tail to pull itself off while I swim?
Any input is helpful!
I also purchased some fiberglass resin and fiberglass cloth so I may make a few single-scale molds to make the sculpting process faster (i.e. Heat the monster clay a tad and smush it into the resin mold to make a bunch of duplicates).


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[KaraLenae]

Great shape! I don't think it would 'pull off' because you will have drain tubes in the fluke. So excited for your progress! Yay!

"It's the good girls who keep diaries, the bad ones never have the time." Tallulah Bankhead

[AelianaNympha]

Great shape! I don't think it would 'pull off' because you will have drain tubes in the fluke. So excited for your progress! Yay!

"It's the good girls who keep diaries, the bad ones never have the time." Tallulah Bankhead

Thanks, KaraLenae! Maybe I'll give them a shot! They'll definitely stand out! Haha


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[AelianaNympha]

Alright: update! I have everything I need except silicone and pigment, and I should be getting that later this week. I'm less concerned about that since I'm still working on my fluke mold. I did make a few different scales to try out. I was planning on doing the individual scale method, but it may kind of morph into mini-sheets (think chunks of four or five scales in one mold) that I can puzzle piece together to save time. I just poured my first resin mold out on the porch. It was slightly humid, which may mess it up, but it's never NOT humid in Georgia in the summer so I don't see how I can get around that. I live in a one bedroom apartment so there's no space big or ventilated enough to pour resin without causing my husband and dog brain damage from the fumes so we'll just see how it does! I stuck it in the storage unit in the closet to cure so it's not out in the humid-ish air and it's not giving us headaches. It's bondo fiberglass resin if anyone knows or has worked with that before and knows I've just screwed myself over TELL ME NOW! Haha.
Anyhoo. Barring any conflict there I'm going to work toward finishing my fluke mold by tomorrow so I can pour THAT mold by tomorrow night or Thursday morning. On that note - has anyone tried making a mold on foam board covered in aluminum foil? I would make sure the clay is securely mashed onto the foil so there aren't any undercuts but it seems like a good idea? Especially cost-wise.


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[KaraLenae]

Hi there! Is this type of board you will make the mold out of? I used this. The only problem I ran into, is when I glued my foam scales on to it with E6000 glue, the glue ate away at the styrofoam underside. I noticed my board wasn't laying flat the next morning, so I had to go back with gator board (foam board with paperboard backing) to make it level before pouring my plaster. I can send more pics of my 'ordeal' if needed.....



"It's the good girls who keep diaries, the bad ones never have the time." Tallulah Bankhead

[AelianaNympha]

Hi there! Is this type of board you will make the mold out of? I used this. The only problem I ran into, is when I glued my foam scales on to it with E6000 glue, the glue ate away at the styrofoam underside. I noticed my board wasn't laying flat the next morning, so I had to go back with gator board (foam board with paperboard backing) to make it level before pouring my plaster. I can send more pics of my 'ordeal' if needed.....



"It's the good girls who keep diaries, the bad ones never have the time." Tallulah Bankhead

Yeah something like that! I'm doing individual scales in clay so I won't need glue. But I was thinking of putting my fluke down on that. I'm currently working on it on the kitchen table but I can NOT do the resin in here. Too many fumes.


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[KaraLenae]

I think it would be fine! I made my clay fluke on a giant piece of cardboard. I can't imagine working in the humidity in GA. My last silicone pour was the day before we hit 115 here in Phoenix. Ugh. Nightmare. Damn these sideways pictures!!




"It's the good girls who keep diaries, the bad ones never have the time." Tallulah Bankhead

[Mermaid Kate Silverfin]

I've done most of my fiberglass moulds on a base of aluminium foil, so you should be fine

[AelianaNympha]

Took the mold off the aluminum foil this morning! It's still pretty gassy (ha! I'm imagining it farting now... #mature) so I stuck it on the porch to air out. I haven't pulled the clay out yet but it looks pretty good so far!


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[AelianaNympha]

... I'm not good at waiting. I scrubbed 99% out with a toothbrush/blue dawn. Now I've taken one of my tools and I'm scrape-scrape-scraping away. SO EXCITED THOUGH! I have four sizes of the petal-like shape and three of the shark scales. Still not sure which I like better. I'm going to buy silicone tomorrow and I ordered part of my pigments this morning. Yay!


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[KaraLenae]

Yay!!! That's awesome!!!! I have no patience either. lol Can't wait to see the pigment colors!!

"It's the good girls who keep diaries, the bad ones never have the time." Tallulah Bankhead

[AelianaNympha]

...AND I ordered the second half of my pigments. I'm getting like crazy-excited-claws. It's like when you think something is so cute you wanna squeeze it except there's nothing cute and nothing to physically squeeze so you're just snarling and clawing at the air. That makes me sound like a lunatic. I might be. SO EXCITED! I'm almost done smoothing and boning my fluke (HEYO! #stillmature) and then I'm picking up the foam board and silicone tomorrow. The only time I left the apartment today was to pick up enough chickfila for two people so I could eat it all myself and watch mako mermaids on Netflix.


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[AelianaNympha]

OHMYGOSHYOUGUYS. I just bought my silicone and power mesh. Holy poop. And I got a notification this morning that half of my pigments shipped this morning and would arrive by Monday. And GUESS WHAT? I just got an email that the OTHER HALF of my pigments shipped this afternoon and they're ALSO arriving Monday. ALL MY PIGMENTS COME ON MONDAY!!


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