WF16 Challenge: Casting Call

[Craft Nerd]

Ok, so I did a paper towel cast yesterday and when it dried, all of the layers came apart.  I wet the towels pretty well and smooshed them into the stamp.  Any thoughts on what went wrong?

[Looser]

The towels I used were very 'linty & shreddy' so they held together nicely. You may want to try doing your cast by dampening the towel pieces & brushing each piece with thinned white glue (like doing paper mache). HTH

And I added pix of clay casts that I did as samples.

[Craft Nerd]

I was thinking that I may need to add some watered down glue.  I was so bummed that it came apart because I got a really good impression.

[CarefreeSadie]

I have this one on my list for today.  The thing is I don't want to make a casting just to make one, I have a whole little drawer full of hot glue embellishment I made using molds and I never use them because they are too thick to stick on anything.  How heavy does this turn out?  I suppose it depends on how thick the pile of glue is before stamping.  Oh who am I kidding I will try this anyway just to see how it works.  Then it can join its brethren in the drawer to languish.  LOL.

Ok I tried this with hot glue and wax.  I didn't like the wax at all it just wasn't quite right so I put the wax back in the pot to re-melt.  I painted the casting with sharpie markers and tried to make it look like an amber casting with a bee stuck in it.  A giant bee stuck in it......LOL  Here is the finished product and thank you for looking.

Thank you for hosting this challenge.

[Conniecrafter]

Ok so this challenge gave me all kinds of problems, LOL, I first tried the paper towel, yep it all fell apart for me too, and I didn't care to try and use the glue method so I went on to the hot glue method, well obviously by the picture you will see I used a bit too much glue or pressed down way too hard, the glue ended up sticking to my wood block, after putting it into the freezer so it would hopefully just pop off nope no budging, so I asked my hubby for help, after a bit of pulling he finally got it off and he said, yea let's not try that again.... there was no way I was going to be able to use it on a card it was way too thick, so I cut off around it, colored it and put it on the card.  It was so funny to see that evening when I got on that Sadie had done a very close to my card, guess great minds think a like   except hers turned out perfect.  I have tried doing a heart into foam but stupid me cut around that too instead of leaving it as a mold, guess that didn't look right to me, oh well I tried.

Woops I forgot the link to my card : http://www.duhnproductions.com/Pics/displayimage.php?album=lastup&cat=0&pid=2389#top_display_media

[Looser]

Sadie & Connie... Love your casts! Too funny that they are so similar in images.

Connie. FWIW... If you want avoid the glue 'sticking' to the wood mount? smear a bit of petroleum jelly on the wood before pressing into the glue.

Want to 'control' the thickness of the glue? Glad you asked...

Make the 'puddle'. Cover with a non-stick something & press it with a flat weight of your choice. Chill the glue & then soften with a heat gun to do the actual casting.

I recommend shooting for not-less-than an eighth inch thick when casting in glue, but feel free to explore. And for good measure... If you make your puddle directly on PP or CS, you can cast directly in that & get interesting results.

[Conniecrafter]

thanks for the tips

[CarefreeSadie]

I was really afraid that the glue would be way to rigid and thick to actually use on a card.  I am surprised at the flexibility of the hot glue cast when it cools.  It makes it really kind of neat to work with, nicer then I thought before I actually did it.  I think that is why I didn't like the wax casting because it was rigid and cracky instead of pliable.  The hot wax things that I have used in molds was not as flexible as this pile of hot glue after it cooled.  I would assume because it was smaller diameter and thicker so it was more rigid.  I will try this out at sometime with smooshing the top and then reheating to try and get a better overall thickness......thank you for the tips and tricks,   

[stampwilly]

Here is my entry. I used a small butterfly stamp so that I could use this as an embellishment sometime. I used a silver colored glue stick in my glue gun and made a puddle, then I pressed in the stamp. An added bonus was that my stamped was stained with permanent black ink and it came off on the impression. I got a clean stamp and better detail on my casting! Thanks for the fun challenge.

April

http://www.duhnproductions.com/Pics/displayimage.php?album=lastup&cat=0&pid=2394#top_display_media

[Far North]

I just posted my card for this challenge in the gallery.

I decided I didn't want worry about an uneven bottom to adhere to my card so I decide to fill my stamp with the hot glue. I used Tombow's multi-glue and my impression seems to have a strong bond. 

Perhaps I should have spent more time cleaning my stamp for my result doesn't look as clear as Sadie's and Connie's and the bottom which wasn't touching the stamp is white. LOL-or perhaps it could be that my glue sticks are probably over 20 years old.  And you used brighter Sharpie colors that look great...I used purple for one of my circles and it looks black...I added some silver Inky Gold...and it added some sparkly to it gives a little brighter feel. My stamp is one Tim's distress images...so my edges look ragged but that is the image. Trimming the hot glue was easy.

I followed Daniel's details for adding the hot glue into the stamp.  Since my gun does not have a brake to stop the liquid hot glue I did get some overflow and some cooled too much before I finished...know reheating with a heat gun is a great quick solution.  i did forget about adding a lubricant before adding the glue and had similar issues as Connie but thankfully I used a rubber stamp not on a wooden block...so I was able to twist the stamp to get on area to release and the rest required a firm pull. Next time I want to try a spray Pam like product. 

Daniel thanks for sharing your knowledge on these techniques and for the fun challenge!

PS...I previously had similiar problems with paper casting and the paper not staying together...but was able to solve the issue by using a small paintbrush to add white glue that dries clear.

[lovepug2]

I must not be very adventurous or maybe I'm just lazy because as intrigued as I was over Daniel's hot glue and paper towel casts, I thought oh we have some playdoh and clay that I will use 

Love the results everyone's getting and it's been very interesting reading about everyone's trials. I will get mine posting later this evening.

[Iring]

I did quite a bit of casting last night.  I tried both

hot glue
and
toilet paper

For the hot glue, my method was to squeeze a puddle of glue on a non-stick craft sheet and press the stamp in to it.  TP was standard 2 ply, I separated the plies (don't know if that is necessary?, some videos said yes, some not)  I used about 3-4 2 ply sheets.

Thanks for the challenge Daniel!

[Looser]

Love all the pieces entered for my challenge!

For those who are playing BINGO...? You have some embellies you can use for April's 'twist'.

[Craft Nerd]

Attempt number 2 worked.  And I was able to reuse the paper towel I used for the first one that fell apart.
Heart

I'm planning on putting it on a cards.  And I definitely want to try making more casts.

[lovepug2]

I got my casts finished this morning-
http://www.duhnproductions.com/Pics/displayimage.php?pid=2409

This was a lot of fun! Thanks Daniel!  Now to turn them into a project :)I will be back later with that.