𝐋𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐁𝐥𝐞𝐝𝐰𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐚 𝐏𝐨𝐬𝐞𝐚𝐛𝐥𝐞 𝐄𝐯𝐢𝐥 𝐖𝐢𝐳𝐚𝐫𝐝 𝐀𝐫𝐭 𝐃𝐨𝐥𝐥 | 𝐓𝐢𝐦𝐞𝐥𝐚𝐩𝐬𝐞 𝐌𝐢𝐱𝐞𝐝-𝐌𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐚 𝐀𝐫𝐭 𝐃𝐨𝐥𝐥 𝐓𝐮𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐥 →

Much like dharklings, I’ve made another more nefarious aspect of my world, Lord Bledwall (you can learn more about how he arrived at his powers further below). He’s one of my world’s Manifest, wizard caste beings who have power far above and beyond what most inhabitants of The Dream Syndicate possess. He’s an evil wizard figure who has the ability to manipulate these bladed, vine-like growths that accompany him, known as The Bleedwall. The mixed-media poseable art doll’s meant to be imposing, menacing, with his sharp, angular features and withered appearance.

Watch the Making of Lord Bledwall, a Poseable Evil Wizard Art Doll | Timelapse Mixed-Media Art Doll Tutorial

As an adolescent, I’ve always been fond of the design of villains and I can see much of that fondness echoed in this character. When drawing the mouth of the poseable art doll’s design, I was thinking of the toothy maw of a crocodile. Some more obvious features to jump-out at you would be the look of “The Lord of the Rings” ring wraiths (even before the Peter Jackson’s films, many artist’s renderings of these creatures had much in common) and the look of Shredder from various iterations of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. In much the same way that these villains are encased and adorned in metal, so is the warlord figure of Lord Bledwall. The substance of the Bleedwall that he commands is an ever-expanding, invasive species that will either corrupt, harm, or kill whatever it comes into contact with.

Open edition prints of "Lord Bledwall” are available here.

Prints of “Lord Bledwall” are available here:

Open edition print: https://www.inprnt.com/gallery/thedreamsyndicate/lord-bledwall-wizard-fine-art-print/

The more the wall hungered
The more that the enemy bled
The more that the enemy bled
The more the wall hungered

Lord Bledwall rules a land that was at war with a neighboring kingdom and he loses his son to the conflict. In his anger and grief, he happens upon a large, strange seed that calls to him. He nurtures it with his hatred and desire for revenge and day by day, month by month, it grows into this bladed and barbed barrier along his lands that comes to be called The Bleedwall.

The wall hungers and attacks friend and foe alike, maiming or killing anyone that comes within it’s lethal, sinuous reach. The Bleedwall ever expands and Lord Bledwall ever becomes concerned with assuaging it’s bottomless hunger. This caused the majority of his kingdom’s subjects to flee and how Lord Bledwall got his name, to be forever associated with that accursed wall.

Thanks for joining me so far and here’s to the adventures we have in future! To be the first to know when I launch new polymer clay art videos, be sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel and hit the bell icon. Catch all of my videos here: https://www.youtube.com/thedreamsyndicatearts. You can also find many of the supplies I use in crafting here: https://www.thedreamsyndarts.com/supplies-gear/. And sign-up for my newsletter (in the sidebar) to get the latest studio goings-on! Thanks so much for joining me on this journey and until next time: Make. Believe!

Find me elsewhere online:

INSTAGRAM: instagram.com/dream_synd_arts/

FACEBOOK: facebook.com/TheDreamSynd/

TWITTER: twitter.com/Dream_Synd

PINTEREST: pinterest.com/TheDreamSyndicate/

WEBSITE: www.thedreamsyndarts.com/

𝐌𝐚𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐏𝐨𝐬𝐞𝐚𝐛𝐥𝐞 𝐀𝐫𝐭 𝐃𝐨𝐥𝐥 𝐇𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐬 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐏𝐀𝐏𝐄𝐑?! 👐

Today I’m going to share my process for making poseable art doll hands with… get this, paper! Well, more accurately, I use medical paper tape to make the hands for my mixed-media art dolls in a technique that’s sort of half-assed paper mache. This technique’s suitable not only for art dolls, but also for stop-motion animation puppets.

You can watch how I make this poseable wire armature hands on YouTube and I’ll also try to give as brief summary of how I craft these hands as possible. I’ll also put links to where you can get the supplies you need for this project. This method will allow you to craft a variety of hand shapes and forms and when you become well-practiced at it, you might be able to make a new set of art doll hands in about two and a half hours.

Watch Making Poseable Art Doll Hands with Paper?! 👐 Timelapse Art Doll Tutorial 👐

The supplies you’ll need for this art doll hand tutorial

Poseable Art Doll Hands Supplies

Aluminum tubing that will compose the character’s forearm and also hold the wires for the hands

• Cutting Mat https://amzn.to/371kAXD

• Medical Paper Tape https://amzn.to/2ZGPzEe

• Aluminum Wire (16 gauge) https://amzn.to/2MNiy7D

• Aluminum Wire (18 gauge) https://amzn.to/2zARPCt

• Pliers & Wire Cutters https://amzn.to/34ekFGY

• Pipe Cutter https://amzn.to/34g43ym

• Small Scissors (any small, decently sharp grooming scissors will do) https://amzn.to/2ZHbQC2

• X-acto Knife & Blades https://amzn.to/2Zbqh2y

• Measuring Tape https://amzn.to/2tGeUEc

• Transparent Ruler https://amzn.to/2rkPpre

• Aluminum Tubing https://amzn.to/2UgQpXq

• Metal Ruler https://amzn.to/2ZdmvWl

• Sharpie Markers https://amzn.to/2EJ7O48

• Mod Podge https://amzn.to/2ZGXFwT

• Helping Hands https://amzn.to/34RCKts
  
  

Here I’m twisting wire to form the shape of the hand

For purposes of this poseable art doll tutorial, I used 16 and 18 gauge wire and a particular diameter of aluminum tubing, but you can adjust the size of the materials you’re using to accommodate whatever proportions you would like. The first thing you’ll do is use your pipe-cutter to cut lengths of the aluminum tubing that will form you character’s forearms. Afterward, cut two pieces of your thicker gauge wire at about 5-6” long (though whatever scale you’re crafting at will effect this measurement), create a loop- this will determine the size of the art doll or stop-motion puppet’s palm and back of hand, and then braid the two ends of wire.

Basic shape of the hands attached in aluminum tubing

You can then cut the braided ends of these loops so that there’s a piece left almost as big as your pinky across. You’ll then wrap the medical paper tape around this piece and you want to place this inside of the aluminum tubing pieces. You want this to fit in the tubing snugly, such that if you lightly pull, the hand wire won’t come out.

“U” shape to form the art doll’s pinky and thumb fingers

Next cut a longer length of wire, about 14-16” (I typically use the tip of my middle finger to the crook of my arm as a rough measurement), this piece is going to form the character’s fingers. You’ll leave a length of wire for the pinky finger, wrap the wire around the thicker gauge hand wire, have the wire create a gentle “U” shape, and then wrap this wire around the hand wire with it’s placement roughly where the thumb would go. I typically find the outermost fingers’s placement, the pinky and the thumb, as I craft the art doll’s hands. In all cases when you’re wrapping the finger wire around the hand wire, you want this wire to wrap around tightly- you may want to use your pliers to help in this process.

Completed art doll hand armatures

Now we’ll find where we want the index finger, wrap the finger wire around the hand wire. This will create a broad partial oval shape and the index finger and thumb will be connected. Next loop the finger wire around the “U” shape and back up to the hand, then wrap it around to create the placement for the middle finger. Then you’ll create another oval shape, winding a bit of the remaining finger wire around the hand wire and snipping off any excess with your wire-cutters.

Paper tape helping to lock the finger locations into place

You can adjust the spacing between the fingers, possibly even clamping them down with your pliers. Once that’s done cut thin strips of paper tape, and place them such that about the middle of it goes across the hand wire and each strip is going between our fingers. This will help keep your finger wires in place and you can take the wire-cutters and cut in between the connected finger wire pieces. You can take a sharpie marker and mark-off how long you’d like each finger to measure then cut them down to size.

This is our first layer of paper tape- it looks pretty rough, but it’ll come together in the end

Wrapping paper tape around each finger

Next you will wrap strips of paper tape, that are a little longer than twice as long as the finger, over each finger’s wire, smoothing it over one side and then having the paper tape overlap itself, wrapping around. You’ll typically do two layers on each finger in this manner.

As you place strips, follow the contours of the hand

Using thicker strips of medical paper tape, you’ll cover-over parts of the palm, usually folding over the wire at it’s mid-point. It’s going to begin to cover over the hand and also cover the tape from in-between the fingers and also the paper that coats the fingers. You want the paper tape to go where it wants to go, it may not form a mirror image of itself as it folds around the contours of the hand.

After you’ve a base layer of paper tape covering the hand armature wire, you can wrap pieces of tape around each finger. These paper tape pieces should be just a little shorter than the length of the fingers and about one and half times to twice as wide as the width of each finger.

You can bulk-out the muscles that comes from the thumb and pinky on the palm by placing strips that go across the length and width of these areas. At this point, you can also wrap a piece of paper tape that’s almost as long as the aluminum tubing and overlaps pieces covering the hand wire.

Next you’ll use as broad of pieces of tape on the hand as will comfortably fit- the wider the pieces, the less seams will be apparent on the hand. As you start to get a hand shape that you like, you can place a long strip that you might taper on the hand that will then wrap around the aluminum tubing and then you can wind another piece of tape around the tubing.

Wrapping a larger strip around the aluminum tubing

Painting a flesh tone on an art doll hand

“…Paint your art doll’s hands at the same time you’re painting other areas of it’s flesh so that you won’t have to try and color match it’s skin tones later.”

Other than patching areas that might need more tape, the poseable art doll hands are constructed. You can now apply heavily water diluted Mod Podge and let the hands dry. At this point you can trim the finger tips as they will have a blunt and malformed appearance. You want to trim a little bit of the paper tape material at a time. Once this is done, you can also patch any areas of the hand that look like they need it. You’ll apply a coat of less diluted Mod Podge, let that dry, and then you might mix-up a base coat tone with some Mod Podge and water that will serve as an under painting for whatever flesh tone you want for your art doll. The under painting color should be one that if the flesh tone paint was thinly applied over it and it showed through, it would add rather than detract from the piece. One tip I can give you is to paint your art doll’s hands at the same time you’re painting other areas of it’s flesh so that you won’t have to try and color match it’s skin tones later.

Thanks so much for stopping by. If you’ve read this post and watched the YouTube video, but still have questions, be sure to comment them below and I’ll do my best to field it. If you use this technique, tag me on social media so that I can see what you’ve made. You can find me on these platforms:

• INSTAGRAM

• FACEBOOK

• TWITTER

Prints of my art are available through my online store.

You can find my process videos by subscribing to The Dream Syndicate Arts here for more fantasy art doll polymer clay sculpture videos: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFMoEW3xC740tWfQNSixs_Q

Until next time: Make. Believe.

"𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐂𝐇𝐈𝐍𝐆" | 𝐏𝐨𝐥𝐲𝐦𝐞𝐫 𝐂𝐥𝐚𝐲 𝐅𝐚𝐧𝐭𝐚𝐬𝐲 𝐀𝐫𝐭 𝐃𝐨𝐥𝐥 𝐈𝐥𝐥𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧

I’m not sure what my latest polymer clay fantasy art doll Drust is… I think of him as some sort of goblin I suppose. If you asked Drust, I don’t know what he would tell you he is either. I imagine him to be adventurous and likely mischievous at times. One day in his boredom, a wayfly happened by and Drust couldn’t help but chase it!

In the scene captured in “Reaching”, I imagine that Drust has scaled a column of face vaults, statues with secrets of the ages locked away within, and finds his wayfly quarry just out of his grasp! Will he catch it or will it slip through his spindly little fingers?

A wayfly is a winged-key found in the wilds of the Dream Syndicate. Found individually, in pairs, or flying in flocks, wayflies often are found near ancient ruins or in catacombs. Capturing a wayfly takes guile, but the real clever feat is to determine which lock a given wayfly calls home.

Watch the process of how the poseable goblin art doll Drust was crafted

Prints of “Reaching” are available through my store here:

Limited Edition of 25 Print: https://www.thedreamsyndarts.com/thedreamsyndstore/reaching18x24print

Open Edition: https://www.thedreamsyndarts.com/thedreamsyndstore/reaching11x14print

Watch Details Being Added to the Face Vaults Polymer Clay Sculptures

Check-out a Winged Key Fantasy Stop-Motion Animation

Thanks for joining me so far and here’s to the adventures we have in future! To be the first to know when I launch new polymer clay art videos, be sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel and hit the bell icon. Catch all of my videos here:  https://www.youtube.com/thedreamsyndicatearts. You can also find many of the supplies I use in crafting here: https://www.thedreamsyndarts.com/supplies-gear/. And sign-up for my newsletter (in the sidebar) to get the latest studio goings-on! Thanks so much for joining me on this journey and until next time: Make. Believe!

Making Slimy Slug Art Dolls with Resin Slime 🐌

Today we'll be embellishing wooden display bases as we make slimy slug art dolls with resin slime! I'd previously sculpted these polymer clay slug art dolls with super sculpey over aluminum foil armatures, made these handsome display bases, and only recently had the idea of "slug trail" trailing behind them as if the slugs (slowly) made their way up on to the base.

WATCH MAKING SLIMY SLUG ART DOLLS WITH RESIN SLIME 🐌

I'd already given the slugs a thin coating of two part epoxy resin to give the sculpey art dolls a wet sheen look and I used the material again to make the slimy path for the little critters. Since I've had these particular opened bottles of epoxy resin for a few years, this was a great way to use the older materials rather than wasting them. 

Slimy Slug Sculptures

These slug sculptures can slime their way to your home & heart.

Buy a Slug Here

 

To be the first to know when I launch new polymer clay art videos, be sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel and hit the bell icon. Catch all of my videos here:  https://www.youtube.com/thedreamsyndicatearts. You can also find many of the supplies I use in crafting here: https://www.thedreamsyndarts.com/supplies-gear/. And sign-up for my newsletter to get the latest studio goings-on! Thanks so much for joining me on this journey and until next time: Make. Believe!

BRAMBLING 🌲| Making a Fantasy Art Doll

And finally, a brambling is full born... or is it sprouted from a little acorn? The biology of the little fae creatures aside, this fantasy art doll is completed! All told, he probably took around 16 hours to craft (including accidentally sculpting two right hands for him! Unfortunately, not the first time something like that's happened, I assure you!). In prior videos I shared the process of sculpting and painting him in-depth and in this most recent one, I sew his clothes and show-off a bit of the staged set that went into making the finished dimensional illustration.

Watch Brambling | Making a Fantasy Art Doll

I enjoy characters with fanciful clothing and while the brambling's clothes are meant to have a utilitarian, rustic look to them, I was able to add some visual interest with the fae creature's asymmetrical, tattered cloak. The clothing was distressed by wrinkling, staining with acrylic paint, sanding, and then hand-sewing the fabric directly on to the art doll's body. I usually make a point of distressing an art doll's fabric as i like the viewer to imagine the secret life that the art doll has when they're not around. A life with a bit of mystery and magic's a better one! Lastly I set-up the scene by arranging fabric, vines, butterflies, and even used some small tree stumps! I photographed this mixture of found objects and then spent a little time post-producing the image in Photoshop.

Here's the finished dimensional-illustration:

You can find a print of this illustration here: https://www.etsy.com/listing/601530840/brambling-fey-fantasy-fine-art-85x11?ref=listings_manager_grid

I hope you enjoyed exploring this magical fey creature as much as I have! To be the first to know when I launch new polymer clay art videos, be sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel and hit the bell icon (but because YouTube's wonky, you can also join the newsletter). Catch all of my videos here:  https://www.youtube.com/thedreamsyndicatearts. You can also find many of the supplies I use in crafting here: https://www.thedreamsyndarts.com/supplies-gear/. Until next time, make believe!

Sculpting St. George 🐉

When sculpting St. George, I wanted a younger interpretation of our hero. Just about every time I'm sculpting an art doll, I begin with sketches and for this piece I did a few quick studies from teenage aged boys- some of the reference pictures came from Google image searches and some from this great book of Norman Rockwell's depictions of childhood. I also spent spent some time looking at prior depictions of St. George in medieval and renaissance art.

Watch Part 4 in the St. George & the Dragon Piece | Sculpting St. George 🐉:

I wanted to capture a sort of frightened, panicked expression and I was somewhat thinking of Kevin McCallister from "Home Alone", you know, the shaving cream, "Aaahhhhhhhhhh!" scene. My idea for the finished piece of art is to create an image that references the legend of St. George and the Dragon, but to also convey the concept that the dragon isn't nearly as threatening as George thought and it was his imagination making the dragon more terrible than he thought.

If you want to make the imaginary a reality, be sure to subscriber on YouTube!

If you want to be the first to know when I launch new polymer clay art videos, be sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel and hit the bell icon (but because YouTube's wonky, you can also join the newsletter). At present, I am launching new videos Saturdays at 2pm EST and I will keep this information up-to-date on my YouTube channel's banner and "about" section here:  https://www.youtube.com/thedreamsyndicatearts.

A Dragon is Born: Making A Poseable Mixed Media Dragon Art Doll 🐉

It feels so good to finally post a finished fantasy art doll project. In this last installment (for making the dragon anyway) in this St. George & the Dragon piece, I show the final steps for making a poseable mixed media dragon art doll. Once the polymer clay head was sculpted, painted with acrylic paints, the larger part of making this fantasy art doll involved sewing, lots and lots of sewing. I can find sewing unto itself a challenge with making visually pleasing seams and heck, I often find threading a needle and efficiently tying-off a seam to be a difficult at times, but you get to do crafting on hard-mode when you try to do these things with protruding spikes or wire for your thread to snag on!

Watch Part 3 in the St. George & the Dragon Piece | Making A Poseable Mixed Media Dragon Art Doll 🐉:

In this video you can watch the poseable mixed media dragon art doll get finished! All told, this fantasy dragon sculpture probably took 18-19 hours of work- that was A LOT to compress down into under 30 minutes of video.

In next week's video, I'll be working on crafting a young St. George art doll where I'll be sculpting the figurine's polymer clay head. If you have any suggestions for future fantasy artdolls for me to work on, I'll happily take you suggestions in the comments below or on YouTube.

If you want to make the imaginary a reality, be sure to subscriber on YouTube!

If you want to be the first to know when I launch new polymer clay art videos, be sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel and hit the bell icon (but because YouTube's wonky, you can also join the newsletter). At present, I am launching new videos Saturdays at 2pm EST and I will keep this information up-to-date on my YouTube channel's banner and "about" section here:  https://www.youtube.com/thedreamsyndicatearts.

Taking Flight with my First (Solo) YouTube Video with a Dragon Head Sculpt!

I've spent the last few months getting things together to bring this first polymer clay art doll tutorial (as well as many others). In this first video, I'm making a dragon head sculpt with Sculpey and in future videos I'll show you more of my process for making poseable art dolls. The head is sculpted with a few stainless steel clay sculpting tools and, more often then you would think, is shaped by my fingers. When I'm all done, this dragon artdoll will be for a St. George & the Dragon illustration.

Watch Part 1 in the St. George & the Dragon Piece | Dragon Head Sculpt with Clay:

In this video, I share my process of how to make a dragon head sculpt with clay. This is the first part in a series of a St. George and the Dragon mixed media pieces that I'm working on.

The majority of my future videos will focus on fantasy characters from mythology and folk-lore, I've got some fey characters lurking in my sketchbook waiting to be brought to life. I've thought about doing fan art of characters I love, but I'm still not 100% sure I will- I'd love to make a Daredevil (and a bunch of the other Defenders characters) or The Rhino from Spider-Man (The Rhino's costume is just ridiculous!) or maybe if I do make them, I'll re-imagine them as fitting into more of a fantasy setting. What do you think? I'd also love to make the time to play around with stop-motion animation with my poseable art dolls.

If you want to make the imaginary a reality, be sure to subscriber on YouTube!

If you want to be the first to know when I launch new polymer clay art videos, be sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel and hit the bell icon (but because YouTube's wonky, you can also join the newsletter).