Ogres are like onions, they can be green. Last week I worked on creating two identical casts of two fingers, my pointer and middle fingers. First, I created a negative out of alginate. I did this by mixing the correct parts of alginate and water that were written on the instructions(4.5:1 water to alginate by weight) and sticking my fingers in the alginate. Then after the negative was created, I mixed together rockite and water(1:3.5 water to rockite by weight) highlighted in the instructions and, I poured the combination into the mold, letting the mixture sit with a screw suspended in each finger slot for about 24 hours.

Figure 1: Casting instructions and example set up

 After the mold had been set I then poured another set of the concrete and water mixture. After another 24 hours, I removed those pieces leaving me with four fingers of concrete. I decided to try to sand some of the imperfections in the fingers before applying spray paint however, I was unable to send too much because I was concerned about removing the details of the finger from the mold.

Figure 2: Fingers Post Molding

After some sanding with 400 point sandpaper, I spray-painted the fingers with the green spray paint. Spray painting the object Was not a straightforward task way that I approached. It was by getting a piece of cardboard and spraying one side of the fingers fall on the cardboard and then waiting two minutes and then rolling over so that I could paint the other side additionally I had to modify my angle of attack of the spray paint can multiple times to ensure that all side to the finger equally covered with spray paint. After letting this spray paint dry for 24 hours.

 

Figure 3: Spray Painting

Overall I am satisfied with how one of the fingers turned out which are the ones I submitted. The other finger, the middle finger had a lot of defects that ended up impacting the final product. However, these imperfections allow the finger to cosplay as ogre fingers. Additionally the quality of the mold seemed to rapidly degrade over time so it is key to observe the instructions carefully and to finish molding both sets with in about 48 hours the alginate mold being created.

Figure 4: completed fingers

Figure 5: Clean workspace

 

The majority of the costs of the project was related to labor time. I think that in future iterations since I have gained experience through working on this project once I’ll be able to produce high-quality molds that will allow for fewer defects requiring less post processing, decreasing the cost of the project by 20 to 30%.

 

Type	Item	Price	Source	Quantity	Total
Materials	Alginate	$12.46 pound	amazon.com	1 pound	$12.46
	Rockite	$4.17/box	amazon.com	1 box	$4.17
	Spray Paint	$5.95/can	Home depot	1 can	$5.95
Labor	Concrete Finisher	$23/ hour	ziprecruiter	2 hours	$46
Total					$68.58