This molding and casting thing was way more technique-heavy than I could have ever anticipated. Measuring and pouring alginate for molding and plaster for casting was easy, but keeping my fingers still enough and pouring the plaster steadily enough to prevent air bubbles and deformations was quite difficult. After two attempts, I ended up with a pair of mounted fingers that turned out somewhat decent; here’s how:

Level 1: Attempt #1

I admit to complete ignorance when approaching my first attempt in class. I intended to dip my fingers into the alginate to form a hook shape; however, I went way too deep into the plaster and ended up molding half of my entire hand. Furthermore, my fingers slowly relaxed and came together, molding together rather than forming independent digits I could hang my keys on. Here’s what it looked like:

As you can see, the alginate also got stuck in the orifices and was impossible to get fully out. This obviously was not going to work, so I went for another attempt.

Level 2: Attempt #2

After failing the first attempt, I decided to do two fingers at once in my second mold. I also kept them straight and poured the plaster more slowly to avoid issues with air bubbles in the alginate. This mostly worked, but the alginate seemed to cling to my finger as I was pulling it out, making the end of my finger look like I put it into some heavy machinery:

Despite this, the level of detail in the skin texture is incredible. All that’s left at this point is to paint, yielding this as the final product:

As you can see, the detail is quite fine, even capturing the bunching of my skin at the knuckle. Had I left the alginate to solidify for longer, I believe the tips would not have turned out so gnarly. In any case, I’m quite happy with the product!

Cost EstimateSet featured image

~60 grams alginate at $0.037/g: $2.22
~1 ounce plaster at $0.139/oz: $0.14
~1 hour labor at $15/hr: $15

Total Cost: $17.36