Now Ive begin the supporting shell for this, it will be in several pieces, each piece acts as a relief for various undercuts and opposing angled surfaces. Multiple smaller pieces make it easier to take apart too. Here’s a successive series showing how it’s made, with the last photo removing the rubber portion from the model;

Now that I’m done with the winged lion for the time being, it’s time to turn towards finishing the mold for the lioness roundel which I intend to complete today. The rubber portion has already been done, next comes the plaster shell. The first public cast is already pre-sold and paid for by a previous client who purchased the wolf head roundel some time back. I’m inclined now to start a lion model facing the opposite direction so there will be a pair. As I remember i have about 150# of the red clay, and about half a ton of the raku clay on hand. It would be a good…

Now that the lion is finally mostly dry except for the base which gave me a bit of trouble all along, I hoisted him up carefully to insert a couple of blocks to rest it on so the bottom of the base can dry out better. The base was originally built up on top of a sheet of safety glass on top of the plywood to keep the moisture from warping the plywood. But unfortunately the glass prevented moisture from drying out of the bottom, which resulted in it drying mostly from the top and sides, and that started causing the slab to want to warp upwards and crack. As…