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Gemma Jewel polymer clay necklace, part one
After making my Gemma-Jewel circuit I needed something to put it in. I couldn't find a tutorial that fit my minimalistic needs (and skills) so I'm trying to figure something out for myself (inspired by those existing tutorials) and learning as I go.
My first attempt with polymer clay (since I was a very young child) involves Glow-In-The-Dark Sculpey. (Fimo is fine too.) The craft shop had a mould of sorts, a tray of various sized half domes. So I tried the largest ones. Successfully they did fit the Gemma-Jewel and battery. But, I'd made no provision for closing it. Here I tried blutak. Which worked, but left a bit of a shadow. And I still had no way to attach it to a necklace.
I removed the blutak, and instead wrapped some waxed cord around the bead halves to keep them together. I could loop more cord through to attach it to a necklace, but opening it to change the battery would mean undoing and recreating the wrap each time. Something more convenient would be needed.
I attempted to make some holes to thread cord through in the already baked clay, but it broke apart. So I created some more Sculpey bead halves, making sure to put holes in the clay before baking it. I ended up only using one of the sets of holes, and creating a closure with four magnets and white Sugru. (It needed to be an after-baking operation as magnets are not things you want to heat up.)
After letting the Sugru air cure, it did function very well. The Gemma-Jewel and battery was kept centred with a dot of blutak on the back. And it stayed closed for all of CCC. While still letting me change the battery easily when needed. Success! But. As you can see, there are still shadows from the Sugru, and the curved back of the bead leads to a non-ideal excess of movement.
I have something much more complicated in mind, we'll see how it turns out. (Btw, the code used is once again the FastLED library, OceanColors palette. It's simply mesmerising.)
My first attempt with polymer clay (since I was a very young child) involves Glow-In-The-Dark Sculpey. (Fimo is fine too.) The craft shop had a mould of sorts, a tray of various sized half domes. So I tried the largest ones. Successfully they did fit the Gemma-Jewel and battery. But, I'd made no provision for closing it. Here I tried blutak. Which worked, but left a bit of a shadow. And I still had no way to attach it to a necklace.
Gemma-Jewel in Sculpey bead halves
Photo by ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chebe
I removed the blutak, and instead wrapped some waxed cord around the bead halves to keep them together. I could loop more cord through to attach it to a necklace, but opening it to change the battery would mean undoing and recreating the wrap each time. Something more convenient would be needed.
Gemma-Jewel in Sculpey bead halves wrapped in cord
Photo by chebe
I attempted to make some holes to thread cord through in the already baked clay, but it broke apart. So I created some more Sculpey bead halves, making sure to put holes in the clay before baking it. I ended up only using one of the sets of holes, and creating a closure with four magnets and white Sugru. (It needed to be an after-baking operation as magnets are not things you want to heat up.)
Gemma-Jewel with Sculpey bead halves fastened with magnets and Sugru
Photo by chebe
After letting the Sugru air cure, it did function very well. The Gemma-Jewel and battery was kept centred with a dot of blutak on the back. And it stayed closed for all of CCC. While still letting me change the battery easily when needed. Success! But. As you can see, there are still shadows from the Sugru, and the curved back of the bead leads to a non-ideal excess of movement.
Magnets and Sugru Sculpey pendant closed
Photo by chebe
I have something much more complicated in mind, we'll see how it turns out. (Btw, the code used is once again the FastLED library, OceanColors palette. It's simply mesmerising.)