My niece's birthday party is Saturday and she is in love with the jonas brothers. I was thinking about making a 3d guitar with a pool cut out in the middle. Then the challenging part is trying to make 3d people resembling the Jona's brothers and one of my niece in the pool. HELP!! I've never done people and I'm sooooo nervous they'll look like crap. Any advice, and tips?? I read on here that there was a face tutorial, is there one? Please help....i gotta start Monday!!
The only advice that I can give you would be to practice with playdoh. Check out youtube. There should be some helpful videos there.
What are you using for the figures . . . gumpaste? candy clay?
I used candy clay for the first time last weekend, and rather liked it. It was very easy to work with. It needs to set overnight before you can shape it. Needed less drying time.
My favorite part: its edible. My kids really enjoyed that!
I've made fondant figures before (without the Gumtex). They worked out just fine, but needed support from bamboo skewers or toothpicks. They also took longer to dry. I've never used MMF before, but I think its similar to fondant when making figures.
Good luck. I've only done little animals in fondant/gumpaste and they were soo much work. I certainly don't have the talent to even venture into people. I would suggest going to the library and looking at books on clay sculpting. I remember way back when i did my animals i found alot of great books that showed how to sculpt people, but it was just in another medium. I agree with the above poster...playdoh is a great practising tool.
I would recommend gumpaste, particularly since you have less than a week for them to dry. It shouldn't dry out if you keep the gumpaste covered in plastic wrap when not actively working with it. I use my daughters' sculpey clay books for ideas on how to mold several figures, and it was really helpful! Good luck and have fun 
Carol Deacon has a simple tutorial on youtube on how to make a sugarpaste figure. She has separate tutorials for the face and hair.
I'm sure there's more videos. Good Luck!!
I have used mmf fondant for making people before and it works pretty good - its just not as easy as another medium....the white almond bark from Walmart. It's cheap, you get alot, and it tastes and smells great. Melt 10 oz bark and then thoroughly mix in 1/3 cup corn syrup (I actually use a little less corn syrup with the white bark) to make the candy clay. Leave the mixture out on your counter uncovered for an hour or 2 to dry and you can start working on your figures when the mixture hardens. If the mixture starts to separate when you add the corn syrup don't worry - just pour some of the separated oil out of the container and it will be fine after it drys a bit on your counter. After it has sat and has hardened you can work it into a ball and start your figures. The difference between this and mmf is that with the clay you can mold it and flatten and smooth it and there will not be seams because the heat from your hand can remove and fix imperfections. With mmf you can't mold it so perfectly - there are sometimes seams. If you use chocolate clay I suggest you knead the colors into the clay instead of painting them on. Sometimes painted food color on candy clay will bead up and not cover smoothly. If you paint on candy clay use colors specifically designed for working with candy.
When it comes to making people I really recommend aine2 she's awesome. Her people always look so real you'd never know they were gumpaste. But I prefer using fondant with a little tylose. For some reason my gumpaste always cracks, no luck with it. But I'm pretty sure you can find a tutorial on youtube.
Wow, everyone. Lots of ideas!! I am so excited to start. I guess I will try the candy clay idea. So, I can knead in the food color to get the skin tone and stuff?? I will definatly try youtube for ideas too, i should have thought of that! Thanks everyone, so much!! I'll post pictures in about a week!!
I like MMF by itself or 50/50 MMF with gumpaste (i use the package mix too). Here are some great links (at least I think they are) that might help:
http://www.cakecentral.com/article62-How-To-Make-a-Fondant-Fairy.html - this one is an article on cc for fairies but same principles apply.
http://extra-icing.blogspot.com/ - Lorraine McKay who is amazing at figures I think has a tutorial with step-by-step instructions you can purchase (small fee) that illustrates how to do a specific figure, but would give you a good understanding of how to so the ones you want, at this site which might be helpful plus there are some other great links on it.
Liis posted this in the figures gallery which is great for making eyes http://www.cakecentral.com/modules.php?name=gallery&file=displayimage&pid=72902
Hope this helps some. Good luck!
I love working with the MMF/Gum paste mix it's been great for me! I also use the powder gum paste.
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