Baked!

Okay, so the clay part is done and I've baked the sculpt. I managed to catch the mistake that the collar of the armor had not been sculpted so I rectified that before baking. From this, I realized that for clay sculpting, it is very important to go over the whole sculpt just before baking to make sure that everything is actually really done before going on to do it. Really should do it, since clay affords one the option. Don't think of checking things over as a chore, but an opportunity to get things right. This applies to many things in life, not just sculpting.

I've also gone on to do the dude's weapon, which will be a guan dao, or a Chinese halberd. I started with the business end of the weapon and took the decision to do the whole bit in brown stuff this time, since it is good for filing and sanding, unlike green stuff or Procreate. Could I have done it in clay? Well, yes, but clay is pretty brittle after baking and this bit is going to be top-heavy (the chibi proportions I am working with will have the head of the weapon big, while the shaft will be thin and narrow) so it might topple over and break/shatter. Anyway, here is a pic of how far along the head of the guan dao is:

So in stages, here is how I am sculpting this:

I start with the armature. Put beside its owner to show the scale.

Wrap the putty around the armature like so. I am leaving part of the armature exposed to show how it is done. Refer to the completed bulked out shape in the first pic of this post to see the end result of the first stage.