THE Wrestling Belt... a behind the scenes for Chad Diety

Working with Roma Plastilina for the first time in over a decade. The good news is that now they make a non-sulfur version (because the stuff I used in high school smelled to all high hell)

Today I made this large buckle, tomorrow I make the small side buckles, a mold for it and then from that a positive out of plastic.

...and then I paint it and mount it onto a belt... yes, this stuff is not exactly easy but it is enjoyable. Pray that the foam mold and plastic steps go well since I haven't done that before... but we follow directions and with a little luck it will all work out.

 The foam mold portion of this process went well.  Perfect on the first try... but then the liquid plastic portion of this adventure kicked me down a peg from my feelings of success.
The plastic filled and overfilled the mold until I was left battling an ever expanding amount of sticky plastic goo that thankfully had a plastic container collecting the excess rather than the kitchen table.

 Eventually I discovered that positioning pencils under the mold would keep the flow inside.

 The plastic was supposed to dry in about 15 minutes but the next day I was still left with soft and sticky shapes that began to bubble and expand like cancer had taken a turn for the worse.

This is when you try again. Plastic pour #2... neater... actually started to solidify when it was supposed to...

Primer.

Black detail. (a little gaudy at this phase but hold on, it's just a step in the process)

Oooh... more gold... (I'm not going to even get into how much of a fight it was to mount this thing onto a belt)

Victory!!!