How to Make Christmas Figures with Sculpey Polymer Clay
For these figures I have used Sculpey Polymer Clay.
Model your figure using simple balls or rolls of clay and add detail to make the character come alive. I like to use with either Modelling Tools or Colour Shapers to mold, smooth, make indents and remove clay.
Bake the figure at 130 degrees Celsius for 15 mins. This timing is advised by Sculpey and based on clay that is 1/4″ thick. As your figure is probably going to be thicker than this in places, start at 15 mins and then put back into the oven if needed for 5 mins at a time until you are happy that the clay has been fired. Simply keep an eye on it to ensure that it does not burn.
Once the figure is cooled, it can be painted. Acrylic Paint is commonly used as it is waterbased and dries quickly. I opted to use Oil Paint on these figures as drying time was not an issue and I, personally, prefer the ease with which oil can be blended and the slight luminosity of oil that makes the figure resemble glazed ceramic.
Alternatively, you can use coloured clay and not have to paint the figures at all. There are many brands of coloured Polymer Clay which come in small blocks of a good range of colours. These can even be mixed with each other to create subtle shades and blended into each other to create graduations of colour if required.