Thread: What is the best clay?

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I'm looking for a clay that meets the following specs:

Easy to use and easy to smooth

Air dries overnight

Fairly light weight

Carveable, sandable, paintable when dry.

I've tried the Playdoh modeling compound and didn't like the spongy feel to it plus it was hard to smooth out.

Celluclay is light weight enough but can't get a smooth enough surface.

It's too expensive to buy a bit of all the different kinds out there so I'm hoping someone here has the perfect answer.

There are a lot of clays out there, as you noticed, but there are other questions or needs that should be answered first.
Is weight an issue for the final piece?
Is fragility or sturdiness an issue?
What do you plan on doing with it?
Would you be using it over and over again?
Would you be exposing this to water or the elements?

While the air dry part will vary with the amount of water you use, and the atmospheric conditions at the time and location of use, the sandability or carvability will be the bigger issue. While materials like Sculpy, Super Sculpy, etc. are carvable and sandable, they require baking in your home oven for curing to the point of sanding or carving them. The material, like most clays, gets easier to manipulate or smooth out as you work with it. The more you work it, the softer and more plyable it gets. With water solvent clays, it is the opposite, the more you work it, the faster it dries out unless you add more water to the mix. The down side to water based clays and ceramics is that they have a tendency to be brittle or more fragile when they are only air dried. If you fire them in a kiln, then they can get very hard, but they also become uncarvable or sandable once you have fired them. The water based clays and ceramics are cheaper by the pound than Sculpy products, but a lot less workable, and you can't fire them or bake them in your own oven. The Sculpy clays come in various mixes for different strength needs. They can be worked and reworked almost endlessly before you bake them, then, once baked, they can be carved, sanded, glued, etc. They are waterproof, and can be painted or finished with almost anything.

Great info on clays FontGeek. I work with Sculply and there is a big difference between Sculply and Supper Sculply as far as how durable the item is after it's baked. Sculply ( sculply 1) tends to be brittle when baked. Supper Sculply ( sculply 111) is the same stuff they make PVC pipe out of but it's more expensive than the regular sculply. You can get both in the same size boxes.

If you need detailing tools make them out of bread clay. This stuff is supper smooth and extremely durable down to paper thin. Wont stick to Sculply1, 11 or 111. I've used the same bread clay tools for over 8 years now.

IMHO, Super Sculpey is probably the best clay (polymer or otherwise) for making props. You have to bake it in your oven (sorry) but it's super strong and fairly easy to work with. It even comes in "flesh" tone.

For some really cool props made with Super Sculpey check out www.grindshow.com.

Doug Higley is a true artist when it comes to Super Sculpey.

His stuff is the MADMAN!

My Wife has just gotten into Sculpy and doll making. She bought a tape from Jack Johnson, very informative! Some people selling dolls on E-Bay have people refuse to purchase them because they don't believe they are dolls, they think they are looking at photographs of real people!
I'm working on making a "real" Monster, myself.
"Ugly" I can do.

I like to use model magic it can be smoothed by dipping your fingers in some water and it dries very light if that helps

I like sculpey polymer clay. shape it around an armature made of tin foil and bake it in your oven. fun stuff.