Cloth Doll Faces: A Practical Guide to Creating Character and Expression

by Ray Slater

Overview

Discover techniques and ideas to creating cloth faces filled with personality and fun in this book by leading international dollmaker and textile artist, Ray Slater.

Leading international dollmaker and textile artist, Ray Slater, reveals her secrets to creating faces in cloth filled with vibrancy and dynamism.

The face is the most important and challenging part of a cloth doll, bringing life and personality to the character. Conceived as being the hardest part of the making process, creating the face is, in fact, easy to do and an enjoyable, creative part of the making a cloth figure. Just by following a few simple rules a whole world of wonderfully expressive, fun characters can be created.

This book will show every stage of how to create personality-packed faces, taking you from the initial inspiration sources, the design and drawing process, to the final colouring, sewing and embellishment of the head.

Using just three basic face designs - flat, three-dimensional and collaged - Ray will show you how to create a fantastic collection of characters, giving tips on how to adjusting their proportions, hues and positioning of the features to make a whole host of faces with different looks and expressions. Fully illustrated step-by-step instructions break down the process of making each kind of face, as well as tips on little adjustments you can make to create your own unique doll. In addition, discover helpful galleries of eyes, noses and mouths to inspire you and provide further ideas for how to bring more personality to your doll's face.

Finally, Ray has shared two body patterns in her book to suit all three head types, so that you have the opportunity to develop the character of your dolls completely. Each body is fully demonstrated with clear photographs and detailed stage-by-stage instructions, and body templates are included for you to easily recreate in the comfort of your home.

Brimming with ideas and practical advice on, this is an invaluable companion to cloth doll makers everywhere, whatever your skill.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781782213079
Publisher:	Search Press
Publication date:	02/09/2021
Pages:	144
Sales rank:	526,067
Product dimensions:	8.40(w) x 10.70(h) x 0.40(d)

About the Author

Ray studied Embroidered Textiles at Goldsmiths College and Theatre Costume at Croydon College of Art before working in theatre, film and television. She curated an exhibition of cloth dolls from the US, Canada, Australia and the UK in 2003, and is now one of the UK's leading teachers of doll-making. She practices a wide range of textile-related subjects and her current work has evolved from her passion for costume and textiles. She is the author of Cloth Dolls for Textile Artists and teaches throughout the UK, Europe and America.

To see more of Ray's work visit www.rayslaterclothdolls.co.uk.

Table of Contents

Introduction 6

Face & dolt-making notions 8

Materials 10

Toots 12

Draining & colouring equipment 14

Inspiration & design 16

Influences, sources & styles 18

Developing a design 20

Designing & colouring a face 22

Proportions of the face 24

Draining eyes 26

The Basic Technique 26

Changing Expressions 28

Gallery of Simple Line Eyes 30

Gallery of Realistic Eyes 32

Gallery of Decorative Eyes 33

Drawing noses 34

Creating Simple Line Noses 34

Creating Realistic Noses 35

Gallery of Realistic Noses 36

Drawing mouths 37

The Basic Technique 37

Colouring a Closed Mouth 38

Colouring an Open Mouth 39

Shading a realistic face 40

Paler Skin Tones 40

Darker Skin Tones 41

Older Faces 41

Gallery of simple Line faces 42

Long Faces 42

Square Faces 43

Oval Faces 44

Gallery of realistic faces 45

Long Faces 45

Square Faces 46

Oval Faces 47

Dimensional Faces 48

Gallery of decorative faces 50

Long Faces 50

Square Faces 51

Oval Faces 52

Designing a collage face 53

Gallery of Collage Faces 54

Face-making techniques 56

Flat faces 58

Making a Flat Head 58

Needle Sculpting a Flat Face 59

Inspirational Flat Faces 62

Dimensional faces 68

Making a Dimensional Head 68

Needle Sculpting a Dimensional Face 70

Inspirational Dimensional Faces 75

Extra features 82

Making Ears 82

Eyelids & Eyelashes 84

Adding Hair 85

Collage faces 88

Making a Collage Head 88

Making Collage Features 89

Inspirational Collage Faces 95

Basic doll-making techniques 102

Before you begin 104

Basic bodies 106

Basic collage body 114

Templates 118