General Info

There are so many ways to make caned faces, it could take you forever to play around with them all !

(...see below in Component Method for for warnings about packing clay around features and reducing... and how to avoid distortion)

3. Or some will make the cane in several component parts, breaking them down to simpler shapes or making separate components for parts which stick out
.........after reducing each component separately
............ they will then rejoin the canes as one new cane
........... or they will rejoin slices of the components rather than as canes
...(for example a whole round face cane, plus ear cane (cut in half to make 2 canes) to make a cat cane

...this last technique also allows a face cane to be created with a variety of hair cane or slice possibilities ...or possibilities for hat, necktie or bodice, etc.
by either creating the face cane without a forehead, or by cutting away just the parts of the cane necessary to add a certain hair style, hat, etc. .DB

reducing face canes

for most info on reducing canes, see Canes--Reducing ... especially the end-caps method of reducing to prevent distortion

Bob just rotates (his huge cane) and whacks it...... his acrylic rod is actually crazed from all the whacking. Kat
...Bob's lesson on reducing a huge face cane by rolling around the outside with a large solid acrylic rod...pressing down on the middle... pounding with the rod up and down the sides of the cane...then pulling
http://www.tinapple.com/oldsite/reducecane (then click on Next, on left, to see the whole reduction)
...Bob reducing another huge face cane
BEFORE: http://albums.photo.epson.com/j/ViewPhoto?u=4153008&a=31266991&p=68339447
DURING: http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/nitrogal68/detail?.dir=/5ffe&.dnm=8817.jpg&.src=ph
http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/nitrogal68/detail?.dir=/5ffe&.dnm=3215.jpg&.src=ph
AFTER: http://albums.photo.epson.com/j/ViewPhoto?u=4153008&a=31266991&p=68339547 (hard to tell the diameter here, but I'm sure it's less an an inch)

various photos of face canes and component canes (like eye canes) ... some being reduced with various techniques (... look at thumbnails of all 100 photos to find them all!)
http://albums.photo.epson.com/j/AlbumIndex?u=4153008&a=31266991&f=0

(eye cane) http://www.tinapple.com/oldsite/retreat/pix009.jpg
(eye area cane) http://albums.photo.epson.com/j/ViewPhoto?u=4153008&a=31266991&p=68339447

My first couple of face canes were similar in that there was a wide range of expressions as I reduced the canes
....they started out happy, transitioned to wild, then sorta angry and mean... then settled on complex and wise.. . it was the weirdest experience I ever had with any creative material. Desiree
...I was reducing my latest face cane and happened to look at one end..... Egads! She was looking back at me with this panicked look on her face. "Don't reduce meeeeeeee"... I uploaded it just for fun. http://beadyeyedbrat.com/reduction.html

(see more in Canes-Reducing)

Packing clay in and around the facial features when using the component method can cause distortion in the cane when it is compressed and reduced, because it's really difficult to avoid having tiny gaps between the added packing pieces of clay.
...unfortunately, these gaps will be filled in by any clay closest to it during reduction!
(one example of lots of small logs used to fill in around main face components --huge cane though)
http://albums.photo.epson.com/j/ViewPhoto?u=4153008&a=31266991&p=68339447 )

HOWEVER, one technique which helps avoid this eventual distortion is to create each feature and it's immediately surrounding clay as a final rectangle (or any shape which has straight or even sides).
.....this will allow for very few gaps to exist between clay pieces because only the small areas right next to the feature need to be (carefully) packed .... also only one end of the packing piece needs to be exact (the rest is disregarded for now) ... results in less work for the caner too!
..... after enough small areas around the feature have been well packed with clay, the unit is trimmed then into the largest rectangle that's possible within the well-packed clay area
..... after trimming to a rectangle, large slabs of skin color (or whatever) can be easily added for the rest of the face with no possibilities of gaps (as long as the joining pieces' sides are flat too)
..... finally, the excess skin (or background) clay can be trimmed away to create the desired finished shape of the face
NOTE: backgrounds, or any other cane components can also be treated this way as well
... for example.... to create a mouth unit, cane a freestanding lip section, then wrap around them with thicker and thicker layers of skin color, until a rectangle can be cut which includes the whole mouth and a tiny bit of skin around the parts which are closest to the outside of the rectangle. Other large hunks of skin color can be added to this rectangle perfectly evenly and quickly. ....(great tip from Kim Korringa)

( keeping component shapes in their shapes, even without gaps problem.... could apply to facial canes as well)
......I've always had trouble getting my canes to come out exactly the way I want and particularly when I have one complex shape, and I'm trying to surround it with a filler color. When I compress the cane, my complex shape always tends to distort a little (a simple example of what I mean is when you surround a center rope with 5 other ropes to make a simple flower...when I compress this, often my center rope comes out as a pentagon instead of a perfect circle).
..... Well, the trick I learned is to cool just those component log shapes I really want to keep their shape or precision, and also warm the clay I want to fill the gaps.
.....If you do this quickly enough, all it takes is a gentle compressing to cause the filler clay to perfectly surround the complex shape without any change in the complex shape. Then you can let the whole thing come to an equilibrium temperature before reducing. Wow, it makes a huge difference. Now I can keep my corners sharp. –Doug

PLUG method

The plug method creates a solid flesh area first, then removes plugs of it and drops in units for the features separately (each eye, nose, mouth, cheeks, or some combination). The features are surrounded by flesh colored clay to make them the same shape as the plug removed, and to prevent chinks in their outer edges.

some of my faces, most made with the plug method (website gone)

I want to recommend using the plug method of making faces, especially if you just want to try some simple ones:

---Begin with a thick (3/4" tall) disk of your skin color. Remove a round plug of clay for each of the eyes, cheeks, the nose, and the mouth with some kind of circle cutter (for eyes, tiny triangles can be cut out on each end of the eye circles, --and no eyebrows).

---Then create circle-shaped features and insert them (or an individual feature surrounded by skin color in a circle shape) into the holes in the large face disk.

---*If* you need to cut in from the side of the disk to open the hole large enough to insert a plug, surround the plug first with a tiny bit of skin color to prevent any chinks where the hole might not close exactly in line throughout the cane. (Otherwise just enlarge slightly by pressing on the walls of the hole.)

---You can then add hair by cutting away bits of the outer part of the face disk for hair-around-face;
then add ears, collars, jewelry, hats, clothing, whatever, if you want.
. . . faces (canes or individual slices) can be cut into from the outside using the just the edge of a cutter, or a bent tissue blade, to create spaces for hair to intrude into them.
.....for curly hair, try taking a few bites here and there into the forehead or cheeks, then inserting spirals or random curves made with long stripes or long, flattened Skinner Blend logs.

Carolyn's lesson on making a fish cane shows the eye cane added plug style after a hole has been made in the body (she uses just a needle though)
http://www.carolynsclaycreations.com/Tutorials.html
(for more details, see Canes-Instr. > Picture Canes)

(this huge face cane has unit canes for the eye area, mouth, etc., but notice all the small snakes of clay used to fill in the space around them:
http://albums.photo.epson.com/j/ViewPhoto?u=4153008&a=31266991&p=68339447
....using the replacement-plug method described in this sub-category avoids having to fill in with all those tiny logs, and therefore can prevent a lot of distortion caused by the gaps between the logs during reducing)

OTHER METHODS for making face canes

Barbara McGuire does her face canes like a combination of the component method and plug methods:
....she starts with a face color cane in the finished size she wants
... she then cuts across the face cane in various places, and removes large rectangular chunks of the cane, in order to have spaces in which to insert rectangular eye, mouth cane units
http://www.hgtv.com/hgtv/cr_clay_techniques/article/0,,HGTV_3241_1373508,00.html (show # 613)

OTHER METHODS for making faces
......with canes or cane component or other......

dimensional features could be added to blank, face-shaped clay using single slices of feature canes (eye, nose, mouth, hair, or accessories)
...also might be especially good for making ethnic faces or masks

Michael Christoph "sculpted" a 3-D face from a face cane slice in a Maureen Carlson class
...begin with a slice rolled out to the size you want
...work from the back and front, to push parts of the design into a different plane (to make 3-D)
...as you hollow out the back, build it back up by adding small pieces of clay to fill in the cavities
...(use tools such as scalpels, knives, brushes and needle tools to remove, move, indent and smooth parts of the design)
...this takes patience as the design will crack if it is too cold or too old, and will smudge if it is too soft (but even a wrecked slice can be retrieved by slicing thin elements from a second piece and appliqueing them on top of a ruined portion of the original slice). Maureen
http://www.weefolk.com/10_1996.htm ("dimensional millefiori")
dimensional face slice on cloth doll (&) blackboards (on Grapevine Wreath) http://www.weefolk.com/ideas.htm#home
...or might work to put a thick clay slice of the appropriate diameter into a face mold??

"flat onlay" features". . . very thin individual slices from feature canes (like eyes, lips, clothing) could be onlaid onto a blank face slice, then rolled completely into it for a flat face (rather than bulding them into the cane itself) . . .(see Canes-Instr. > Overall Techniques for more info on gen. technique)
...or one could add just a single feature cane slice-- e.g., a mouth slice-- to a cane which had been built without. that feature
.....that way different mouths, for example, could be used on each slice of the mouth area
...or if using more than one feature slice, you coud keep rearranging them for each slice (might be sticky though... add a bit of cornstarch, then remove before rolling in?

face cane slices flattened onto clay bases
...my face cane slices flattened onto solid color clay balls to make whole heads ....for doing this, the background color of face slices (or "skin" color of slice if no background) should be same color as color of the ball it's added to, so colors will blend seamlessly) (website gone) ...DB add my faces & skeleton face
...Cindy P's face cane slices on ball heads for cabinet knobs (website gone)
...Christel's female face cane slice plus added hair+ background ...onlaid, then flattened onto a long bead
http://home.online.no/~raje/Polymer/projects/womanpin/index.htm
(for lesson details, see Onlay > Flattened Onlays)

Kim's face slices on ovoid beads... rest of torso-bead covered with "gorkley" strings of clay
http://beadyeyedbrat.com/goddessswap05.html
Patricia's head beads presumably done this way http://reve.roche.free.fr/zagdouns.htm
Sarajane’s non-head beads made up of face slices added to one area of ovoid beads which had already been covered with other slices for hair. background... (also some clothing added as bas relief)
http://polyclay.com/beads.htm

Marlene's face slices (on half balls? so can be flatter) surrounded by hats, ruff collars, etc. (website gone)

Kim's various uses for face canes & slices, including rolling a face slice onto a ball?
http://beadyeyedbrat.com/canerecomb1.html

Lidija's painted faces (on flat, oval clay)... with impressions and onlays as embellishments on forehead (could also be hair or headgear, etc.)
http://www.lidijafairbanks.net/face_techno.htm

(see also Onlay )

ADDING to faces (slices or to canes)

Adding to COMPLETE slices (or canes)
*Rebecca's many face canes & hair (added to complete round face cane)
http://members.aol.com/nogyclay/page/index.htm
Dawn Sch's jester round faces, with added neck ruffs and caps (cane slices)
http://members.aol.com/rhaiven/jest_purple.jpg
Cindy's fish magnet shows fins, tail (and lips?) added onto teardrop-shaped fish body slice
http://www.picturetrail.com/gallery/view?p=999&gid=549045&uid=454469 (gone)

Dotty's caned eyes and noses --and ears-- onlaid or added to cat face slices or canes (website gone)

Adding to CUT AWAY areas of slices (or canes) ...creating empty areas for hair, hats, bows, bodices, e.g.
Julie’s many face canes with hair
http://members.aol.com/wise1j/page1.html (...click on all Razberi Kids categories)
*Svetlana's (oval) faces and bodies on bottles (hair cut into faces, or neck,clothing a bit)
http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/dailypix/2001/Jun/04/il01a1_b.jpg
Christine Brasher's faces (hair cut in)
http://www.polymerclaycentral.com/pcc/featurepics/chris13.jpg
Babette's faces (somewhat dimensional) with cane slice hats, etc.
http://www.babettecox.com/polymerclay.htm (click on Face Pendants for closeup)
Bob Paris' face slices with hair, hats and bodices
http://albums.photo.epson.com/j/ViewPhoto?u=4153008&a=31266991&p=68339446 (for close-up view, hover cursor in lower-right corner, then click on 4-arrow square)
http://www.interpoint.net/~bob_p/facenk01.JPG (gone)
(for more info on removing parts from the outside of a slab or cane, and filling in again with the same (or another shape) of different clay color or pattern
...see Canes-Instr > "Landscape Canes" for more on this technique)
.......to facilitate this kind of cutting from the outside, see Cutters-Blades > Blades >"Bending" --bending tissue blades)
.......some portion of the outer edge of many small or large cutters of all types (aspic, Kemper, cookie cutters, etc.) can be used for this purpose too
.......some food garnishing tools might be sharp enough to make these outer cuts (rather than single stroke cuts from a blade, or bending a blade)
.............Oriental Garnish Making Set http://www.polymerclayexpress.com/equip.html

dimensional or non-dimensional clay bits or cane slices (of headwear, bodices, hair, etc.), could be added
on top of or underneath or extending out from the face cane slice (could be flattened ot not)

Sarajane's (rolled flat --non-dimensional) girl pins with caned headwear, bodies, etc., added to basic face slice
http://polyclay.com/pins.htm

Julie's leprechaun face slice with added dimensional hat and beard... and chicken face slice with dimensional egg (broken open) shell at top and bottom
http://members.aol.com/wise1j/3dbeads.htm
dimensional hats added to faces http://sdpcg.org/Slide%20Bank/ss14.jpg

*Kate's dimensional hair, hats, etc. (relief) on many face & bodice pins (website gone)

MORE WEBSITES with added items
*Wanda's clown & lady faces, decorated (website gone) (website gone)
Cindy's faces with hair & onlaid hair, headwear, fabric, eye glasses
http://home.earthlink.net/~claycrazy/beads4.html http://www.home.earthlink.net/~claycrazy/lamp.html (gone)
http://www.geocities.com/claycrazy1/faces.html (gone?)
Justino's face canes with slices hair http://www.wco.com/~justino/polymer.html (gone?)
Kara’s slices with hair (website gone)
Bordello ladies (faces & hair) --swap (website gone)
Jean’s faces + hair, etc. (website gone)
claydaze's women's faces, hair (also animal faces) (website gone)

Feature Canes ...eyes, lips, noses

Kim K's lesson on making lips with a Skinner blend cane (spiral cane, rolled up, light in center) cut into two pieces
...stacked on top of each other...sides pinched out and up into slight smile...middle lip indentation made with small rod, then small log of skin color put in indention to hold it in place.
http://www.pcpolyzine.com/0209september/lipcane.html
mouth cane lesson by Bunny ...lips very full . . . using a Skinner blend bullseye cane (as above)
...she cuts the cane in half lengthwise, then cuts one of the halves in half again (=3 units). . . .
http://www.thewildbunny.com/lipcane.htm ....more examples http://www.thewildbunny.com/babe_beads.htm

eye cane, how-to http://members.aol.com/polyclay/cane.htm
(eye cane) http://www.tinapple.com/oldsite/retreat/pix009.jpg
(eye area cane) http://albums.photo.epson.com/j/ViewPhoto?u=4153008&a=31266991&p=68339447
various photos of face canes and component canes (like eye canes) ... some being reduced with various techniques (... look at thumbnails of all 100 photos to find them all!)
http://albums.photo.epson.com/j/AlbumIndex?u=4153008&a=31266991&f=0
....a possibility for small face canes... to begin the eye cane, load two colors into the clay gun, the iris color first then black—use the middle part of the cane (or whichever proportion you like best) as your iris and pupil cane.
...Grove and Grove's caned eyes and eyelids (in masks)
http://www.groveandgrove.com/maskpingals/maskjewelgal.html (gone)

(Cynthia's video lesson listed above shows a bit about making eyes and nose, as well as hair)

...(see many good ways to make canes for eyes, noses, mouths, hair, etc. in Sculpting-Body )

Animal & Misc. faces canes.. and Ideas

Candy's many face canes ... many animals....... plus bat, ghost, skull, etc.
http://www.velocity.net/~cam/
*Kim Korringa's canes (flowers, faces, quilt, still life, cats, fish, mosaic people, misc.)
http://kimcreates.com/gallery.html
Christy Hensler’s lesson on cat cane (face & body)
http://www.povn.com/rock/gpoly.html (click on "demo)
IrishRed's lesson on cat face
http://www.tlcnet.com/~polyclay/canes3.html
Jewel's complex, bear face canes
http://pcpolyzine.com/march2001/downunder.html (halfway down page)
claysquared's dog and cat faces
http://www.claysquared.com/silly.htm
.......(see many more animal canes in Sculpting > Websites > Whimsical)
antalias's cane-covered animal face (website gone)

Christel's fish cane -- http://212.62.242.82/christel/Dscf0007.jpg
...I made it with one piece of white and yellow skinner blend for the face, inserted round eyes to the cane. The body was made of (another) Skinner blend (rolled up). For the "fishy look" I used a ripple blade and stacked thin sheets of black clay, and put it back together. The fins are basically just several stacked colours cut to shape. . . . Air bubbles also Skinner blends from shade of blue and white. Christel

Keith's various emoticon faces canes (basic face is bullseye Skinner blend translucent cane of black to white,.creating gray in center... black eyes and mouth are probably inserted into that cane)
http://gallery.gundo.com/gallery/ClayPenSkinnerBlends (or http://www.polymerclaycentral.com/masterindex.html ClayPen photos)
..."happy face" emoticon cane (yellow & black) ...i couldn't find instructions on the happy face, so i made one myself *glowing with pride* (lesson):
--make 2 black snakes (same size) & 1 yellow snake slightly larger than the black snakes... put them together to look like this: oOo
--wrap with yellow sheet
--make bullseyecane( yellow inside, wrapped with black) about the size of the oOo in diameter... cool in freezer a short time
--cut the bullseye lenghtwise in half (giving you your smile) .... .attach to bottom of oOo for this:
oOo
- U
--then make another yellow snake to cut in half to give the rounded top to the face
- ^ ...........(no keyboard key to represent an upside down U?)
oOo
- U
--then wrap with a thicker yellow sheet .... cool in freezer before slicing … Voilia!!! ... Donna aka Khalua

other "faces"
pumpkins (could also have onlaid features), skulls, Santas, robots, monsters,
...and actually, anything can be "given" a face ......for example: eggs, trees, suns, stars, boxes, etc.
Candy's lesson on making a jack 'o lantern pumpkin cane
http://www.velocity.net/~cam/pumpkin/jack.html
Nora Jean's lesson on making a skull cane on top of a pattern (and surrounding it with clay patterns)
http://www.norajean.com/Biz-Archive/Day-of-Dead-002.htm (begin with 2H... then click on pg. 3,4,5 for the rest)
.....(see Christmas and Halloween-etc., for more of these

skin colors don't have to be the traditional pink, brown, etc
.... you can also use wild colors, or glow-in-the-dark, or clay with inclusions, etc.

I made cool hair for my caned face from a checkerboard ikat-cane for one of my face cane swap pieces (Donna's squashed ikat technique). Trina (see Canes-Instr. > Ikat)

OTHER USES for face canes

Can add individual clay features (on tacks?) to pumpkins or hard squashes ...or monsters ...or potato heads, etc. (like the Cooties game or Mr. Potato Head

Use individual cane slice faces for cards or other bas relief.... as a head on a drawn figure (stick figure or fancy), or other body (polymer or mixed media)

I've turned some of my ugly canes into centers for flower canes. . . My most popular flower center is the ugly face cane that doesn't look nearly so bad when reduced to fit amongst the petals. People are so intrigued when they notice a face looking out where they didn't expect one. LynnDel

many faces of various types ...at Ethnic Faces swap (some not caned)
http://polymerclaycentral.com/pcc/swapethnicfb.html
newsgroup's t-shirt project --many face slices of various types
http://members.aol.com/appleannie/tshirt.html
Polly's faces with lots of border stuff
http://members.aol.com/polyclay/previous.htm
claysquared's girl faces and bodies
http://www.claysquared.com/silly.htm
slice of my skull cane, made in Steve Wood class
http://i96.photobucket.com/albums/l163/DianeBB/canes/34efd299.jpg (upper left)
......raw slice of skull cane rolled onto raw black ball, then baked for head on fingerpuppet...hair and hat added... (+ others)
http://i96.photobucket.com/albums/l163/DianeBB/sculpts_more/PiggyskeletonNatashacoloredfaces.jpg
Japaya's colorful Dia de los Muertos "sugar skull" cane
http://i169.photobucket.com/albums/u232/meriporlared/DSCN2361.jpg

Donna's lesson on skull face cane (website gone)
PoRRo’s translucent face cane + (website gone)
*Grove and Grove's caned mouths (in masks) http://www.groveandgrove.com/maskpingals/maskjewelgal.html (gone)
*Grove&G.fish,flowers,insects,masks,faces+ http://www.groveandgrove.com/wearablegallery.html (gone)
*Wanda's Santa face cane (website gone)
JC --hinged clay people http://jewelrycrafts.com/clayproj5.html (gone?)
Cheryl's many (portrait) faces http://members.aol.com/cmich80220/index.html (gone)
*Comport's figure pins,*goddess http://www.mdpag.org/impress2.htm (gone)
Denise's first face cane (diff. way of doing eyes and mouth) (website gone)
Libby's face canes and Face Cane Swap http://hobbystage.net/art/libbym/ (not accessible?)

The Hot Off the Press booklet '36 Millifiori Canes' (sic) by Amy Koranek has instructions on face making too. Emily N.
http://www.hotp.com/ (enter title in search box) (out of print)

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