I decided to grab a block of translucent clay and when I saw that Michael's has Cernit brand available I decided to get it. I then went to my YouTube channel thinking I had done a baking test of translucent clays many years ago. I was really confused to not find a video since I remember doing the test. Then I checked the blog and discovered that when I had tested the translucent clays way back in 2012 I had made it a blog post only. So today we are testing the 3 brands of translucent clay I have on hand.
I am doing the test in a similar manner to how I did the old one just subbing in the clays I have on hand today. Some of the clays are different than I had then and some of the brands have made some major formula changes in the last decade plus. So I was excited to see how this was going to turn out and if I would get similar results to what I got way back then.
The three brands of translucent clay have on hand today are: Sculpey III, Fimo, and the Cernit that I just picked up.
I mixed all three of the translucent clays with both red and black. I chose those two colors specifically for the following reasons. Red because red has a habit of color shifting more than any other color of clay I work with. And black because if we are mixing a translucent with black we want it to still be black and not change to a gray.
I did several things off camera for the test. First I marked a paper plate for my baking surface that gave me areas for each brand of clay and a spot to put the control samples of the colored clays. That way I knew I would be able to keep all the samples in the correct places and not get them mixed up.
Next I found the thinnest craft-sticks I had on hand (a slim stick from Hobby Lobby) to use as a rolling gauge. Since I only had one I cut it in half that’s why I am using the short pieces in the video.
After rolling the clay I used a small round clay cutter to cut pieces that were all the same size of each clay. And since I was so short of the Sculpey clay I cut those circles in half and used just a half circle of each clay in each test. I cut 3 half circles of each of the translucent clays and 4 each of the red and black clays. I made sure to put the pieces of clay in the correct areas of my labels paper plate.
I then mixed the samples I wanted to bake- 1 that was equal parts black and translucent and one red and translucent. I left one piece of the translucent clay plain also. In the center of the paper plate I kept on piece of each of the red and black clays.
I rolled the mixed samples out with my clay roller and the same spacers. I then baked the all the clay at the proper temperature for 10 minutes and allowed the clay to come to room temperature.
Now let’s talk about each brand individually.
Sculpey III- this one is definitely the softest of the three and the easiest to work in with the colored clay. The big downside for me is the translucent clay on its own stays somewhat beige when baked. Although this wasn’t an issue in the test with the colors that I used I think if I had used white as a third color we would have seen a difference in the baked color. Also the translucent properties are really not great. Even with the thin sample I baked there was no way I could see the black lettering on the plate through the clay.
Fimo- this was the firmest of the translucent clays and because of that it was a bit of a challenge to get it combined with the colored clay. Once mixed in it acted very nice. This translucent clay is very white when raw and keeps that white hue when baked alone. I do find it works well with pretty much any color of clay I combine it with. I could see the lettering through the plain baked sample a bit.
Cernit- this clay does have a somewhat strange texture by itself. It is almost slimy and because if that it was a bit hard to combine with the colored clays. I do like the feel of the clay once I got used to it though. It did bake up the most translucent of all the clays tested today. I think for most projects when I can get this one I will stick with it. I like how it worked in.
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