Mold making and Casting products through EnvironMolds, LLC

The EnvironMolds website features an interesting array of art supplies that are distinctive, top quality and handy as well. It includes eyes, body parts, paints, makeup, name plates, mounts, etc.

EnvironMolds specializes in providing easy access to everything to do with mold making, casting and life casting materials. It’s not just about materials, tools and equipment needed for creating these intricate artworks. The website, Artmolds.com also features an Art Supplies tab that encompasses a wide variety of unique and useful art supplies to support these arts.

This includes eyes and body parts, makeup supplies, paints and dyes, craft kits, marble and wooden bases and name plates engraved. Let’s take a look at some of the offerings:

•    The eyes and body parts feature realistic looking glass and acrylic eyes for life casts and sculptures. This includes flat backed, semi-round and fully round eyes along with hand blown ones (with or without veins). Larger-than-life plaster study casts of body parts are available for studio reference and the Styrofoam mannequin head can be used for mask making.

•    The paints and dyes section opens up specialized paints and pigments that are compatible with latex, silicones and polyurethanes. Skin-safe body paints are also available in a variety of colors.

•    The makeup supplies offer extensive options in high quality makeup products - face and body paints, eye makeup, brushes, applicators, bald caps, etc. - that are perfect for theatre as well as personal use.

•    The bases in wood and marble are just the thing for mounting a sculpture and give a finished look to the artwork. These are available in different shapes, sizes and colors to suit the sculpture.

•    A brass name plate engraved with the title of the artwork and the name of the artist lends the perfect finishing touch. The life cast or sculpture will get a professional look akin to the galleries! There are options in sizes, type of corners and lines of text.

•    The craft kits have an interesting lineup of options ranging from making pot castings, leaf castings, fossil castings to even life casts of the hand or feet.

MoldGel Alginate SILFREE is considered the healthiest, safest and most environment friendly alginate formula in the market. It is silica free which makes it suitable for use on baby skin too.

Alginate is a simple dental impression material that lends itself well for making body molds. It is a natural material derived from seaweed and considered completely safe for the skin. The powder is mixed with water (in the defined proportions) and applied directly on the body to capture impressions for making life casts.

However, the alginate powder does contain some amount of crystalline silica which is considered a carcinogen. Even though the silica content is on the marginal side, EnvironMolds has developed a special silica free and dust free formula called MoldGel Alginate SILFREE.

This is made with food grade ingredients and is both environment and user friendly. To add to this, it is the only alginate that is fluoride free and lead free as well.

The powder mixes easily to give a smooth, creamy consistency which helps reduce mold voids due to air bubbles. It also yields greater coverage because of the mix ratio of 1 part powder to 7 parts water, (compared to 1:3 ratios for regular formulae). In fact, this has emerged as the highest yielding formula as it gives greatest value ounce-for-ounce.

Apart from the economical factor, the silica free Alginates provide excellent forensic detail down to the fingerprints. The delayed and gradual set time (4 to 5 minutes in MoldGel Alginate Silfree regular formula and 7 to 8 minutes in SloSet) allows a considerably longer window for working with the alginate mix. It further boasts of delayed shrinkage too and the casting time limit is extended up to 24 hours!

Finally, as MoldGel Alginate SILFREE is gentle on the skin and yields a softer set, it is ideal for casting hands and feet of babies and small children.

The formula is available in 1lb, 10lb, 20lb and 50lb packs on the EnvironMolds website, Artmolds.com. Other variants like Hollywood Impressions SILFREE and LifeMold Silica Free Alginate are also available.