Day 14 - Fashion Assassin

Assassin bug earrings

Today I made a new earring design for my shop. It's a red bull assassin bug (and therefore also counts for bug-a-day! Hoorah multi-taking!). Made from shrink plastic, colored pencils, sharpie marker, silver earrings, metal findings and crystal beads.

Here's an overview of the process:

It starts with a sketch

Next I make a prototype in shrink plastic to see where its center of gravity is, and how I want it to hang on the earrings.

Using the computer, I flip the image and then it is traced onto the shrink plastic with sharpie marker, which is the best type to use for most shrink plastic applications. Then I punch holes where needed.

I then color them in with colored pencils and cut them out. Next they go in the oven and bake for a few minutes, shrinking to about a third of their original size.

Here they are after baking.

Next I apply three coats of polyurethane varnish which dries and sets overnight.

Next I assemble the crystal beads and bead connectors, and finally assemble the earrings.

Done! You can view the earrings in my shop here.

[January 14, 2016]

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