Sculpt an Animal Crossing Figure With Air Dry Clay : Bob the First Villager

Hi!

This tutorial will show you how to sculpt Bob with air dry clay. Bob is a lazy cat villager from Animal Crossing, This character appears in every Animal Crossing game, he seems to be the first villager ever designed.

I hope you'll envoy this tutorial! :)

Supplies

Tools & materials :

-Air dry clay

-1 styrofoam ball

-Acrylic paint (magenta, red, white, beige, pink and yellow)

-Black fineliner pen

-White posca pen (0.8 mm)

-Purple sharpie (for the eyes)

-Purple pencil

-Basic sculpting tools

-Paintbrushes

-Wooden skewers

-Iron wire

-Dremel tool

Step 1: Sculpt Bob's Head

First, you will need to print a picture of Bob and air dry clay.

The type of clay I'm using is paper-based. It hardens at room temperature (for at least 24 hours) and softens with water.

For this step, I also used sculpting tools, a soft paintbrush, wooden skewers, iron wires and a styrofoam ball.

In order to sculpt Bob's large round head, you can start by flattening a chunk of clay. Then, wrap it around a styrofoam ball and put a wooden skewer inside the ball.

Allow the clay to dry for at least two hours and pierce two holes for the ears using a dremel tool. Insert a piece of iron wire inside the holes.

In order to make the ears, you can sculpt two simple teardrop shapes. Plop them down on the iron wire and blend the seams with a soft wet paintbrush.

Let the clay dry for at least 8 hours.

Once the clay is cured, you can use sandpaper to sand the imperfection until the surface looks smooth and soft.

Step 2: Draw Bob's Face

You can create a stencil for Bob's face with the picture you printed.

Use an X-acto knife to cut the paper, cut out Bob's eyes, ears and mouth.

Place the paper on the clay and draw Bob's face with a mechanical pencil.

Step 3: Paint Bob's Ears and Eyes

Mix yellow, red and magenta acrylic paint in order to get the perfect shade of pink for Bob's ear.

Paint inside Bob's ears with a light salmon color. Let the paint dry a bit and paint the center of his ears light yellow.

Use red paint on the edges.

For Bob's dark purple eyes, you can use a plum colored sharpie on the irises.

Step 4: Paint His Face Lavender

Material :
-Magenta, blue, beige acrylic paint.

-Black fineliner (for his eyes and mouth)

-Purple pencil

Bob's fur looks lavender, so I mixed magenta, blue and beige acrylic paint in order to paint his body and face.

Paint his face lavender with a small flat paintbrush.

Next, redraw his eyes and mouth with a black fineliner.

Paint the rest of his eyes with light yellow acrylic.

Once the paint feels dry to touch, you can draw the outline of his spots with a purple pencil and paint the spots all over his face in a darker shade of purple.

Step 5: Sculpt Bob's Body

Cut four small pieces of iron wire in order to make the armature for the arms and legs. Cut a fith large piece of wire for the tail.
Then, take a chunk of clay and roll it into a small "bean" shape. This will form Bob's abdomen.

Next, put this bean shape on a stick and insert the wires where the legs and arms should be.

Make 4 small log shapes for the arms and legs and slide them on the armature. Smooth out the clay with a wet paintbrush.

Allow the clay to cure for 24 hours and pierce a hole for the cat's tail. Insert the wire inside the hole.

Step 6: Sculpt Bob's Shirt.

For his shirt, you will need to flatten a piece of air dry clay.

Next, cut out a thin ribbon of clay with a sharp knife.

Wrap a tiny piece of the clay ribbon around Bob's arm in order to sculpt the sleeves of his shirt.

Blend the seams with a soft paintbrush.

Place the rest of the thin ribbon all around Bob's waist, this will form the bottom of his shirt.

Finally, for his tail, roll a chunk of clay into a thin snake, and insert a wire inside it.

Put on the cat's tails.

Step 7: Paint Bob's Body

Apply light purple acrylic paint all over Bob's body (except for his shirt). You will need to paint his shirt in a bright shade of red.

Let the paint dry for a bit. Then, use a white posca pen to draw the flower's on Bob's shirt. Next, a tiny drop of yellow paint at the center of each flower.

Don't forget to paint two stripes on his tails and you're done! :)