3-D molded soap needs to be finished off to make the bars look professional. I have not figured out a way to make 3-Dsoap without needing to trim. The coral colored bar on the right is fully cleaned up. A general rule of thumb is: the hotter the soap is, the more runny and thin it is. The cooler your soap is, the more viscous and dense it will be. The more cool you pour your melted soap, the less trimming you need to do. But, you will still need to trim.
Using a non-serrated knife (such as a cheese knife or a paring knife), hold the soap firmly in your left hand and wield the knife with your right hand. Reverse the directions if you are left-handed. Slowly start to trim the soap by drawing the knife toward you – slowly, slowly, slowly and carefully. Blood ruins a great soaping afternoon.
In the photo below, the speckling is caused by improper colorant mixing. If the colorant had been pre-mixed in a little water, the speckles would have gone away. Or, if the colorant had been mixed more vigorously in the soap, the speckles would have disappeared.
Tomorrow’s final 3-D soap mold tutorial will include information on how to layer your 3-D soap molds and color-in details using soap.
I am getting sooo tempted to try these!
Labcolors are fully preserved to be added to distilled water (8 or 16 oz) and not grow bacteria or microbes. So, you could mix with water and keep the batch to reuse. Alternately, you could also mix up a small batch just for a one time use. Next time I use Slate Blue, that’s what I’ll be doing. =)
Anne-Marie
HI,
About the speckling…I’ve had that prob with the bright pink labcolor. I tried heating up the pink and stirring and stirring and still ended up with a couple of small specks. If you add water to the colorant, will you need to add some sort of preservative to the soap, too…bc of the water??
Jeannie in GA