What is an armature?

An armature is like skeleton; it gives strength and flexibility to the clay character. If you plan to move arms, legs or anything else on the clay character, you will need an internal skeleton of sorts to stop to appendages from breaking off or bending in the wrong places.

What is an armature made out of?

Armatures are built out of wire. You can use armature wire (sold in most art stores in spools of varying diameter), pipe cleaners, or stem wire (used in flower arranging). We prefer the stem wire as it is inexpensive, easy to hand out to students, easy to bend and shape, and easy to store. It comes in a variety of metals as well as wrapped in cloth or plastic. Be careful when using the spooled wire as it is stronger, can puncture fingers and needs to be cut with metal cutters (not scissors). The stem wire tends to be thinner in diameter, but the shorter lengths can easily be wound together with other pieces to create a larger skeleton. Again, watch for finger punctures and cutting with metal cutters, not scissors. Metal will quickly blunt scissors and cause metal to be bent or damaged rather than cut.

How is it made?

To build an armature, take a piece of wire and bend it in half. Create a skeleton, like the one below, leaving small loops for the hands, feet and head. The loops are easy to attach the larger balls of clay to for the creation of the head, hands and feet. Watch the ends of the wire, they will eily poke through the clay. Try to fold the ends over with needle nosed pliers or by hand.

The "Clay Animation How To" web site- learn about much more complex armatures!

More about armatures- easier to follow!