This Tutorial has been prepared by Cindy Howe.

Tisha Ritter is the owner and originator of the TIBs Brushes and Technique.
Tisha has granted Cindy permission to do the tutorial and they have both given us permission to use the tutorial on our website.

This method will make greenware cleaning fast, easy, and most importantly, more healthy!

Your greenware will be beautifully cleaned in 1/3 the time, with ....

No more dust in the lungs, or all over the house!  

You MUST use the brushes specified in this tutorial,  nothing else will give the same results.

T.I.B.s brushes stands for Tisha's Incredible Brushes.  Tisha Ritter  has developed this wonderful product line, and the methods for it's use.  I have  adapted and illustrated her techniques for use with our tiny doll castings to show you how wonderfully these brushes can work for us too.  

General Cleaning Technique
Materials T.I.B.s Brushes sizes 4,5,6 for miniatures Greenware Bowl of Clean tap water Absorbent fabric Exacto Knife Finger Tool Ball Stylus

My preference is to work on dry greenware. 
If using leather hard, use VERY LITTLE water, and LOTS of care.  Also, if working on leather hard greenware, substitute a wire cleaning tool for the scalpel to remove seams.

This is the usual position that you would use a brush to stroke, with the flattest side of the bristles horizontal, parallel to the surface.

We will call this the horizontal position.  This position is used in the second step of cleaning.

This is the first position used in this method when cleaning and removing seams.

You will need to keep a bowl of clean plain tap water at hand.  During some steps, you will be cleaning your brush often.  To clean, tap and press the brush against the side of the bowl. Swishing the brush around in the center of the bowl does not clean it out.  You must use the side of the bowl to remove the clay from the bristles.

You will also need a piece of absorbent cloth, such as a cloth diaper, or old cotton t-shirt, folded several layer thick on which to blot excess water from your brushes.

Ok, lets begin to clean our doll.

Gently remove bulk of mold seams using your scalpel. 

Hold brush in the position shown, the Vertical position, and move across the seam line, using the side of the brush to move in the direction shown.  Continue stroking in this manner down the entire length of the seam area.

You do not need to rinse your brush very often at this point, as the clay in the bristles helps with the cleaning process.  

Use this method to smooth all areas where seams have been removed.

Use your dampened brush to smooth areas such as the cutout on the bottom of the torso, tops of arms or legs, and armholes.

Notice how quickly these brushes smooth jagged cut edges??

After all seam lines have been removed, and all additional detailing has been done, it is time to smooth your entire surface.

The HORIZONTAL brush position is used for this step, and you MUST rinse your brush often.  

Wet your brush, and blot excess water.  Use just the soft TIPS of the bristles to gently stroke over the entire surface of the doll.  Start at the top of head, and stroke downward, following the curves and contours of the face.  After every 2 strokes, STOP, rinse your brush completely and blot.  then continue.  You should see any white streaks on the surface disappearing, and your surface should be completely smooth when finished.

After cleaning seams, use your brush in the horizontal position to do an all over smoothing of the piece, remembering to use a very light tough, a very clean brush, and to blot excess water each time you rinse your brush.

The same basic technique is used on legs.

PINHOLES

Everyone gets pinholes on occasion.  The old solution used to be to try and sand them down, or fill them, neither of which was very effective, or much fun.  The most drastic solution was to throw out the piece.

Not any more.  Here is a LARGE pinhole.

I want to make a special doll for an upcoming tutorial.  I need to have two legs that can be used in a kneeling position.  The mold I have has a left leg that is in the perfect position  The right leg is bent too much for my use.  I can't have a doll with two left feet......

Working with leather hard greenware...

I cut the feet off at the same place on the ankles, and stuck the foot into place with just a tiny bit of water on the joining surfaces.

Using the brush in the vertical position, I stroked quickly across the area where the two pieces were joined.

I then finished cleaning the seams on the piece, and smoothed the overall surface with the brush in the horizontal position, remembering to rinse and blot often when smoothing.

After less than a dozen brushstrokes over the attached area, the leg is perfect, with no sign of any patching or attaching. 

No other method is as fast or gives such wonderful results when adding or patching greenware.