◆ Plaster
Cast a 100 mm bust of Homer, blind poet of the Iliad, in plaster or concrete. From a museum scan.
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Homer as a 100 mm bust: the headband, the deep-set blind eyes, the full curling beard and the cloak over one shoulder, standing on the round turned foot of the original cast. Next to the Socrates bust from this catalog it makes a pair of Greek thinkers for a shelf, or a pair of bookends.
The master is a 3D scan of the plaster cast of the portrait of Homer in the Royal Cast Collection of SMK, the National Gallery of Denmark, published by SMK as public domain. The mold is made with the hugging-shell mode of our silicone mold maker, the mode the site picks for this shape: the beard and the curls would lock a rigid mold, and silicone peels out of them.
Cast it in plaster or Jesmonite for a crisp white bust, or in a fine concrete for a heavier one. The same silicone mold also takes resin, soap or candle wax.
Print the base with the bust fused onto it and the two shell halves, pour about 286 ml of silicone, and cast in the flexible mold that comes out. The zip carries every printed part, the bust as its own STL, the tool's own print-settings sheet and a recipe file for the generator.
Shown as a 3D render of the printed mold parts pulled apart around the master, not a photo.
Print the base, which has the master already fused onto it, and the two shell halves. No supports.
Stand the shell halves on the base around the master and hold the seams shut with steel binder clips. The seats for them are built into the shell.
Tape the outside seams or run a bead of hot glue along them, because silicone finds every gap.
Mix 315 ml of silicone in one batch, pour it into the open top in a thin stream, and fill level with the rim.
Once it has cured, unclip the shell and slide each half off SIDEWAYS, not upward: the master is wider above its foot, so the base rib is left open for that. Then peel the silicone off the master. That silicone is your mold.
Set the silicone back in the shell to keep its shape, and cast into it through the opening the base left.
Print details
| Cast material | Plaster |
|---|---|
| Printed parts | 3 |
| Size (W x D x H) | 88 x 94 x 115 mm |
| Print bed needed | 94 x 69 mm, 116 mm tall |
| Filament | ~163 g |
| Layer height | 0.2 mm |
| Infill | 15% |
| Supports | Not needed |
| Download | ZIP: 3 printed parts (STL) + bust master (STL) + print sheet + recipe |
| Added | 2026-09-24 |
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Yes. Homer is 100 mm tall and Socrates 95 mm, both are scans from the same museum collection, and they stand well together on a shelf or as a pair of bookends. Cast them in the same plaster for a matching pair.
From SMK, the National Gallery of Denmark. Its Royal Cast Collection holds plaster casts of famous ancient sculptures, and SMK has scanned many of them and published the scans as public domain. This is their cast of the Hellenistic portrait of Homer, the blind poet.
Brush a thin first coat into the beard and the curls with a soft brush, then fill the rest and tap the mold for a minute so the bubbles rise out. A silicone of Shore 20 to 30 A stretches out of the beard without tearing.
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