ow to Create Clay Animals

Community Q&A

Creating clay animals is a great way to make a small gift for someone you love, create a colorful
zoo for your living room, or just to spend a fun afternoon flexing your creativity muscle. If you
want to know how to create clay animals, all you need is some modeling clay, a willingness to
learn, and a love for clay creatures. Just follow these steps and you'll be on your way to creating
your own clay zoo in no time at all.

Steps
1.

Start with a lump of clay. Any sort of clay will work, though modeling clay will work
best. Use a lump of clay that is firm enough to hold a position, but soft enough to be
sculpted. The more clay you use, the bigger the animal will be. Start off with a piece of
clay that you can comfortably hold in one hand -- about the size of a tangerine.
 o Make sure to place the clay on a flat surface.
2.

Roll a snake from the clay. Just place your hand flat over the clay and roll your palm
and fingers up and down until you've created a long and round shape. You can even
squeeze the clay a bit so it's already long and not too thick before you really start rolling
it so the process is easier.
3.

Break off a small piece of clay to form the head. Just break off about 1/5 of the snake
to separate the clay that you'll use to make the animal's head. To break off the head, just
gently pinch the snake at the part where you want to pull of the head and pull it off with
your other hand.
4.

Roll the head into a ball. To roll the head into a ball, simply place your palm over the
clay and roll it in a circular motion. It shouldn't take more than a few seconds to roll the
head into a neat round ball.
5.

Form arms and legs out of the snake. First, roll the snake one more time to even out the
edge that you broke off to form the head. Take a popsicle stick or something with a
similar shape and firmness and push it down through the left and right side of the snake.
Lift it and see that you've created two arms and two legs for your clay creature.

o Make sure at least 1/3 of the snake stays untouched. This will be the body of the
creature.
6.

Pose the arms and legs. You can pose the arms and legs any way you want depending
on what the animal is doing, whether it's sitting, standing, pouncing, rolling over, or lying
down. Here's how you can pose the arms and legs a variety of ways:

o Sitting. To make the pose the arms and legs in sitting position, simply bend the
clay in the middle and bend the clay so that the entire body and the arms are bent
forward, creating an upside-down "U." Then, move the back legs forward so that
they face the same direction as the arms and are curved over as well. They should
be partly resting on the floor in the back so the creature is in true sitting position.
o Standing (on all fours). Just lift up the torso and lift up the back and front legs,
resting it slightly more on the back legs, but making sure that both the arms and
legs are positioned perpendicularly to the torso and floor. The front half of the
creature will be lifted higher than the back half. This will help support the head.
o Lying down. Tuck the legs slightly under the body and stretch the arms out
forward so the creature can by spread out on the floor. You can also stretch the
legs back instead of tucking them in, as long as it's clear that the creature is lying
down. Just lift up the part of the snake that will support the head slightly.
7.