Anatomy: Making the Armature for the Body

It is important to draw an armature map before beginning an armature for a sculpture that includes the whole figure. This is an example of an armature map for a twelve inch sculpture. Measure out twelve inches and draw a figure that is seven and a half heads high. Mark the chin, apex (nipple), navel, crotch, just above the knee, the mid calf and the ankle.

Next, use 11 gauge wire and place the wire upon the armature map. Using plyers, bend the wire at the clavical (the shoulder bone) out to just inside the shoulder (about one eighth of an inch). Go straight down the center of the armature map past the bottom of the feet by about one to one and a half inches. Loop the wire back up to the apex. Use the wire as a model make one more piece just like the first. Now there are two legs, a torso, and two shoulders. See figure number two.

Make sure the two pieces are even. Take the looped end of each "leg" and one at a time place into the chuck of a drill. Hold the loose ends together with plyers, and after tighting the chuck of the the drill,twirl the wire, as shown in figure 2. Cut about nine inches of 16 gauge wire and use this to wrap the two pieces together in the middle between the navel and the apex. Make sure to keep the wrapping neat and tight (like a "slinky")

Set this aside and get ready to do the arms.