Toucan in Polymer Clay

Make a ball with approximately one large bar of black fimo, pinch the top to mark the head, flatten slightly.

Stretch the bottom part into a point.

Take one bar of yellow clay and half of red. Make 2 cylinders, placed side by side, and roll to bind the clay together.

Run the resulting strip of clay lengthwise through the medium-pressure dough machine (M.A.P). Fold the clay over on itself, still lengthwise, and run it through the MA.P about fifteen times until you obtain a gradient.

Cut 3 strips lengthwise to overlap.

Applying pressure with your hands, compress the strip until it forms a square.

Using the rolling pin, roll out the square to a thickness of about 1cm, taking care not to go from yellow to red but the other way round.

Cut a 3 cm length from your strip and shape the beak.

Roll out a small amount of the white with the M.AP. and use a 2cm round cookie cutter to cut out the base of the eye.

Prepare 3 extremely small balls, one black, one blue just a little smaller, then a tiny black and a splash of white.

Build your he by crushing the balls from the largest to the smallest on the white circle. Make a thin plate of black and position it at the end of the beak, pinch and remove the excess.

Take 3 cm of the degraded clay length, cut the segment in 2 and lengthen the red part into a point to make the tail.

Use caramel clay to form a pointed cylinder. Texture the surface by scratching it with a toothbrush and piercing needles.
Color the surface with black paint and wipe off any excess with a cloth. Bake this faux wood for 15min at 110°.

Cut 8 small pieces from the black clay to form the toucan's legs.

Build your toucan around the already-fired wood by crushing the tail, positioning the body on the branch, pressing to weld the legs and applying a little liquid fimo to hold.
Cut 1 cm from a metal rod, then connect the beak to the body.
Bake for 30 min at 110 degrees.