Green Stuff Essentials

Getting started with GS can be difficult. The stuff seems to stick to everything except where you want it to, and I like to say that it needs to be persuaded to take any given shape, rather than simply told to. I plan to add an actual tutorial here later on, where I show how to make a (preferably beginner-friendly) project, but I thought I'd start with a simple post about what you need to get started.

 

Let's start with the obvious, the material itself. There's a good chance you've previously bought some from Games Workshop, which comes in small blue and yellow strips. I don't do that anymore. It is a lot more expensive bought that way, but that's not the reason (truth be told, you'd have to really use the stuff a lot for that to make a difference), but the fact that the two components touch in the middle. This leads to the middle part hardening, which in turn leads to inconsistent, lumpy putty. You may have to do some hunting to purchase GS in bars, but knowing the manufacturer's name (Polymer Systems Inc.) and the product's official name (Kneadadite Blue/Yellow Epoxy Putty) will get you far.

 You can do some sculpting by just using your fingers, but not really anything very detailed. Sculpting tools come in variety of shapes, and the "best" one is largely a matter of preference and habit. Pictured are two bought miniature sculpting tools and one that I made myself out of two sewing needles, a little wood and Green Stuff. The one in the middle is by far my favourite that I use for most of my sculpting. The one made of needles comes in handy when nudging the corners of a model's eyes into shape and other precise tasks. The bottom one is in the picture pretty much just to show that they come in that shape, too. There's nothing particularly wrong with that shape, though, I'm just far more used to the middle one.
Whichever tool you need, make sure you dip it in water, lick it or maybe use a sponge first. A dry tool will stick to the putty, making sculpting unnecessarily frustrating.

A miniature drill and a hobby knife are pretty much essential for modelling, but they have their uses in sculpting as well. The drill comes in handy when you're attaching a head sculpted at the head of a toothpick to the armature or when adding a top knot to a model's head, for example. Basically, whenever you want to expand a model substantially enough to need an armature, the drill comes in handy.
The hobby knife is there for when you will inevitably make a mistake and need to cut off the failed part and redo it. In some cases, you need to use pliers and/or sidecutters instead of or in addition to the knife, depending on the size and location of the part being worked on and if you need to redo the armature as well.

 Speaking of armatures, you'll want to have a variety of different thicknesses of wire. Pictured are 0.4 mm copper wire and 0.7 mm and 1 mm steel wires. These suffice for most situations, although I sometimes use 1.5 mm steel wire for some of the larger pieces. Choose wire thin enough for your purposes; you can always add more Green Stuff around the wire to give it extra support, but if you chose too thick a wire, the final piece will be too thick, too.
Cork is very useful material for basing. For sculpting, I generally use it to hold the piece being worked on. In this case, it's a work in progress shot of a head at the end of a toothpick. Triangular toothpicks are often pretty useful for using as armatures for smaller pieces. Unlike wire, they can easily be whittled thinner as necessary, and the fact that they're angular and won't bend makes them easier to hold comfortably..

One final piece of equipment I find very useful, if not absolutely necessary, is a miniature oven. Green Stuff cures faster in higher temperatures. However, if the heat gets too high, not only does it cause a fire risk, but the Green Stuff piece may distort and even start to bubble, obviously making a mockery of any fine detail you worked so hard to sculpt on it. When in doubt, the safe bet is to use less heat rather than more.
There are a several different methods for achieving the optimal curing temperature. I used to have a lamp with a 40 W light bulb right over a metal jar, until EU regulations made finding normal 40 W bulbs uncertain at best. Currently, I use the same metal jar lightly covered with a piece of aluminium foil on a coffee maker's heatplate. The piece being worked on doesn't directly touch the metal jar, but is being held at the end of a length of wire or a toothpick.
Whichever method you choose, pay attention to fire safety. Keep the heat source well away from any flammable painting chemicals (white spirit, acetone etc.) you may have around. Have a smoke alarm in the room you're working in, and a small fire extinguisher wouldn't hurt, either.

Hope this helps someone to get started. I'll try and think of an appropriate difficulty level project for a more detailed tutorial at some point later on.