In December 2012 we finished our chocolate letter assignment with Erik van Blokland.
There is a very nice Dutch tradition to eat chocolate letters when celebrating Sinterklaas. So production part should have been made in a certain period of time, around December 5.
Process stages:
1. working on a clay prototype, following certain parameters:
— max. thickness: around 20 mm
— max. size: A5 (depending on the size of the vacuum machine you have)
2. drying the prototype (depending on a size and thickness this can take several days)
— fixing the shapes after drying
— polishing the surface
3. making plastic mould using vacuum machine
4. making a real chocolate letter by casting melted chocolate in a plastic mould
(you can use any type of chocolate and also mix them together for a marble effect)
5. cooling the letter
6. eating the letter!
There are some advanced tricks for getting a perfect chocolate with no scurf, but I was more interested in shape development, so that part did not bother me that much
the idea about the shape came from one of my TypeCookers
I made two versions, because the first one had too thin connections which broke while drying (that first one then became a stencil)
clay letters are prepared for the vacuum
mould is ready
finally — lovely milky stencil [g]
—
Here you can see the letters of my classmate: http://teotuominen.tumblr.com
A wider overview on the theme: http://fontfeed.com/archives/typemedia2011-chocolate-letters/
video by Erik van Blokland:
video by Yanone:
