2D Cake Decor

You may know by now that I specialise in figurines. It's a real passion that I have to try to get the character looking as close to the real thing as possible.
I will be featuring a few "how to's" for modelling figurines in the future. (Please kindly comment if you would be interested in something like this!)
Another type of cake that I do is a 2D decor cake. I actually find these more difficult and time consuming than the figurines. (Don't get me wrong, the figurines are not necessarily a breeze...)


Baby Bop 3D Figurine

2D Diego

  Although it takes long to make the figurines, (and I really can spend up to an hour on a face alone); the 2D cutouts are far more complex for me.
Some advise for when you are working on 2D decor:
Use your fondant veining tool for indentations and decorative lines. These tend to give a more realistic finish, rather than using a knife.
When looking at your picture, figure out shapes from what you are looking at, for instance, Diego's boots above are hearts cutout with a regular heart cutter and then just trimmed with a circle cutter to give the open edge of his boots.
Some of your shapes will need to be free hand, such as diego's t-shirt above. But try to use different shaped cutters as far as you can.

In this basic layout of Mickey Mouse, I've tried to explain briefly what I mean by 'using shape cutters'.



www.easy-drawings-and-sketches.com

Remember to always round/ smooth the edges with your fingertips, to make the character more believable. When there are snags and fluffy bits around your edges, it reminds us that it is just made up of shapes. Smoothing your lines will bring it all together nicely.




In the photos below, I have shown broken up dimensions for these 2 characters, to make up the final character.

Its simple when the character is viewed in sections.

Sometimes it works out better if portions of your character are modelled partially 3D, as I suggested with Mickey Mouse's mouth.

Goofy's hands, mouth, eyes and hat were 3D modelled.

Donald's hat, beak, hands, bowtie and legs were partially 3D modelled

Have a look at a few of the other 2D cakes/ biscuits I've done:

 



Giraffe biscuits, neck and head made with the end of a large music note cutter

Noddy made up of a series of different sized circles and ovals and a bit of 3D modelling.



The heads are just cut out with an oval cutter and the bodies are many dots cut with a piping nozzle.



These were mostly just freehand cutting.



Again mostly freehand cutting, but you can see the different pieces that have been used to make the character.

Mostly 3D modelled.



The completed SpongeBob cake.

I know this is only a short 'how-to' and there are a few holes in the explanations, but next time I make a 2D decorated cake, I will try to take step-by-step photos that could explain it a bit better.

Please comment on this post, I'd like to know if this came across as helpful or not.

xxx