Building Your Layers When Using Layered Stencils

In our last “behind the scene” post we talked about determining the depth of an image. We briefly touched on the subject of creating base support layers and how important they are when it comes to layered stencils. Let’s dive into more detail on this subject to better understand why I create all of my stencil sets this way and why you should too!

Let’s start by taking a closer look at some of the layers of this elk design. Pay close attention to the edges of the frosting, at how crisp the lines are.

Now lets compare that image to a design I frosted years ago, before I had fully perfected the layered stencils. How do these edges compare to the ones above? They’re a lot messier, right? That’s because when I originally started to experiment with stencils, I did not make sure that each stencil built upon the stenciled layer below. I actually tried to frost NEXT TO instead of ON TOP OF the previous stenciled layer.

Don’t get me wrong! This Beauty and the Beast design still turned out stunning and the customer loved it! The difference was the amount of time and frustration that could have been avoided if I had properly layered these stencils. The largest struggle was that the icing would push underneath the edge of the stencil, which I then had to constantly fix with a toothpick.

Watch the video below to see the creation of the entire front antler. Remember, we need to build our layers so that everything layers on top of each other. Without the supporting layers below, you can not achieve the crisp outlines and you waste a lot of time fixing frosting that has pushed underneath the stencil. When watching the video, pay close attention to the red highlighted area, which is the ‘base support’ for the antler.

Taking a closer look, notice how there are gaps in the base support. These gaps will not be noticed in the final design because we will be frosting the front antler separately and “pasting” it over this base, which we will discuss more in the next post!

You may be wondering why we need to frost this base if we are frosting the antler separately. This is because the antler we are frosting separately is the antler closest to us. To achieve that 3D effect we need to make sure that the antler protrudes further out than the back antler seen in this image.

That is it for today! Again, please feel free to utilize the comment section with any questions. I love to hear from everyone and will do my best to answer any questions you may have.

I’ll see you on Saturday when we dive more into why I frost my designs in sections!