Putty does what the tool tells it to, and a steel blade tells it something a finger never can: a crease with a sharp bottom, a plane that is actually flat, a hollow with a clean rim. The tools gathered here are the shaping end of sculpting — palette knives and spatulas for spreading and pressing, styluses for dots and rivet heads, ribbon tools and carvers for cutting material away, burnishers for smoothing a surface down.
Most of them work best at a particular moment in the cure, when the material has gone from sticky to firm. Getting that timing right matters more than owning a large set.
Palette knives in flat rectangular, diamond and drop shapes, spatula sets for modelling work, burnisher sets, stylus sets with ball ends in graded sizes, mini ribbon tools for hollowing, hook and pick sets, stainless carvers in boxed sets, flexible steel scrapers, silicone guide rings and boxed selections with a case.
A broad flat blade places a mass of putty and flattens it to an even thickness; a narrow one presses it into a corner. Drop and diamond profiles get into the inside of a fold where a rectangular blade would bruise the surrounding surface.
A ball-ended stylus pressed into firm putty gives a rivet head, a bolt recess or a row of identical dimples far faster than any other method. Graded sizes matter here, because consistency across a row is what makes it look manufactured.
Once the material has cured, shaping becomes a subtractive job. Ribbon tools hollow, carvers cut a clean V, and flexible scrapers level a surface without digging in. For very fine cutting on cured putty a fresh blade from scalpels is still the sharpest option available.
A polished steel burnisher run over firm putty closes the surface and removes tool marks. Used too early it drags; used too late it does nothing. A damp silicone shaper does the same job on softer material and is more forgiving.
Keep the blades clean and dry between sessions; a film of cured putty on a stylus ruins the one thing you bought it for, which is a repeatable shape. The full branch is listed in sculpting tools and materials.
