Lesson 2: Melt the candy well and definitely in 30-second increments. Use something narrow and deep, like a tall coffee cup. The wrist action will give a smooth all around coating.

Lesson 4: Use icing and food coloring like paint. We tried Wilton's Edible Ink Pens. Do not waste your money. They don't work on candy melts, and worse yet, scratch the candy surface.
Use a very, very fine paint brush and add food coloring to the leftover frosting. I was feeling nearly homicidal after the frustration of the ink pens. Notice the scratchy, weak Jason mask at the left, below. But it was easy to give him a makeover using a brush and food-colored icing.

Despite the non-functioning ink pens, my daughter and I spent a great afternoon making these. Until we figured out the icing trick, we made the best of the icky-ink pens with "emoti-pops" --> :P, XD and T_T and the riddle pop: What does the equation the square root of -1 is greater than 3u mean?
Eat Well. Be Well.