Joseph Fireborn

So, did anyone answer your question? I too, need a good wax resist.

Forbes wax resist; I get mine from Highwater Clay.

Yea, I got a few answers. I am gonna start with Forbes, as the first one I try.

Knowing how dedicated you are you will make an awesome teacher. Kudos on your grades and Masters acceptance. 

It's a wonderful career to have, Joseph. I too have been an economist but have spent the last twenty years teaching secondary math with a middle grades specialty.

Gabby that is awesome! I am so excited to be there in a few years. 

Thanks Min for those words of encouragement!

Whew... Done! Now I have blackish/grey kiln shelves. The corelite shelves held up a lot better than the cheap ones that I bought a while back. Those are like the ocean now. The corelite ones you can't even tell a grinder was on them. When I finished I patted my clothes off and it was a white dust storm. The sky was blocked and my dog yelped because she was scared of the sudden darkness.

Sorry man, I moved it down here to South Texas.

Yeah, that's why I currently leave the glaze mixing up to you wizards...

lol. wizard. more like bumbling baboon.

A Baboon Wizard? Sounds like a new animated film!

Glad to see it worked out for you. always nice when things go right.

Well, no wonder you're pleased! Beautiful results, you should always spray in the wind .

Thanks Rae.

I have had a far more difficult time getting my glazes right than any other aspect of ceramics. I rarely have issues of any kind with the making process, if I'm going to have a problem it's always with the glazing. It can be really discouraging and the journey to success is different for everyone. It's such a disappointment when time after time you open the kiln and the results you see don't match the one you were going for.

Giselle. I can get my glazes pretty good now. I struggled with replicating results for a long time. But now my real problem is just picking a glaze and sticking to it. Although maybe it isn't a real problem. I do need to start using some glazes on actual work and listing it online for sale. I think I am just going to make yunomi and cups with handles for a while. They are my favorite to make anyways.

I tend to stick to about a half-dozen glazes, I don't think that's too many. How many do you have?

Chilly, that's how it is with California. Except it's two drops of rain that stops us in our tracks. We drove down to L.A. last weekend after rain and there were accidents on every freeway.

Thanks for all the great advice everyone. I appreciate it dearly.

I don't think my stuff is aesthetically where I want it to be, either. A mentor told me once that if it was of a passable level of quality (even throwing, functional glaze), you should sell it off and make room for the next stuff. The work gets better as you make more of it. This I can vouch for.

It's also encouraging to make a little bit of that money you've poured into everything back.

Some good looking glazes in the gallery Have you called them variation glazes or are they variegation glaze? Not easy with a bit of dyslexia.

I dunno. Variation glazes because they add variety to my pots? I dont even know what variegation means lol... sorry for the confusion I will just change them to glazes.

Variegation is where the glaze splits into two different glass probably because of titanium.

Denice,

The firing was subpar; as to be expected I presume after 3-4 years of not firing consistently. I have dismantled my pottery studio and it is all sitting there unused. I am debating on selling it all. I just don't have the urge right now, but I know I cannot replace it for the price I will sell it for, so I haven't.

I am terribly sorry to hear about your cancer. You are on the right path, search for only the best doctors. I went through years of cancer treatment and if it wasn't for the best doctors in the south east I am pretty sure I would not be here typing this message for you today. I wish you all the best and I know if anyone can beat it, you can.

Much love!

Thank you for the pep talk,  I am going to start calling tomorrow, I tried Friday and everyone was closed.  What I am going through is nothing compared to what you had to endure.   I  wouldn't sell your equipment,  stuff it in a corner.   You will be wanting to get back into it in a few years.   I sold my kickwheel  after I bought a used Brent.    The man who bought it  was around 45 years old,  he had done pottery in high school.   The day he purchased it he just found out he had been appointed to a high level security job with the government.   Several months later  I received a photo of a pot and a message that my kickwheel had saved his life.   He said his new job had so much stress that throwing every night is the only thing that kept him sane.  You better hang on to it,  who knows there maybe another pandemic in a few years.    Just a thought,  have you ever considered making teapots,  you can start out with a one cupper and work your way up.   With love Denice

Everyone's journey is different. Doesn't mean it isn't hard to endure. Don't compare and contrast, just focus on you and your plan.

Kiln in a corner.

My wife said the same thing and she is a brilliant woman who I always listen to. So for now it sits in a corner. The kickwheel story is sort of the same story as mine. My hands were badly frozen up and I had nothing during the day, so it sort of saved my life in a way as well.

It's not specifically pottery, but it can be applied. Twyla Tharpe's "the Creative Habit!" Is interesting reading about some practical mechanisms involved in creating long term.

Zen and the Art of Pottery.

Thanks everyone for all the kind recommendations and all the personal messages. I didn't mean to scare everyone. It is just standard procedure infusions based on my treatments. Hope everyone has a good new year! I have a lot of reading to do in 2016.

I gave up rather quickly because it hindered crystal development. On my winter list to try it again.

im going to use the grid method on this, when I get the book in the mail soon. I think that will be the best way to figure it out as the glaze will pool and i can test many things quickly, or atleast I hope quickly once I learn it all.

How did any of your tests go? Did you return to them? Searching the forums for various Silicon Carbide posts.

Good the results are on my blog. I am scaling down my testing to 15% per load, and making the other 85% of my kiln for sale. Or that's the plan anyways.

Get feeling better.

Great results Grype (or may I call you Joseph?).

Thanks Evelyne. Joseph is fine. I need to just change my name on here to my name. Grype was just something I came up with a long time ago. Stands for gryphon.

Welp. Sprayed for the first time after breaking in my compressor etc. It is interesting. Going to take some practice to get used to the movements and spray gun techniques. I like the low amount of glaze I have to have on hand though. I made some tall cylinders to practice on then fire to see how each different application comes out.

High Volume Low Pressure. Remember, low pressure coming into the gun.

Yea I kept the pressure at around 25 coming into the gun.

Welp. I think I might have found a temporary direction for a while. I just unloaded one of the best pots in my short career. Pictures coming soon. I also figured out how to layer my white so that it wouldn't be so boring. But I will have to do a ton of testing before that is ready to be used on actual pots. This black iron rich glaze is so darn beautiful.

The problem with going in a direction is you never have consistent stock xD

I think I am going to go for it and just see what I can do with these 3 glazes. Of course I will satisfy my testing hunger with my yunomis as they are a wonderful place to explore form and surface. Can it be true? Will I stick to it? I highly doubt it. HBP is always right.

I finally got around to watching it. So relaxing with the piano music. I loved seeing your process.

I really enjoyed watching your video. And I have bookmark you for future videos, etc. You are doing so well. Thanks for sharing.

Joseph, I couldn't find a place to follow your blog. Did I miss it or is there just no button?

I got an electric kettle this year for the studio. It's great for heating fresh throwing water and I also heat water to clean my wax resist brush.

My hands ache and burn when I go out there at night. During the day is fine. At night if I run a load of laundry in the dryer and use hot throwing water and wear layers it's not too bad.

Joseph, can I swipe that idea for an apron for this year's gift exchange down at the studio?!? That would be absolutely PERFECT!!!!

I want to make potter's aprons out of old jeans and I could just SEE that embroidered on the pocket.

It would make a good gift!

Sounds as if you're taking a smart approach. Lots of folks have said that it's limitations that lead to good work, and they are right. Because clay is such a protean material, it's a little harder to get natural limitations, so they have to be self-imposed.

I like that saying rayaldridge. Self imposed limitations to increase quality of work. Good stuff.

Whatever you do, just keep doing it. It will be nice to see your results. Cool.

I am excited to read my johnbritcone6 book after Christmas.

Yep. Mine comes in tomorrow. Plan on reading it while im testing my kiln, adjusting my cone offsets. Thanks for the tip on the falls creek shino. I found your post about it, and looked through the pictures. Looks amazing.

Tri color glazing is fun... Play around and you will find a combo you like... we use Birch, Fire Brick, Ox Blood or Jade... all different Companies ...

Glad you fixed it.

So handy .... I'm fortunate that my dad is able to do those kinds of things because I'm not handy in that way at all. So he comes over and builds me shelves, and when he builds his own shelves, I go over and organize them for him in exchange.

Joseph, what's your Etsy shop? I'm on there every day.

And this is why it's called a process!

Aye! I enjoy the process more when I make things I love. I love yunomi. Thin beautiful cups. I figure I can apply to other cup shows in 2018 besides AKAR. There is one called SIP. I believe there are others as well. So I might be applying to a lot of those in 2018!

I was inspired today and can't wait to get my big raku built. Materials are on the way.

nice nice! can't wait to see the tiles.

That when I glaze fire and realize a mistake in size, or texture, or whatever, I have several weeks of partially finished work with the same mistake because I didn't know yet!

Haha. It's awesome isn't it!

Ah well. Forward progress is all I really want.