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Glaze Test City


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I want to visit! Can I use google earth to preview ?

Simply amazing, how many test tiles around are there, or should I ask how many firings instead?

 

You should do this for your facebook people Joel. It would be a crazy cool video if you could make it seem like you were driving down a glaze street taking turns down color avenues etc. 

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Right now I have half a base glaze that I am working on. I have a few recipes sourced and tweaked from tutors about two years ago but they seldom get used. Fell out with all my glazes after they would never come out the same twice and decided to find out what all my materials do. That is what the picture is above, plus many random recipe tests before the Currie tiles.

I am much more interested in the experience of doing the testing than the results. Working with each material gives valuable insight into many more things than final fired surface.

Some tests will make it onto pots but first I am designing my 'transparent base' that will be a good all rounder. That is the half finished glaze. I did my first ever melt test yesterday with it :D and with the addition of .25g Cobalt Carb and 2.5g Red Iron Oxide. I imagined it would be far more fluid.

 

I really thought about going back to university to study Ceramics, but with the cost it is cheaper for me to work part-time and learn how I want in the studio.

 

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Yeh, Joel,

a passionate interest can easily be mistaken for lots and I did not mean to make light of a very debilitating condition.

On reading many posts here I get the feeling that there runs a thread or pos. a river of ability/need to pursue knowledge that is exciting to witness.

Would you have guessed that on starting work with clay that you would be spending may hours not making pots but testing the properties of chemicals?

I find this area of work, i.e. pottery or what ever name you wish to call it, so exciting as it covers so many areas of required knowledge.

This also leads to wondering why the education systems of so many countries separate the arts from the Sciences at an early age.

Thanks for posting all your results.

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I am sure you were not making light of it :D There is no black or white with how you use the brain. Just a pet hate of mine how OCD gets used to explain cleaning the house or enjoying things in their 'right' place.

 

I have always loved chemistry but never knew their was so much in ceramics when I started. Ceramics is a great area of study as you say, many different skills and techniques required so lots to keep you stimulated and explore.

 

I am yet to find anywhere near as much beauty in the arts as I find in science but ceramics is a good mix of creating and creation(science/universe) Glaze testing makes me feel like the earth. Reading up on geology and how magma/lava crystallise into rocks and then making these rocks my own lava flows on rocky pots!  :D Love it

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It makes a great abstract of a ancient city with the shadows and light dancing on its windows.  As Jolieo said, it looks like it would have GPS coordinates, somewhere on the Arabian peninsula.

 

 

How many workable grazes are you using from these tests?

 

Jed

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  • 2 weeks later...

It's only ocd if you do the compulsion for the compulsion's sake and not for the outcome . I have done sooo many color charts on watercolors and oils,pastels . Everything does not react the same even in those mediums, especially with each other. My biggest frustration was having the end result not match what I was going for and I Han no idea how to get there. Those charts at least gave me a jumping educated guess.

Still love that photo.

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  • 1 month later...

I have a very basic question as I am a beginner.  While taking a class at the local community college, no one wore gloves to handle their bisqueware.  I am reading on some 'how to' blogs that wearing gloves is an absolute MUST so as to not transfer oils to the bisqueware.  I don't believe I have encountered an issue with this, although my firings do not always have perfect outcomes.  Since your discussion started about glaze, I thought I might be able to ask here.   Thank you, fellow potters, from someone feeling like an intern.  ;-) 

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you might question the blog writers as to why they wear gloves, maybe they use a lot of hand lotion.

 

i have never worn gloves but i guess that if someone wants to dip a bisque piece into a toxic glaze (!!!) for a long time, gloves might be a good idea.

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I don't wear gloves either and I'm allergic to a lot of stuff. I don't go swimming in the glaze buckets either but do get glaze on my fingers. With bisque I just wash my hands like always before starting to work and then I dip each piece in clean water to rinse it off. I set the pieces aside as I stir up the glaze and everything is ready to go by the time I am done. I've not had any issues with oils from hands causing glazing issues.

 

Wonder why they think there is enough oil on their hands to cause problems? Maybe they work in a really hot environment and sweat a lot?

 

T

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Some glazes are mildly caustic in the bucket. Nothing major, but if your hands are dry and cracking from clay, it can make a bad situation worse. If you have cracks on your hands, you are more likely to absorb stuff that maybe isn't good for you long term. Gloves are a good idea. We used to get the good heavy hand cream and oil up before putting the (nitrile or vinyl) gloves on for a day of glaze testing. Poor girl's hand treatment.

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Guest JBaymore

 I can calculate covalent and ionic bonds without having to mix anything. You might find quantitative kinetic reactions and formulation an interesting topic.

 

Aha....... you have been studying well.  That should open up how to get some really nice coloring of the background and macro-crystals when you know what will enter "first" into the developing silicate crystals.

 

Welcome aboard the forums also.

 

best,

 

.....................john

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TY John:

 

After 42 years of building hospitals, high rises, and houses: it is actually nice to learn something new. In 2007, I was in antique store in Williamsburg. VA. staring at this piece that had macro crystals on it. Told the owner I wondered how many hours this artist took hand painting these perfectly formed patterns: not realizing it was a specialty glaze. Spent 2007 until 2011 typing in keyword searches trying to figure out what the crystals were. Finally I typed in macro crystals, and on the third page I came across a website of a potter: clicked it: finally!!! Spent the rest of 2011 and early 2012 reading, studying, researching the metes and bounds of what was required to make them. In early 2012, I spent my RV savings buying the kilns, equipment, and supplies to begin my big adventure: which included building a detached 26 x 44 studio with 400 amp service to run everything. By late summer of 2012 I began to realize I was dumber than a box of rocks about clay, forming techniques, and glaze calculations. Out of the 100 tiles I fired in my first load (attempt), one came out with a very small crystal.

Of the sixty or so books I bought about clay, glaze, equipment, kilns, minerals, chemistry, along with nearly 1000-1200 hours a year of studying since 2012: I can grow a rather mean crystal. Was given several old kilns that I took apart, studied, and reassembled just to learn how to service a kiln. Spent a day at the local supply house learning how to make my own elements. At the current rate of learning, sometime in 2018 I might actually know something.

 

Glaze Nerd

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