Joseph Fireborn
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Status Updates posted by Joseph Fireborn
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Finally maybe at last back to pottery now that my youngest is 8 months old. Life is crazy!
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My studio was in a small building in our back yard when my son was a baby, they didn't have baby monitors yet but I had this weird radio system. I would work in my studio and listen to him sleep, when he woke I would here giggling and playing. I knew my time was limited. I would start cleaning up and head on into the house about the time of the first cry. He started walking at 8 months old so I really enjoyed listening to him and not having to follow him around the house. Denice
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They're intense at that age! The work gets slower, but it still happens.
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Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all you wonderful people.
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Happy holidays to everyone. Denice
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yes happy holidaze
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Made some breakthroughs in my glaze work this week. Finally going to have some stability in the final product which is what I needed to move forward in production quantities for online, future shows and galleries!
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Working on a soft blue glaze today to celebrate the gender of my baby on the way. I think I might do some limited edition work in a very soft robins egg blue since that is my favorite mason stain to date. Finally getting some time in the studio again. Life is crazy.
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Thanks Old Lady and Benzine!
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Congratulations a Libra, my birthday is October 15. Libra is a great first child, I was quiet and had lots of patience, Libra's are all about balance and peace. Most Libra's are very artistic so you may have a potter in the womb. Denice
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Congratulations. So much to look forward to.
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That moment you have been making jars with a gallery and also a lid inner gallery that are so perfect that when you wax them they no longer fit inside of each other... perfection. Then that moment where you realize you forgot to turn on a preheat for your greenware to fire in a glaze firing and remember at 540F before you have a terrible disaster in your kiln and you stop it and vacuum it the next day. Thank you Jesus.
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Single firing, I take it?
I have neither the skill nor disposition to attempt that... I have had some of my students, make that decision for me though. Thus far, it has been on wares, that I didn't stack...
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I am OCD, on my kiln. I will check the program numerous, times, check that the vent hood is on, etc. Because that one time that you don't...
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Going to run some line blends today. I want to matte down my standard white glaze slightly. I want it to be more of a sheen satin and not a solid glossy glaze. Taking a much needed day break from my studies.
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Think about using this glaze to do your line blend - https://digitalfire.com/4sight/recipes/cone_6_dolomite_matte_base_glaze_121.html
I used this and a clear in a line blend to get an excellent satin white liner glaze. Came out to use 40% clear and 60% dolomite matte. Had 3 good candidates to choose from. I was looking for a white liner that was not to shiny but not scratchy.
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Cool. I will try if what I did doesn't work. Yarr!
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How is everyone? It has been a while. Just wanted to check in and say I love and miss you all! Fired my kiln today. First time in 8 months I have even touched a pot. Made me realize how much I miss this community. Hope everyone's pots are great and their glazes are perfection!
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Knowing how dedicated you are you will make an awesome teacher. Kudos on your grades and Masters acceptance.
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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.
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Gabby that is awesome! I am so excited to be there in a few years.
Thanks Min for those words of encouragement!
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Firing the kiln tonight. Extending my firing to 20 hours from 18. I have pretty much settled on my glazes so I am now just trying to fine tune my single firing schedule. I have 4 glazes total and 2 wood ash pastes. All of the glazes are white. How hilarious is that? The last white glaze I added forms a lot of crystallization so I wanted to hold longer at the right temps and I also slowed down my cooling from cone 6 to 1800G at 125F per hour. I am firing two platters that I can barely fit in my kiln, so I am excited that they come out good so I can give them away.
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Firing kiln with a bunch of vases with my wood ash glazes and modified slips. Excited to see them tomorrow night.
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Tom, I posted some pictures of a vase just for you.
Enjoy.
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I think they are reasonable representations of wood fired pieces, fresh out of an electric kiln.
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I am not trying to replicate wood fired pieces, I just really like those surfaces.
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Just peeked in my kiln full of test tiles with wood ash mixtures, pastes, and soda washes. Some very very promising results. Can't wait for the next 250F to cool so I can open that beast and spend days looking at every inch of every tile! It has been way too long since I have run a kiln load full of tiles.
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Nice. I have some really beautiful wood ash results that I just pulled out of the kiln. I am very happy with them. Formulated them all myself. Getting the hang of the feldspars. Out of the earth and into the fire was an absurd recommendation from John. I miss him.
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I talk to John on occasion still.
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I just emailed him thanking him for all his past post. They are enlightening.
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We had two nice days in a row here. I cleaned the studio up a good bit today and tomorrow I am going to mix up some ideas I have had brewing for a while: chicken grit, course grog, red sand, white sand(with smallstones) and black ice porcelain into my red rock clay. Nom Nom Nom. I am going to mix the black ice and red rock at different amounts looking for a dark black reddish body that I can spray with soda ash solution(safely) and then rub wood ash/flux mixture all over it dry. Then fire it on top of seashells! Can it get any more exciting!? I think not! 2018 is going to be a great year. I am only working with 2 glaze bases: Charles Titanium Grid 10 and Milky Gloss. The rest will be ash and soda mixtures. I also won't be glazing the entire pot anymore. Looking for that sheen. My elements are going to hate me, c'est la vie! But I also have to replace my controller tomorrow. Busy day Busy day!
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Anything worth doing is worth doing badly at first!
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Right On Brother! Denice
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Finally over my cold. I had such plans for this break, but between a family cold, kiln controller dying, and freezing cold garage I haven't gotten much done. However, I am going to accomplish a lot in the new year! Going to continue to work on my surfaces and glaze development. Exciting times.
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good time to plan for the next steps you want to take. drawing what is in your head, checking if you are prepared for actually working with clay when it gets warmer and you feel better.
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I have spoke to a bunch of people who had a miserable holiday break including myself and my husband. My husband told me yesterday that he couldn't wait to get back to work at least he gets paid for being miserable. The gray skies and extreme cold doesn't help. I am still down and out from my MS relapse, I have two half finished pots in my studio but they are so cold I don't have a problem with them drying out. Denice
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Enjoying the chilly weather by my warm kiln cooling down while I throw pots in the garage. Couldn't ask for a better day.
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Changing elements and TCs. Then doing the element break-in firing while I clean my studio and mix some glaze. FUN DAY!
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And finished about 30 minutes ago. Gotta love L&L. Making frenchfries to eat while my kiln breaks in! Yummm. Pictures going to the forum post about the TC's now.
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Ahhhhh! Studio is nice and clean. Swept. Mopped. Hand sponged all surfaces. What a great way to start next week. New elements, new TC, clean studio, and some new glaze test!
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Those days when you wake up with tons of plans and do nothing. Bleh. Guess I will just work twice as hard tomorrow.
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I have had a week like that, I am still managing to get a little done in my studio everyday. Maybe next week I won't be so busy. Denice
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Welp. Got stuff done today. Sprayed and lined an entire kiln load. Hopefully if everything comes out good I will be listing it all. It excites me that I used only 2 glazes! hahah.
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Peeped into my peep holes. Beautiful greys!
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I am so happy with my work! I never thought I would say that this early in my career. Although I am still testing new glazes and new techniques. The majority of my kiln loads are finally being made to sell. How cool is that! Toot Toot!
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I am happy for you also, I know you have been working towards this moment and all of your hard work paid off. Denice
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Photos???
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@Marcia Selsor I know! It is raining here and I was planning on spraying and cleaning up a bit. Instead I am just going to throw all day.
@Denice Thanks!
@Roberta12 umm, you can check my gallery or my instagram link in (profile.)
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Good Ole Bisque Firing. A large shallow bowl/platter, a few cups and another bowl. Pretty much an empty kiln tbh. I haven't had time to make a lot until today. 20+ mugs drying in my greenhouse. I will handle them tomorrow evening.
All of it in crackle slip. I think I might have found a better way to do it. 2 of the pieces have this new method and I think the texture looks at lot better.
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Hope you share more later about this new method and pics of the texture. Actually, I did not know what "crackle slip" is, but I found this snippet online, which includes a recipe...is yours real different? Just curious. http://www.potters.org/subject15984.htm
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Lee.
I posted a picture yesterday of my slip on a greenware pot. It doesn't have the crackles yet because it doesn't crack until I have fired it. Here is a picture:
The slip decoration alone adds a lot of texture to the pot, all the tiny holes from my brushing technique, then on top of that it will form cracks and large "mud" cracks which resemble dried earth. If you look in my gallery you can see some recent work that shows that under stoneware pots.
I don't use a recipe. I use a clay with a high shrinkage rate with some chemicals added to it. A lot of trial and error.
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I also just posted a picture on instagram of a platter/bowl that has been bisqued and shows the micro cracks starting.
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Firing a new schedule. Needed to shorten mine as it is just too long. So I bisqued my pots before hand to avoid that extra slow ramp. I also changed the slow cool. It is still same total time, but slightly different in temps and ramps. Hopefully it works better or reasonably close because these 17-19 hours firings are just to hard to schedule in.
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Cutting down trees from Irma. Mixing slip and some new glazes for highlights. Applying slips. Sunning my cups. Glazing tomorrow. Firing Monday! WOOO! Weee
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Going to start working towards entering a cup show in my state. Called SIP. Based out of Savannah. Fun times.
