kswan

There's way too much weight in the middle of that piece to be supported by those ends. If you can leave a part unglazed in the very middle, you can support it from underneath. For example, take a small shelf post and top it with a rolled or rounded piece of clay in the same shape as your curve. Since the sculpture will shrink you could make the support a half centimeter or so lower than your sculpture, which would still support it when it wants to warp downward.

I think you might want to look at a kaki or tenmoku like this: Harris #1 K (Kaolin) | Glazy I think holding during cooling increases the red though, so if you want a browner color rather than reddish, don't hold on the cooling cycle. On Glazy you can look at people's tests and see what results they get with application thickness, cooling, and different clay bodies.

The problem with underglaze showing texture is that it is usually opaque and hides texture. You can wipe away high points like Neil said, but the filled in spots will not have fine details, if that's what you're going for. If you want to see fine details, a better option might be clear glaze mixed with a mason stain brushed on in the blossoms. For a more blocky or stylized look, wiping away underglaze from highlights will work. Maybe even try to mix the underglaze with clear and brush that on? Not sure if it would be concentrated enough color.

I don't sell pieces that have technical flaws in them, like an S crack or a little crack where a handle meets body. If they're still functional though, my husband and I use them. I try not to break anything that is still functional because I hate wasting things. There are organizations that give household items to people transitioning out of shelters, and they are very happy to receive nice handmade items. Also, if there is something aesthetic I don't like about a piece (color not exactly right, handle bigger or smaller than normal), I will still offer it for sale because it may be just right for someone else. I'm a bit hard on myself when something doesn't look exactly how I want it, but I've learned not to outright dismiss a piece. Some shows I've been in have a policy about only first quality, no sale items at my booth, which is fine with me because I worry people might start asking for discounts on other things too. A couple minor pinholes don't automatically become seconds, but if I don't like it I refire. Colors are underglazes covered with my clear or satin glaze to avoid worrying about leaching, except for my vases, where I use colored glaze for the inside and the handles. I've made a clear with a little added mason stain that I've started using recently, and that's been working out nicely though. I prefer to be cautious in areas where it could be a safety risk. Like Pres, I strive to make my best work with the knowledge I have built up over time. It took me many, many years to get to a point where I felt comfortable selling anything, and in baby steps. I've read recently that the clay I use (BMix5) might be more porous than people realize. I did tests on it when I first started using it, for glaze fit and acid testing. I fire it to almost cone 6, but I recently got paranoid about it and I'm going to do more testing, including a more thorough absorption test. Last time, I did a shorter boiling/soaking time and got negligible weight gain. Over the last 6 years since I've been using this clay, the pieces we use daily in the kitchen are still solid, not crazed, and not hot in the microwave. No one has told me of any problems they've had with my pieces, thank goodness. But still, I'm going to use the winter to test some things out to reassure myself. I may even tweak my clay as well, now that I have a pug mill! I've thought of going to half porcelain, half stoneware and maybe adding a little fine grog to make my life a little easier. I feel like I need to share some of this stuff with a ceramics therapist...

I've gotten some 5 gallon soy sauce buckets from a Japanese restaurant. They seem to hold up well, as they may be sturdier than the ones you can buy from the hardware store. For the uneven bottom of a glaze bucket, you can try using a brush to stir the glaze. I prefer to keep my stirrers in the bucket to not waste glaze by rinsing it off every time you mix a glaze, so I use ones made of silicone or plastic so it doesn't rot or rust. I imagine you could even attach a kitchen scrubbie to a stirrer like a spatula to get down into the uneven spots. I'm thinking of those rounded ones, not flat like a sponge.

I'm glad someone has answers about cutting a small part off a shelf. I have the same problem as @oldlady with my shelves fitting in my newer 3" brick kiln. My shelves are rounded, not octagonal, so I put my fingers on the shelf where the kiln bricks make a corner. It's a squeeze, but I can get them in and out. My bigger problem is the square shelves I use as plate setters. I could get them two across in my old kiln. In my newer kiln, the corners almost touch the bricks. I just lopped off two corners to make it easier to fit them in! The other two corners can stay, since they are where I place the posts for the next plate shelf. Thanks to people who suggested using an angle grinder. We got one of those from a family friend who passed away, but I'd never used one before. I watched a bunch of videos, bundled myself in every bit of safety gear I own, and got the two corners cut off of all six shelves. I asked my husband to be nearby in case he had to rush me and a severed finger to the hospital, but I still have all my digits and limbs intact.

This could be a fascinating avenue! Thanks, Min!

Yes, @PeterH, that is what I was thinking of. I didn't know what it was called, but I'd do it the low-tech way visually! @Bill Kielb Thanks for sharing your video. I've tried all kinds of sharp. Sharp on the inside. Sharp on the outside. Razor thin lip (which works but leads to breakage). Angled up. Angled down. Wide spout. Narrow spout. Agh! I haven't tried sanding the bisque surface of the spout, but it still probably wouldn't make that much difference given my track record! I'm going to experiment with this, especially on the glaze side of it. It just seems logical to me that I should be able to make a glaze (or bare clay body) that can behave the way that butter does. I'd love to be able to just get a spout done without endless fussing and disappointment. Sigh.

@Hulk I had just reread that post of yours, and good work with the teapot! It looks like your clay has some grog in it, am I right? It seems like that may play a part in helping prevent drips. @Min @PeterH I'm thinking of something to be fired on, rather than applied after firing. I wonder if a very stony matte glaze would work, just at the cut edge of the lip. Or brush on a slip that's rougher textured and leave it unglazed, but my Yixing teapot is a very smooth clay body, so that can't be the only thing. Is there a way to find out water's hydrophobic reaction to clay/glaze materials, or is that something to just test out on my own? I seem to recall something about this in the back of my brain somewhere, that you can check this on fired glazes by putting a drop of water on it and seeing how much it spreads out or forms a ball. My clay and glaze let it flow too much, and I wonder if there is a known specific material (ie sodium flux versus calcium, kaolin versus ball clay) that helps with this. Does sand or grog have an inherent ability to cut the flow?

I've been trying to understand the physics of a dribble free spout (on a pitcher or teapot) for quite some time now and I'm curious to know if other people have information to share on this. I have read some scientific articles that talk about things over my head, like hydrodynamic suction and flow rates. I haven't even made a teapot in years because at least half of my pitchers' spouts dribble when I test them, and I end up with a collection of things I can't sell. I have tried many variations on angle of the spout, having a thin lip, curving the edge of the lip inward to help cut the flow, wiping away the glaze from the lip, etc. Every time I meet a small pitcher like for soy sauce or cream at a restaurant, I examine it closely if it works properly. Metal ones almost always work perfectly, even if they are all sorts of different shapes. At my house, I look at the coffee pot, the electric kettle, Pyrex measuring cups, my Yixing teapot, and anything else I can try to see if there is some magic formula to make mine work perfectly every time. Why does metal work so well? Like those discs you put in a wine bottle to stop it dripping. I feel pretty certain that my clay body and glaze are working against me. I have made some well-functioning spouts in the past with a different clay body in a class and had not a drip in sight. The clay had sand in it and was meant more for handbuilding, but for some reason it made a perfect spout with little effort on my part. I had heard from another potter that a swipe of butter under the lip can stop drips. Every time I try that, no matter how good or awful the shape of my spout, the drips completely stop! But who wants to sell a piece and say to a customer, "Just put butter on it every time you use it"? I'm looking for a material (clay, slip, glaze) that I can make or apply to a spout for a pitcher or teapot that will behave as hydrophobic to get my spouts under control. This winter I'm going to try teapots again and I'm going to try to copy the design of my Yixing spout. I use B Mix 5 clay without grog. The Yixing teapot isn't glazed, and when I leave glaze off the end of my spout, it still doesn't create enough of a cutoff. I don't want to have to fuss with how fast you pour it, or what angle. I just want it to work! Any ideas on a water repellant surface other than butter??

You will also want to be sure that your base glaze doesn't have zinc in it if you plan to use the Chrome Tin Violet. Zinc makes chrome turn brown.

Can I be a functional fine artist? Actually, isn't that what the decorative arts are? I think that's me, as I like to make functional work but with a hand painted surface. When people ask me, I've been saying "ceramic artist" too, because I handbuild many pieces. I associate a potter with a wheel even though I know that's not strictly the case.

@Min I've seen a video of someone using one of those and never knew what it was! It's a great idea. I tried to do something similar to your squished bucket, but with a gardening tote. It's flexible and you can put cinder blocks or something on two sides to keep it in an oval shape. The only problem is that the bottom stays rounded, and also the one I got wasn't tall enough for my plates. Sigh. So now I'm using them for mixing up paper clay, then I can lift and pour it, making it like a funnel by holding the two handles together. I also got some (very cheap) woodworking tools that are curved to scrape out rounded or angled chunks of wood. (I don't know the term for that.) I use them to cut tight curves that my Exacto knife would not make.

My wheel was first. I wanted to practice more than the community studio had open studio hours. My instructor retired and then I bought her circa 1990 kiln a couple years later. I started using the kiln to bisque, then carry my work to the gas kiln at the studio. Now I've bought myself 2 new kilns (one's a baby) with controllers, woo! I donated the old kiln to a community group, but I believe they just stuffed it in an outdoor shelter and never set it up. Sigh. I'm finding that the slab roller I bought to help ease strain on my back after an injury has gotten more use than the wheel these days. It seems like you've got to ease your way slowly into acquiring equipment for pottery, it's such a huge investment.

I took the clay and glaze chemistry classes from Phil Bernberg at Hood College before he retired. Those were some of the best ceramics classes I ever took. He was helpful, patient, and explained the chemistry at a level that was both thorough and easy to understand. He drew diagrams and showed physical examples of everything.

@Callie Beller Diesel Not sure if this is to your liking, but Robin Sloan's books were fantastic. I laughed so hard listening to "Sourdough" that I messed up my work on the wheel. He also wrote "Mr. Penumbra's 24-hour Bookstore". They are not a series though, but they're fun.

I've found as I get older that I do not want to hear music at all anymore. I can't stand the earworms that follow me all day long. Today it's Lizzo... I listen to a streaming local NPR station for a few hours, until it starts repeating itself. I've learned things about human sweat, the new Webb telescope, the color of Greenland's melting ice sheets, John Waters' latest novel and other random things I'd never know otherwise. They also have a bunch of youngster reporters talking about the things that youngsters like these days and I've got no idea what they're talking about!! Audiobooks from the library: knowing that people are trying to ban Toni Morrison's books got me to read and reread some of her works, especially The Bluest Eye. Luckily, I live in a county where they are doubling down on providing more access as opposed to reducing it. Also went through a few Anne Tyler audiobooks recently: French Braid, A Spool of Blue Thread, Noah's Compass. Historical fiction is good too.

Yeah, whacking clay with one of those feels great! I think I was only using about 10-12 pounds of clay, and the monstrosity I made never even reached the bisque stage. You get a rhythm going and it can be very meditative and therapeutic as well. I've got some spare pieces of 4x4 that I will see if my woodworking neighbor can help me shape. Fun project for after my fall shows! Another thing on my wish list to make is a mushroom shaped piece for shaping domes. I know I can buy one, but I'll see what I can make first.

@Kelly in AK What is the handle made of? I've used one of those in a class on making large platters. It was really helpful in getting the clay spread out from a mound.

@Min Where would the cracking show up if clay were used in the soup can orientation? Mostly S cracks at the bottom? I compress the bejeebus out of my clay so I haven't had cracks in a long time, but shouldn't push it, I suppose. I've made a dozen so far using the pugmill that have gone through glaze firing without cracks and were oriented soup-can style. Van Gilder's clay cutting tool is neat, I've only seen something like that for making slabs.

I know many of you use pug mills, and I finally got one for myself to help ease strain on my wrists and forearms from wedging clay. I'm already feeling the benefit of tossing my hand building scraps and throwing slop into it right away, and not feeling the anxiety of seeing huge masses of clay needing to be reclaimed. Now I am trying to figure out how to shape a 4-5 pound or larger pug mill log into the mound needed for wheel throwing. I really don't want to wedge it if possible. I'm trying out rounding the bottom and coning down from the top, but it seems like maybe there's an easier way. Suggestions? Thanks, Kathy

I was making large wall hanging pieces with B Mix 5 and it just doesn't want to be that large and flat. I ended up going with paper clay. I first mixed my own batch of it but ended up buying premade. Jerry Bennett of Philadelphia has an online course for making paper clay that I found very helpful. I still use the paper clay for bisqued press molds and things that want to warp.

I just got back from a weekend show and spoke with a customer at length about gardening and flowers (there was a lull on Sunday), and I showed her ways to arrange flowers in some of my vases. As she was leaving, she got a little teary and said my pottery was "life affirming"!!! You can't get an interaction like that online, for sure! What I've seen are some established potters who promote their work on Instagram (that's the only social media I have now) who then sell from their websites. They are the type who open their online shop at a certain hour and everything sells out almost instantly. One potter I'm thinking of in particular has been working for many years, and she has also built up a huge following online by posting process videos. That's very generous of her, not only to take the time to make the videos, but also to share her specific methods. I don't know if she will even do in person shows now. I managed to snag one of her mugs. It's beautiful, but it's different than I imagined it would be. She already has a customer base but expanded it through Instagram. I would have much preferred to have touched every single one of her pieces, spoken to her, and bought the one that spoke to me best. @Callie Beller Diesel I'd be interested in people's thoughts on that if you make another thread. I absolutely hate the monster that Mark Zuckerburg has created, but it lives in the world with us now. We use social media thinking that it is there to help us, but its only purpose to exist is to make money from us in the end. It's not a free service like the library or something! @Mark C. You're not missing anything bypassing social media, clearly. It's a vampire anyway. I hope your bronchitis clears up soon.

Could that be due to potters selling their work online only? With the proliferation of Etsy and other easy to create online shops, as well as marketing through social media, it seems as though that's what a lot of people are aiming for. They must figure, why go to the effort of packing things up and driving somewhere to sell when I can sit on my couch in my pajamas and sell out quickly? I've only begun in the last five years or so to sell at larger art fairs. Mostly the people I see exhibiting are middle aged and above like myself. I don't know if it's always been that way, because the process can be intimidating, or if it's a changing social situation.

As I'm waiting for my second glaze firing to cool, I've thought about everyone's input here and how to make my life easier in the studio. It seems there is no silver bullet to studio clean up, for sure, it takes time and effort! One thing I realized is that I need to keep my glaze in a larger container!!! My whole pottery-making life, every studio I've ever been in used 5 gallon buckets. In fact, I didn't even know that commercial brush on glazes existed until about 10 years into making ceramics. Sieves are made to fit on top of 5 gallon buckets. My glaze recipes are sized for buckets (though easy enough to size up or down). I make a huge mess when I glaze my bigger plates, bowls and platters, because I have to transfer my glaze into a different sized container. It's also more time consuming to do that. I'm now going to find the right size container for my glaze, so that it fits my large pieces that I dip but isn't too big. It's a light bulb moment for me. I've also decided to get square buckets for my reclaim. Now that I have a pugmill, I don't need to use the Jiffy mixer on my clay to get it smooth for reclaim. The square buckets will snug up next to each other and won't let the little drips and bits fall in between. That's been driving me crazy. I have two reclaim buckets next to my wheel, one for more slippy stuff and one for trimming and dry pieces. Everything else is square around it-- my plaster slab, my tool bins, the table, so square buckets will close those gaps. Thanks everyone for your input, I appreciate it!