Encasing - Wows and Woes

It's been a hectic week pretty much away from the torch but when I was able to get to it, I did some more experimenting.  So much fun to experiement as always.  :)  That makes life much more interesting.  :) 

So here are my experiments :

All encased of course and each one I tried something different. 

Starting with the top row, left to right:  Pink flowers bead was my second try at doing a layered flower.  Hmm, this type of flower will take ALOT of practice on my part.  It became obvious to me right away that I will have to start the flower by adding one more petal making it a 5 petal flower rather than 4 petals.  Makes it easier to center the second layer of petals.  #2 bead is flowers in light blue and a couple with twistie petals encased in some new to me clear glass I think.  I like how the twistie showed in the petals alot.  And the clear glass I used, is AWESOME !  A tad expensive but it's absolutely PERFECT !  If there are any bubbles in that bead it is something I did, not the glass.  #3 bead - I love this bead !  Again I used that awesome clear glass but first I covered the colbalt blue base with silver foil and encased it leaving it silver and gold.  I wanted to see if the new glass would leave the silver - silver or turn it gold like some clears will do.  It only turned it gold ever so slightly in one spot.  The ends on this bead are PERFECT as is everything else !  Wow !  That's a big accomplishment for me still !  lol !  Bead #4 - A white base with orange flowers.  The experiment part here is the orange flowers.  I used a stringer of enamel to make the petals then encased.  I didn't know if enamels COULD be encased so this was the experiment.  I will be digging deeper into encasing enamels.  :)  The last two beads are encased frit beads.  One I just wanted to practice perfection, which I did and the very last bead is pressed which again I was working on perfection. That one is very lopsided.  More glass on one side of the hole than the other. 

So that's it.  To me, they are all WOWS because I am amazed I can still make them !  lol !  I'll keep working on the imperfections to be sure and try improving.  Just getting this far with them is a huge acomplishment for ME.  It might be this is as far as I can get.  Only time will tell.  

At any rate, the experiments were all worth the effort.  Learning new things is always GREAT !   This go round I learned it's ok to encase enamels, the difference in clear glasses is AMAZING, that it takes time to perfect good ends (for me anyway) and slow is always the best way to go when encasing.  :)  Oh and it helps TREMENDOUSLY if the clear glass one is using to encase with - melts like butta !  lol !  

So the second time I was able to torch, I made canes and stringers.  More on that in the next blog post.  Something I've wanted to do for years is coming - I hope !  lol !  

Thanks so much for coming by !  I hope you come back again soon.  :)  Have a great weekend !               

Now What ?

The time has come that the pollen is flying.  It's been in the 80's here nearly all week and the pollen is in full swing.  Especially the icky, nasty, covers everything for weeks yellow pine pollen.  Our gray truck turns a nasty looking yellow/green color from the dusting it takes every night.  I think it's a little early this year due to the warm winter and early spring.  Or so it seems anyway.  So with all that it means no torching til this ick clears up and goes away.  I can't open my window for the replacement air until it's gone.  Even though I can't torch, there will be other things to show coming up soon.  :) 


Just before the pollen struck I was able to finish up a cool "set" done in enamels.  This set really wasn't suppose to be a set as it were but rather testing the waters of a technique which I just happen to really, really like alot !  I saw this technique used not long ago on the glass forum I visit daily and loved it.  From that point on I always wondered how it was done.  I finally found out in a thread and did some further investigation.  The original creator of those beads and another bead artist wrote a series of articles in using enamels in 4 issues of The Flow magazine.  She posted the exact issues they were in so I was able to get all 4 of them.  A wealth of information and the tutorial on the technique for these beads is in one of them.  The original artist was also so kind to post how she made the shape of those beads.  The original artist is Margaret Zinser.  Look her up on the web to see more about her and her art.  


Below is a photo of the set I made before the pollen struck.  It took me a few days to get all those beads done simply because I only torch for no more than 2 hours at a time.  The process for each bead is the same and takes just a little more time and effort than making a simple bead.  My beads look nothing like the original artists beads at all so no copying that's for sure.  lol !  I still love them though and I think they'll look fabulous in a necklace.  I love the look of them and hope to make more using many different base colors.  The black you see in these beads is the base color.  That is NOT an enamel but from a regular rod of black glass.  :)  Such a cool effect.  :)  Also, all of the blue beads are not blue.  Two of them are actually purple but look blue in the photo.  Those are the two closest to the lavender color ones. 

So that's it for now.  Thanks very much for coming by !  Please come back again to see what's goin' on.  

     

Nothing Like Trying New Things - Enamels

Which seems to be what's on my plate these days.  Always something new and wonderful and fun to explore.  I've been so excited at the torch since starting up again it's almost too good to be true - for me anyway.  lol !  Still so much to explore in this fabulous medium of glass.  Maybe I should say of melting glass.  :)  A never ending learning experience.  


Enamels is what has had my total attention this week.  Just playing with them and seeing what they can do.  Boy, can they do ALOT !  Depending on the look you want, it's amazing what glass in powder form is capable OF doing.  I see lots of experimenting happening that's for sure !  lol !  So far this week, I've tried several methods of using them and my most favorite right now is just rolling a bead in the solid color.  The colors are so intense and when  melted into a bead, oh it's just gorgeous !  Nothing like glass in rod form.  There is even some texture to it which gives a bead a new dimension.    The blown bead just below is one color called Brilliant Blue and ohhh, it's just gorgeous !  The color I mean.  Just one color.  I just wanted to see what a single color on a bead looked like.  Yum ! 

 I will be making many more single color beads, blown and just regular, with these enamels.  I LOVE the intensity of the colors.
















I also made a set !  Wow !  That is a rarity for me to be sure !  lol !  I'm just not a set person but this style kinda needed to be a set.  So just below is yet another 2 methods of using enamels.  In stringer form and lightly dipping. 

I'm also not a flower person (can't make them too well) but I wanted to see this method with stringers in person.  It was talked about in a thread on a glass forum I visit regularly.  Turns out, I love using the enamels in stringer form.  On the white base glass, you can see a sort of shading happening and that's just cool.  :)  I made the tiny flowers then randomly dotted green just to fill in.  I should of made a vine cane but I didn't.  Next time.  :)

I will be playing with these enamels alot more in the days ahead.   Thing is, that probably won't be too much longer.........Spring is here.  The Bradford Pear trees are blooming, the daffodils bloomed WEEKS ago, other colorful trees are now blooming as well.  This all means that -  soon - we will be bombarded with YELLOW POLLEN !  ICK !  Which means no open windows - which means no torching until the yellow ick passes.  Sigh.  My intentions are good in that during that time, I'm going to try and make some jewelry with some of the beads I have made..............

Thanks so much for coming by !  I hope you come back again soon to check out what's happening in my little corner of the world.  :)