Mug/pitcher

I'm really happy with this little mug/pitcher! It's very light, has a wonderful handle, and hopefully will look nice when glazed. I'm glazing it with moss creek which should turn out matte green.

The last picture of a bowl is a random bowl someone else made just to demonstrate the way it should come out.

Where I've come

I went to the studio yesterday and had such a successful time!! I'm seeing my improvement with centers the clay because I'm getting it done so much faster and more comfortably. I've also been pulling walls easier and with more control!

I had also gone to the studio a few days ago (yeah, didn't blog about that right away now did I....) but anyway I had made one pretty tall mug but it was still too wet to trim so I kept it covered. I guess I didn't feel the need to blog immediately about it (yes, I know, I should've) because I didn't have a ground breaking moment and it just seemed like any other time I've gone. I will post immediately. Now that my projects wrapping up, you're going to hear a bunch of rushed work in my postings to get everything perfect and done.

Debriefing on sample presentation

What would you like to borrow from the sample?
I'd like to borrow the power point idea to help guide me in what I want to say. I'd also like to borrow the confidence Luke had and speak with volume and complete comfort in front of no matter the number of people.

Strength of the sample? Luke's biggest strength to his project was playing us some music on the harmonica and also the confidence that led his presentation.

What will I do differently?
I was actually planning on having some sort of power point and also demonstrating how wheel throwing works. I'm not quite sure what exactly ill do differently besides having the presentation in a smaller location.

I'm being student evaluator to two classmates on June 14th! I'm really excited to see how others will go about presenting.

Listening to the coach

In the beginning of our project semester we were told that this is OUR project and if we don't want to take people's advice on how to go about doing it, that we didn't have to. In class yesterday we read an article about Olympic athletes and how they listen to their coaches, even with their years and years of training, they still take tips. The article asked, what about you? I guess personally I can say that I don't shoot down very many ideas before considering how they may help me. It is important to listen to people trying to help you because they can give you advice for something that you were never creative enough to come up with yourself. I agree with the article and think you should never be so set on your own goals that you can't steer away from them when given helpful advice by the "coach".

Home stretch

I've actually been working a lot the last week, but I have yet to post about it. These last few weeks are where people start to see themselves fall apart and I'm doing just that. Not to say that I'm any less motivated with my hands on work, but I've been having less strive to post about it. So here's a catch up.

Within the last week I've thrown two successful mugs, trimmed them, and added handles. One of them is small and pretty simply, and I'm very happy with the handle because it's one of my first successful pulled handles. What I mean by pulled is that I wedged out a piece of clay and literally pulled the clay down with my fingers with some water until it was lengthened out and skinny enough for use. The bottom for the mug was going perfectly and I was getting really excited but then, just like with many previous mugs, I wanted to get BETTER, trim just a little MORE, and messed it up. I did manage to fix it but it doesn't look like I had imagined it in my head.

The second mug is much larger than any I've made, but also extremely heavy. Well, "extremely" relative to other ones. I trimmed a lot of excess off the bottom and carved in some patterns to try and get rid of the weight and I'd say I did a pretty good job but it's still not exactly light. I then added another pulled handle (this one not as nice- but still pretty good) and attached it to that one as well.

Today I came back to the studio for a quick drop by to put the mugs out onto the shelf because I had to let the handles dry on the mugs a bit under a bag or else they could have dried too quickly and cracked and then, WHOOPS no more handle.

I'm excited to see how my project is going to end up as the clock ticks down. It's becoming a lot more stressful with all my end of the years tests and projects but I know this isn't the time to start giving up. I do plan on blogging more, with more pictures, and research, and planning. All that has yet to come!

Colors!

A mug of mine came out and the colors are so vibrant and random! I used a chunky glaze called Snow Fire. The crystals inside the glaze exploded and created this color splash.

The mug itself isn't my favorite mug because it doesn't have a handle and the shape is a bit odd so I'm thinking I might paint another mug the same or a similar color.

High fire vs. low fire?

Low fire:
This is the most commonly used firing. The way you paint the low fire glazes, they will always come out the same color with no to very little variation.  This is glaze that can become unstable at higher temperatures. Some problems that occur with low fire are:

• the clay body may remain overly porous
• low-fire glaze colors can appear raw-looking
• many of the traditional glaze materials used in this range are quite toxic in their raw state.
• Low fire glazes mostly need a top clear coat in order for them to be food safe. 

 http://www.sheffield-pottery.com/v/vspfiles/assets/images/spectrum-700_2.jpg

High fire:
A lot of high fires are porcelains and stonewares. Because of the varying effects of oxidation and reduction on glaze colorants, there are very limited glazes and effects that high fires can produce and you never know exactly how the product will turn out.

http://www.livinggallery.cc/SMITH-Flowingexample.jpg

Failed attempts

Some days go well, others on the other hand do not. Today was one of them, I made nothing. Nothing worked, absolutely nothing.

I tried throwing some mugs, in fact I tried throwing three. The first one was going well but towards the end I nicked the clay the wrong way and it was down as a droopy mug. Then the second and third simply didn't work at all. For one, I thought I centered the clay and when I tried pulling the walls, it went insanely off center. For the third I pulled the wall too thin in one spot and the clay couldn't hold itself up anymore so it fell apart. Great.

Cones?

Since I'm making pieces both at school and in the studio, I asked my teacher if it was possible to bring in some finished pieces from the studio into school and glaze them and fire in her kiln. She said it could happen if both Julia's clay was fired in the same cone as her clay. Cone? No idea what that means. So it was time to get to business and learn what that meant.

The full term used for the cones is pyrometric cone. A pyrometer is what's used to measure things at temperatures too high for regular thermometers. What a cone is, is a type of pyrometer.

And? These cones are made of silica and melting agents with triangular bottoms. Since they reach such high temperatures, they're designed to soften and bend at their bases. What these cones are used for are to test the temperature of kilns. Really, they don't "measure" the amount of heat in the kiln, but rather how much heat-energy the pieces inside have absorbed. Cones numbers go from 022 to 14, having the numbers with zeros be a lower temperature.

How do you know what your "desired" temperature is?
The hotter it gets, the more bend the cone begins to have. Once the cone being fired has reached a 90 degree angle, that's your desired temperature. If it's at less of an angle, the glazes are under-fired, and vice versa with over bending, they were over-fired.

In sum, cones refer to the temperature at which clay is properly cooked and properly glazed. Lucky for me, both Julia's clay and Ms. Lutter's clay fire to cone 6 (2232 degrees Fahrenheit) and I can use glazes at either studio.
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On another note! I've made two new mugs! I'm unsure of the color for both of them and am debating whether to add a handle to the other or not (it also depends how dried out it'll be next time I go). But, here are the two sketches (not criticize too much, I'm no artist) of them.

The first one is much larger than any ones I've made previously in terms of how much liquid it can hold, which is exciting because I personally love big mugs. The only downside to it is though is that it's considerably heavier than others and I don't know what adding a handle would do to it. This is the mug that I trimmed a handful of clay off of to make smaller/lighter.

I also picked up three mugs from the studio that I glazed. I'm learning to love the imperfections of pieces but am still upset about some of them.

The first (my absolute favorite) has nothing wrong with it except I decided not to paint the bottom hoping it would drip a little, and it didn't.
The second one was suppose to be one solid color of forest green but instead looks like it was tye-dyed with green which my mom actually really likes.
And the third, well it was an experimental mug so I used it with a glaze that I didn't want to risk on another mug first called "Ketchup". I'm not the biggest fan of it but it was a great experiment and I'm definitely keeping that mug for my presentation anyway.


That's all for now! 

Except workcited:
Jones, Bill. "Ten Basics of Firing Electric Kilns." Ceramic Arts Daily RSS. Ceramic Arts Daily, 17 Apr. 2009. Web. 06 May 2013.
 Peterson, Beth. "Pyrometric Cones." About.com Pottery. About, n.d. Web. 06 May 2013
 Reinbold, Joan. "Definition of Cones in Ceramics." EHow. Demand Media, 13 Nov. 2009. Web. 06 May 2013.
http://www.ceramicstoday.com/cones.htm

Sacrifice of learning

In class last Monday we were asked to write a journal entry discussing where in our project we cradle comfort at the sacrifice of learning. For me, my comfort zone is in the studio either by myself or in class with my peers and teacher. Holding on to this comfort, I'm stopping myself from going out into the public more and potentially shadowing/sitting in on a professional throwing some art pieces.

Happiness Revisited

1. When do you feel most happy?
Like mentioned in the article and what many would agree with, I feel most happy when the things that I CAN, I control and they go the I want them to, leaving me with a sense of power over the events that take over my life.
2. Respond/react to the article.
I agree with this article that happiness is really what you make of an experience. It's the things in like we can't change like your height that don't weigh in on our overall happiness level and the things we can that do.
3. Where am I on the flow chart?
With a high challenge level and medium skill, I fall into the anxiety area on the flow chart.
4. How has this changed/remained the same throughout the project?
It's changed because my skills have developed and I am getting closer to achieving flow but I have remained in the anxiety stage throughout.
5. How can I achieve flow?
With improving my skills even further where I can get more comfortable in my work pattern and process but still challenge myself, I will be able to achieve flow.

"Need Motivation? Declare a Deadline"

An article written my Phyllis Korkki. This article discusses ways around deadlines as well as different kinds of deadlines: ones with no clear deadline, large projects, and ones nobody cares about but yourself. Korkki talks about how to meet a big self-imposed deadline and states that you must divide your work into small tasks and have a deadline for each one of those. This sounds like the first journal entry we had, where we broke up our first two weeks into small deadlines for ourselves to get started. It's hard for me to follow these little benchmarks but with the semester coming to a close, I'm going to need to set some more for myself.

Unsuccessfully successful

Today was a love-hate day at the studio for me. I came in with the hopes of throwing a new mug but my time was consumed with a previous project I hadn't finished yet. I have this mug that I was planning on just trimming and waiting for the handle to dry out a bit before I could add it. Instead, when I picked up the mug, I realized how heavy it was because I made the bottom really thick. So, I instead spent my entire hour there carefully trimming and re-trimming the mug to make it lighter as well as appear a bit cleaner.

Then, as I was cleaning up and ready to put on my handle I thought "Wow! What a great idea it would be to press on a wood-like stamp onto my handle for pattern!" Well, I did exactly that and my stupid self didn't realize it would stick to the table I had laid it out to dry on. Needless to say, the handle stuck to the table. I plan on going back tomorrow and trying that again! Let's hope it works out.

Here's the amount I trimmed off (which might not look like much but it's an entire handful of clay off a mug). I hadn't realized previously how thick I made the bottom.

From left to right, just to give you an idea of the types of tools I use when trimming; large carving tool, pin tool, smaller more detailed carving tool.

The two carving tools give away their purpose in the name but the pin tool not so much. Basically what it's used for is a number of things in the process of making pieces. You can use it to trace a line across the mug while spinning to see if it's centered, you can cut off unwanted/uneven tops, and is also used for drawing in designs onto your mug.