I glaze fired a number of items way back in July.  Then I got busy doing other projects like making a backdrop for photographing ceramics, redesigning a website, and getting settled into a new school.  Finally, you can see the finished pieces from that summer glaze fire below.  I haven’t really been in the clay studio much since then but I’ve got some ideas rolling around in my head for the next time I get some time at the wheel.

All items are glaze fired to cone 6 and are either Warm Brown Stoneware from Amaco or Speckled Stoneware by Laguna.

I just shot a few ceramics pieces on my new and improved backdrop which is part of the Collapsible Photo Booth for Shooting Ceramics.  I had been using some gray fabric from the $1 bin at Walmart but I wanted something a little darker and a little more sturdy.  I searched the internet but couldn’t find anything within my budget (as in “free” or “almost free”) so I decided to make my own.  I had a big roll of pre-primed canvas at my disposal so I cut a piece to fit into the Collapsible Photo Booth for Shooting Ceramics and added a couple extra layers of gesso and then painted it gray.  I had a feeling that the gray had a slightly blue cast and my suspicion was confirmed in the test photos.  So I re-mixed the paint and added a little red and a lot of yellow to even out the blue cast.  It’s not quite completely neutral gray now but it is a lot closer than the first attempt.  Below you can see some photos of the whole setup.  And soon there will be some photos of some actual pottery taken while using the whole setup!

For the past couple days I’ve been working on a new design for the site. So far I’ve got the blog about 80% the way I want it. Here’s a quick preview:

New gray theme

Check again in a week or so and you should see some more progress.

In related news, the whole month of July has slipped by without so much as a peep from the blog… Don’t worry, I’ve been stockpiling news stories.  Hopefully they will be released before I have to go back to school!

Last month I glaze fired close to 20 pieces after mixing some glaze from dry powder.  The Pam’s Blue that I mixed turned out more blue-green instead of the blue-gray that I got from the pre-mixed pint.  It might be applied a little thin but I still like the result.  I got to test a few new glazes such as Espresso Bean and Saturated Iron by Coyote and Frosted Turquoise and Iron Lustre by Amaco.  Some of them turned out nicely.  Most of the items were functional ware: mugs, bowls, etc.

I finally got all the pieces photographed about a week ago and I finished cropping and sizing the photos last night.  Now, as I’m uploading these pictures the kiln is cranked up and bisque firing some of the stuff that I’ve thrown recently.   My wife wanted a set of bowls with handles, I’ve got a set of four mugs, there are some vases and other tall forms and  a few lidded vessels.

On Father’s Day we went on our usual golf outing.  My first (and possibly only) 9 holes of the year.  I took my camera along for fun.  Here are a couple decent shots I got:

I just took some pictures of some of my recent pottery (and found these golf pictures on the memory card).  As soon as I get those cropped and touched up I’ll post them.

About a week ago I mixed up some glaze from a pre-mixed powder.  The powder was Pam’s Blue by Coyote and it was my first attempt at mixing any kind of glaze outside of the Huntington Clay House.  I got to purchase some new tools and I did some research and even talked to a few people on Clayart.  In the end it wasn’t too hard.

nice respirator

I talked my wife into helping and she had a lot of fun….  She took a couple pictures so I could share my experience.  The first thing you want to remember is: Safety First!  I got to wear a new respirator so I didn’t breathe too much of the dust when I was dumping the powder into the water. It’s a good look!

mixing glaze

My wife mixed the water while I slowly dumped the powder .  It got pretty thick, even when I used all the water that the directions called for.  I was supposed to use 1 gallon and 1 pint but added a lot more by the end of the process.  I used my cordless drill and a 1 gallon paint mixer to mix the powder into the water. Even after mixing it with the drill mixer for a while it was still pretty lumpy.

glaze sieve

I put it through an 80 mesh sieve three times.  After letting it sit overnight I mixed it up again with the drill mixer and it was ready to be applied to some bisque ware. I even checked the specific gravity or “density” with a hydrometer.

I’ll have  a full post on the items that I pulled out of the kiln.  The Pam’s Blue that I mixed from powder actually looks different than the pre-mixed pints I’ve used.  Check later to see how!

The 2010 WN Middle School track team had an amazing season finishing 9-0 in dual meets, champions of the Westview Invitational, and….. LLC Conference Champions!!!!  I would like to think it was all because of the shirt design….  Or maybe it was the fantastic coaching staff?  Okay, in reality we had a really great group of 8th grade athletes to lead the way to an undefeated season.

Here is an early shirt design which was created in Adobe Illustrator CS4:

2010 Track Shirt Design

Here are photos of the actual shirts:

Team Shirt 2010

Conference Champions Shirt

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The boys voted for yellow team shirts but the design looks even better on gray.

I’m finally getting a chance to bisque fire all the stuff I made over spring break.  The kiln is on and firing!  I noticed as I was loading the kiln that I was rapidly running out of shelf space.  I decided to haul a bunch of my finished pieces to Ligonier for an “End of the School Year/Clean off the Shelves” Pottery Sale.  There was a really good response and out of the twenty-some pieces that I took in I only brought back four.  I consider most of the pieces I sold “my experimental work” as I was mostly trying glazes and different forms.  A few people requested items of a certain shape or glaze color for next time.  Now that I’m officially on summer break I plan to spend a good amount of time in the clay studio.  I’m going to head down to the hardware store to get a good respirator and one of those long mixers that can be attached to a drill.  Then I’ll be ready to mix up some Pam’s Blue glaze.  I’ve got about 3 weeks left of my class at IUSB but when I’m not in class or doing homework I hope to be glazing the bisque pieces and throwing some new items.

A few weeks ago Schwartz Photography traveled down the road to the baseball fields to take some team photos of two local Little League teams.  Everything went pretty smoothly and the photos turned out pretty well.  Here are a few of the shots:

We had a good time and hope that this could be another area of photography to explore.

Well, back to the real world tomorrow…  Spring Break is over but I feel like I accomplished a few things.  I spent a lot of time in the clay studio, worked on the new site, and did some yard work.

wheel thrown stoneware

Here is a look at the drying shelf in the clay studio.  I threw a number of pieces in the last week, mostly mugs and bowls.  I used three different kinds of stoneware over the last few days and I’m excited to see what the two new clays do when they are fired and glazed.  I feel like I’m making some small improvements with my wheel throwing technique.  For one thing, I’m getting more efficient.  I also feel like I’m better at pulling handles than I was a year ago.  A couple things that I hope to work on next might include lids and throwing some larger forms.  I can’t wait to bisque fire and then try some of the new glazes I got.

I also worked on my new side project.  There is a new feed on Potterymakinginfo.com called the working artists feed.  It produces the most recent posts from the blogs of ceramic artists and potters.