Schwartz Photography strikes again!  My wife and I recently took a few photos of a family down the street.  We took the pictures a little further down the street on some different neighbor’s land.  It was overcast, a little damp, and a lot of the color was still in the trees.  So it was a good day for photos (as in “light” and “color”) but not for lying on the ground or rolling in the leaves.  Below you can see a few samples:

A few weeks ago my wife and I had the opportunity to take some more engagement photos.  They were taken at Bonneyville Mill part near sunset.  Here are a few samples:

Last weekend I was hard at work in the studio.  I not only made a few small clay pieces, I also improved the studio a little bit.  I got tired of walking all over to get a bat when I was ready to throw so I upgraded my wheel table to include a bat holder.  It can hold a total of eight bats at a time and is conveniently located under my wheel table to the left as I am sitting at the wheel.  I also decided that I needed  little more shelf space.  I put a larger shelf above the original glaze shelf which hangs over the glaze table.  Now I have room for glazes, tools and bisque pieces that are ready to be glazed, all within reaching distance of the clay table.  So now I’ll probably have to start some sort of exercise program since I won’t be walking back and forth across my studio every few minutes.

This past weekend I threw a couple small lidded vessels.  Perhaps there will be pictures available on this very site at some time.

The previous two posts were created using Open Source software almost exclusively.  I have always loved the idea of Open Source, not only because most of it is free as in “no cost” but free as in “anyone can contribute or make changes”.  There are plenty of websites that can give a better description of Open Source so go see for yourself.

There are even entire Open Source operating systems.  A while ago I installed OpenSuse 10.3 (a version of Linux) on an old computer so I could see what it was all about.  I’ve been pretty impressed.  I have slowly found and installed all kinds of useful free software including GIMP (a pretty advanced image editor), and Open Office 3.0 (an entire office suite comparable to Microsoft Office.)  I edited the images in the two previous posts with GIMP and typed most of the Nov. 6th post in Open Office Writer and then brought it all to school on my flash drive.  I’m still experimenting but I have found many great programs and all of them have fit my “budget” just fine…  And there are plenty of Open Source programs for Windows and Mac users as well.  Find some Open Source software at SourceForge.

Below you can see a pair of pictures showing a few items that I have recently thrown on the wheel.  There aren’t a lot of items but I hope to add a few more this weekend.  They are made out of Amaco clay: Warm Brown Stoneware (darker) and Buff Firing Stoneware (lighter).  The oval dish was wheel thrown and then stretched into an oval and a slab was attached to create the bottom.  I really just wanted to post again to see if all the “automatic upgrades” for Wordpress worked.  So now I’m crossing my fingers and clicking “Publish”…..

This past weekend I spent most of Saturday installing a vent system for my kiln.  I attached the Vent Master to the wall and then put some metal tubes up through the ceiling of the garage, across the attic a few feet and then out the back of the house through the soffit.  The hardest part was squeezing up into the corner of the attic while trying to stay on the boards that I laid across the joists.  And I didn’t fall through the ceiling or impale my head on the nails sticking through the roof so I would say that it was a successful venture just staying alive.  But I got everything connected and sealed up so the next time I fire I should be able to vent the kiln without running a tube out through the door.  I guess we’ll see what happens…  And if you didn’t notice, I learned how to put hyperlinks in my post!  If you aren’t sure what a soffit or a joist is you can click on the words to find out.  (I had to look them up to be sure that I had the right term myself).  Below you can see some pictures of the new vent system:

Well, here is my monthly post…  Apparently it’s already November.  The school year is flying by.  Cross country finished a few weeks ago so now I have a little “extra” time during the day.  I’ve been keeping myself busy though.  We had a new well dug at our home a few weeks ago which left a couple piles of dirt in our front yard.  I hauled those away and got our yard ready for winter and organized the shed over the past week or two.  Amanda and I took some engagement pictures and some family portraits in the past week.  I’ll post some examples when I get them processed.  Here and there I’ve been able to pick up some clay and throw a couple pieces.  Every Tuesday I’m still going to my Content Area Reading class at IUSB.  We have to do a research project but I got to pick any topic.  I am researching whether I should mix my own glazes.  I’ll post the results when I find out more.

Apart from all that I’ve been watching the Wolverines and Lions lose on a consistent basis, avoiding politics, and a couple days ago I took a class to become certified in CPR.  So I can’t say I’m bored…  I’ll post some pictures in my next post.  Thanks for reading.