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The reality is that, the best way is the way that you feel most comfortable with. I use a series of glaze bases, each one getting mixed before I add metal oxides and carbonates to create the color fields that I desire. Crystalline glazes are extremely sensitive to small changes. If my supplier tries a new feldspar in the clay I use, or my batch of zinc comes from a new mine, my entire glaze can change and will need adjusting.

Crystalline Glazes: Understanding the Process and Materials - Fara Shimbo - Google Книги

One little change and my pots can either be completely saturated with crystals, or totally void of them. Typically crystalline glazes are applied fairly thick, with the thickest application at the top of each piece and the thinnest near the foot. Most of my glazes run about 1—2 inches down the surface of the pot.

I try to plan my application so that everything ends up even after the firing. The thickness of the fired glaze can affect the number and size of crystals grown, and can also change the color a bit.

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I spent years brushing, and loved the control I got, but loathed spending hours glazing a kiln load. I measure the specific gravity of my glazes, and then do a rough guess of the volume of each piece. I use this to measure out how much glaze I want to spray onto each pot. Glaze Firing The firing process is the fun part, but can wreak havoc on kiln elements.

The kiln I use for glaze firings is an electric kiln with 2-inch thick soft brick walls. I fire my pots to cone 10 with a 10 minute hold at top temperature.

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Most electric kilns really hate firing to cone 10, let alone a hold at top temperature. I program my kiln with a typical fast firing to cone 10, and then add the hold. Here is a typical firing schedule:. Removing the Catcher Once the pots are cool to the touch and out of the kiln, the scary part needs to happen. I place the pot on a banding wheel and while spinning it slowly, I use a blowtorch to heat up the riser right below the joint of the riser and the pot The heat causes the riser to expand separately from the pot and forces the pot to break free.

If the seal was nice and tight it should come off very easily, but sometimes a small tap with a finishing hammer is needed. Once the catcher is removed, the bottom needs to be smoothed. I use a homemade lapping wheel now, but for years I used a bench grinder and a Dremel tool. The lapping wheel really gets the bottoms clean and smooth.

Since crystalline glazes require fusing of the zinc with the other materials to make crystal nucleation points, I often apply a very thin layer of glaze over a warm pot to reintroduce some zinc and silica back into the mix. Magic Okay, I lied earlier when I said there is no magic. In fact, there is one magic trick. Well, not magic, but chemistry. It sure feels like magic though. I stumbled onto this technique when I first started making crystalline pots by spilling a popular sports drink into a box that had a pot in it.

I had no idea what happened and decided to just submerge the entire pot into the sports drink overnight and see if I could get it to even out.

Crystalline Glazes Understanding The Process and Materials by Fara Shimbo

It worked like a charm. After some time, I reached out to a friend who was much smarter than I am, who did lots of scientific testing to help me track down the best acid for etching my pots. This is very similar to the way potters used to soak Oribe ware in vinegar to tone their surfaces down a bit.


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Both of these materials are generally safe to use and easy to get. They both work just the same at different rates of time. These salts are easily washed away under clean water They have been with me through undergraduate school, graduate school, and now my teaching career. They forced me to slow down, keep good records, pay attention to details, and occasionally feel like a mad scientist. I still open the kiln way to early just to get a peek inside and see the magic. To see more of his work check out www.

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Will Dickert Chris Gryder: Silt Castings Ian Childers: The Crystalline Journey Edge Barnes: Seaweed, horsehair and sugar Jim Gottuso: The Crystalline Journey Cortesy of: Kiln controllers were supposed to make crystal glazes easy. As usual, understanding the materials and chemistry makes all the difference. And there are so many other little things to know about clay, firing, shape of ware, application of glaze, etc. You cannot afford not to be aware of the research of Fara Shimbo.

She has made every mistake and documented every success. Page after page of beautiful color sample tile grids and exactly what you need to do to make them. Fara does not just grow crystals, she 'farms' them. She fringes them, shapes them, seeds them, mixes different types, colors them, co-ordinates them with the background, she even names them.

Fara is a woman in love with crystals. She has developed a 'language of crystals' and her enthusiasm is so contagious that the readers will also entertain leaving regular pottery for the lure of crystals.