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To begin this bead, I made a large 'blob' of Light Brown Transparent on the mandrel
and encased it with Double Helix Aurae. Light Brown Transparent is a brilliant base colour
for silver glass because it really makes the colours pop.
After encasing the blob with Aurae, I wrapped a twistie around
it in a loose sprial, starting at one end of the bead and finishing at the other end. The twistie had a core of Light Brown Transparent, encased with Aurae
and striped with Triton and Psyche. (all Double Helix reduction colours)
Pretty much any reducing silver glass colours that
keep their reduction under clear will work for this technique. |
Here I was getting the glass HOT. It needed to drip down the mandrel,
pretty evenly, on each side of where it currently sits. This stretched out the twistie
that was added and made it look all stripey and freaky in the finished bead.
Once the glass was stretched out, I went for a round tapered
bicone shape, not worrying about the ends because I was just going to cover them later anyway.
After I got the bead shaped, I applied a loose spiral of goldstone stringer to the bead from one end
to the other and then marvered it into the base careful not to overheat it.
Once the bead was shaped and all of the decoration is applied,
I let it cool somewhat and then gave it a moderate dose of reduction.
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Here, the 'stretching' was done and I was encasing the long tube with
Reichenbach 1011 Crystal Clear.
This is my favourite clear right now because it is the only one that seems to a) not
screw with the colour of my silver glass and b) Not cost an arm and a leg. I like the thin rods because
they are easy to use when encasing because they melt down pretty easily. Crystal is sort of stiff clear,
so the thinner rods are easier to use because they melt faster. Crystal can also boil easily, so you sort of have to be fast and try not to part it in one place in the flame..
I encased using the 'Around the World' method here, coiling the clear on from
one side of the bead to the other, being careful to give the ends some heat periodically so that the bead
doesn't crack. I was applying some pressure while doing this to try to keep the Clear layer thin.
At one point I had to grab a new rod of clear and that took a few moments, so I had to
heat up the right side of the bead and then re-reduce it before continuing to encase it.
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All of the encasing glass was on now, and because getting this bead too hot would undo
all of the pretty mother-of-pearl reduction that I wanted to catch underneath it, I was heating the
surface of the clear that I put on the bead and marvering it flat, getting the bead as smooth as
I could without heating it through. I eventually gave the bead a good heating to smooth it out, but I didn't
want to do that very many times.
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A brief diversion here to discuss how I'd shape the ends of
this bead if I weren't about to hide the ends with Dark Ivory.
Essentially, I heat the glass so that it flows down and the bead will have a
puckered end, let it set for a few seconds and then marver it gently. This takes a lot of practice.
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I then coiled Dark Ivory around the ends of the bead to hide the ugly pointy ends. The Dark Ivory was heated and marvered flush with the rest of the bead, and the ends were fussed with so that they were somewhat even because othewise the next step results in some wonkiness.
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Next, the bead was pressed in this crunch press. This is the Cattwalk Wide Crunch #1 and
I am in love with this press. I can't take any credit for the fancy polymer clay handle since
I bought it in the garage sale on Lampwork, Etc.
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Now that the bead hac been successfully squished, I was painting
Dark Ivory up the edges of the bead. Two swipes of Dark Ivory per side of the bead to give good coverage.
Because the core of the bead is encased, when the bead is pressed flat,
there is a narrow transparent area on either side of the coloured core that has no design in it.
I covered that up here.
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It's probably better to do these writeups when you remember what was said with
more accuracy than I currently do. I think here I might have been expounding on the relative merits of a
few different batches of Dark Ivory. I talk a lot during my demos, so it could really have been just about anything.
This is also the interlude where I spent a stupid amount of time (because it
was a stupidly large bead) firepolishing the chill marks out the bead.
I also, during this time, outlined the whole bead and the 'window'
with silvered ivory stringer. |
Here's the more of less finished bead, just getting some swirls twisted into it with my beading awl.
This little pointy thing is one of my favourite tools. |
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And there's the finished bead, although I will post a better one once I've had a chance to take a proper picture. The propane was turned up to help the silver fume the Dark Ivory a pretty tan colour.
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A lot of food was brought to this gathering, and this is the most people my kitchen has had in it since I moved in.
Here, Tamara, Joanne and Kerry are having a lively discussion.
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And now the demo was finished, and the real fun started. We did a bead exchange, everyone who brought samples
of their work with them shared those and we all ate more crackers, cheese, timbits and spinach dip than we really needed.
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