SUN CATCHER

I definitely have ADHD or so I think, because I like to switch between at least 2 projects at one time.  This way I can let one glass project cool properly while working on the next or at least think about the next.  So here I am with a sun catcher.  I had remnants of an emerald green fractured irid glass which I used on the spiral pattern fuser.  The glass looks pretty and looks especially nice when slumped over the pattern fuser.  But I did not have enough to do another one of that so I turned it into a sun catcher instead.  I just fired two panels to be included in the suncatcher with the irid glass on top and clear glass as a base.  In order to create the two panels I fired the pieces using the panel firing schedule for a project listed on Coleur de Verre web site.  It seems to work quite well when fusing two pieces of 3mm glass together:

Panel Firing Schedule:

300 dph................................1250 degrees.................hold 30 mins
300 dph................................1420 degrees.................hold 10 mins
Full.........................................900 degrees.................hold 1 hour
100 dph...................................600 degrees.................off

Next I am creating 2 decorative pieces with clear base and am putting scraps of the emerald green fractured irid on top and tack fusing them, I hope, with this schedule:

Tack Fusing Schedule

400 dph...............................1000 degrees.....................hold 10 mins
600 dph................................1350 degrees.....................hold 5 mins
Full........................................900 degrees......................hold 1 hour
100 dph.................................700 degrees.......................off

So hopefully this firing schedule will leave some texture on the two clear pieces.  That is what I am hoping to achieve and latel I have not been able to and all my pieces full fuse.

Took a break and dont know whether or not I actually did this piece.  So instead I am working on a flower on a panel of transparent glass, one layer that can be hung outside or perhaps in a window.  Maybe I will get a chain to hang it with after drilling two holes or using bales.  And maybe next time I do this I can try curving the stringers first.

I am firing the above with following firing schedule:

400 dph............................1000 degrees................hold 10 mins
600 dph.............................1400 degrees................hold 5 mins
Full......................................900 degrees...............hold 1 hour
100 dph................................700 degrees...............-0-
off

The firing schedule worked.  It tack fused the flower to the base and did not distort the one layer of glass underneath.  I did wind up using and irid piece of glass with the irid side down and I also used yellow striker glass that turned warm orange.   All are mistakes that don't seem so bad.

 The color it turned is not so bad, warm orange.  I should really start noting the colors that I use.
The guy at the gift shop on main street in Damariscotta really liked the glass so I would like to get so more irid and make a couple more of those plates.

Fiber paper molds

I really like the glass artist who make their own molds and mold natural or found figures in glass, but from all of the reading that I am doing it appears that I am not quite ready to start making my own molds, I am not even ready to understand how it is done.  So for now I will work with other methods, using other people's molds, beautiful as many of them are and today I tried to create texture or a pattern in my glass with cut out shapes.

I had traced the leaves of flowers and cut them in fiber paper.  This paper may have already been used in a firing project but it cut easy enough with some crumbling of the paper.  I think I may have already fired something with this piece and that is why it so easily crumbled but then lets see what happens.  I put it together underneath  layers of glass and used the following firing schedule which I labeled as the schedule for the cherry blossom and Net leaf vein molds.  Lets see how that comes out.  It goes as follows:
300 dph.............................................1360 degrees........................hold 20 mins
300 dph.............................................1445 degrees........................hold 10 mins
Full......................................................900 degrees.......................hold 1 hour
100 dph..................................................700 degrees......................-0-

off
Well that works but I have also added a first step that I believe is a bubble squeeze which allows me to fuse two layers of glass over the fiber paper and also fire them together in one step.  And that seems to have worked  What I have determined is the finished piece is only as nice as the cut out fiber paper is and I do have to work at getting that better.  Finding better simpler drawings that use the space of the glass piece better.  I still think that this project can work.  See here the results of the first try, using cut out circles.  I need to place those elements in a more artistic matter and use something other that clear glass.  Maybe i can also fill them with frit.

In this example I overlapped the circles, maybe I could do more and space them differently.

So here is I tree I traced and then fired, not bad but not great.  Would it look better in a different color glass or if someone with artistic ability had traced the tree?  My next attempt is a celtic symbol which I am fusing into a 2 layered piece I fused years ago.  This piece has a third layer of fishes and other decorative pieces fused into it.  We will see how this effects the whole thing.

And finally what have I learned.   What comes out on the glass all has to do with  how good the fiber paper mold looks and also particularly how it is placed on the glass.  The next one I will try is going to be multiple shapes placed through out the glass.  I think I like more shape then less so basically fill the whole space like the spiral fuser I have from Coleur de Verre.  This is how my celtic symbol experiment came out.

And this is how I fired it:

300 dph..............................1250 degrees................hold 10 mins
300 dph..............................1445 degrees................hold 10 mins
Full.......................................900 degrees................hold 1 hour
100 dph.................................700 degrees................off

Again I wonder how this would look with different colored glass with a smaller pattern that is repeated; with a more realistic pattern etc..................... 



so this is more of what I want to do, wonderful blue glass and the leaves themselves are out so that the way to do that is to trace a leaf on tracing paper and cut it out.  Place paper below the glass and when glass melts it will do so into the space left from the cut out leaf.  So based on this beautiful piece which I did not do, I am going to try again.  Looking for a page of various leaves or what ever and trace them.
So, I am going to slump this fiber paper circles onto the scallop slump mold.
And see how it all comes out.  the question is whether I need to cut the curved top outer edges, out of the glass before putting it on the mold. And also to see if the slumping firing schedule I am using for the scallop mold works:

300 dph.............................1200 degrees...................hold 30 mins
300 dph..............................1225 degrees...................hold 1 hour
Full.....................................900 degrees.....................hold 1 hour
100 dph...............................700 degrees....................off

    Now lets see if this advances one more space or it stays above the last picture.  I did slump the circular piece and it looks like this now.

That came out beautifully.  i want to do a few more