Pods

          For my final project this is the pod that I decided to make. All my five pods and my three test pieces will all have the same form and design. So far I have one completed. It has already been fired and it is going to be cold finished. Cold finished is where you add black under glaze to the pod all over. Then you get paint and brush it all around the pod gently. You don't want to put to much because it wont look good. To make this piece, I used soldate clay. First I had to make a round pod and shape it into the form that it needed to be shaped into. Then I partially cut out part of the top, so it could be open, I had to cut off part of the edges to that the pod would not look so thick, then i had to smothe it out. The inside and outside had to be smoothed as well. As I smoothed it out, I had to make sure that I was also shaping the pod into the form of a leaf. The most challenging part of creating this piece, was trying to find a good way to make the flower fit inside of the pod. But from the help of my class mates they let me know if the pod looked ok as I found ways to put the flower inside, each time they would tell me how it should look. For the middle of the flower, I am going to do flocking. It is really neat, it looks like pollen. And it is very soft. If i could change something from creating this piece, I would have made the pedals on the flower a little bit thicker, that way some of them wouldn't have broken off. I fell that I have almost accomplished my goal, because I am almost done making all of my pods.

This is what my pod looks like on the inside with out the flower in it.

This is the flower that I made to go inside my pod.

         This is what the side of the flower looks like, as you can see, I had to add three layers of pedals to it. So that the flower could look like it had bloomed open.

         These are all the pods that I have made. The thing that I was trying to accomplish, was to have all the pods with the flower inside of them done. But unfortunately, I was not able to finish them all on time. But I will be coming in after I get out of school and spend the whole day in the pottery room to finish my pods. Overall, I feel really good about my pods. I like them, and the way they look. I wouldn't have changed anything that I have made. The thing that I like about my pods, is how some of them are bigger and smaller than others. I like it, because as an organic form, not all things grow at the same pace.

References to Organic Forms

                        These are the references that I will  be looking at to make my five organic forms.

Organic Form #1

    This is my first Organic Form that I have made. To make this form, I didn't really use a resource from somewhere. This one was my first organic form so I decided that my first one should be a practice since I hadn't made any before this one. Making this form was a little bit hard, because I tried to make it the way I had pictured it in my mind, but it didn't come out that way.
    To make this form, I needed to use some clay, a salsa bowl some paper to go inside of the salsa bowl. you make your clay into a round ball. You put your paper inside the salsa bowl, then you stick your  clay inside of the bowl, and begin to form it in the way of the bowl, pulling it up and out. You have to make two half bowls. Then you have to connect them to make a whole circle. Once you connect them, you put a coil around the circle clay where they connect at, so they can stay attached. To shape your circle into the shape you need it to be, you have to use a paddle, and lightly pad it so that it will go into the form you need it to. When you have your the shape you want, you can start to attach your parts that you want your form to have. Make sure you use a magic blanket and some water to smothe out your edges. 
    The part that I like the most about this form, is how the pedals come out. Each side of the form, has a different amount of pedals. The reason why I made it this way, is because when a flower opens up, not every side opens up equally. The kind of clay I used for my organic form is Soldate. I like this kind of clay, because it makes me think of sand, and it is easy to control. To finish my organic form, I am going to cut out the center, (the part that looks like an x). Once that part gets cut out, I am going to stick a oval organic form inside of it, and then coming out of them will be wires that will stick out of it, it will look like a flower. I am not sure what kind of coloring or glaze I will be putting on it.
                  The pictures below are all of my organic form, they all show different sides and angles.

This is one of my recent projects that I am working on, it is a pitcher with eight cups. The cups are about five in. tall. and the pitchre is about two times as tall as that. I am modeling my project after Lynda Ladwig, who made the same thing.
Each cup has its own design. Before the cups are fired, I had to let them dry, to almost bone dry. Then I added this white underglaze, that dries fast. Then after the white underglaze dried, I added black cone five glaze, that Lynda Ladwig uses. Then after that it gets fired. When it came out, I put Ice Blue Celadon on it. Then it got fired again. The thing that took me the longest to make, was the pitcher, the reason why, is  because I took too long to add the handle and the spout. I dont know why I did not work on it. So the pitcher began to dry before I attached the spout and handle, that I kept on having to make it soft then it would get a little too dry. so finally one day I just attached it. So I left it out to dry. To make it dry faster Lisa placed it in the killn. But some how it ended up getting fired before I could put the white and black underglaze on it. So in the pic you can see that my pitchre is not finished. It still needs to get fired that way I can put the glaze on it. I hope it doesn't break or crack. In the pic, I am missing two cups, one of them has not gotten fired yet, it is waiting, and the other one is somewhere lost, but I know it will turn up somewhere! After my cups and pitcher get fired I will add glaze to them, then they will get fired again, then I will be done with my set!
The most challenging part of making this set, was making the pitcher, because I had to figure out how big I had to make it so that it could serve eight cups. Also attaching the spout and handdle, because I took too long to do it.
The best part of making this project, was adding the black glaze, I like it, because it is something different, and it is not just plain glaze, like all my past project cups. Another part that I liked about making this project was how the black underglaze kinda bleed on some of the cups, I think that looks nice!
When my  project is done I will post a pic so you can see how it turned out!

This is my second set of Tumblers that I have made. These two are made of porcelain.
They are glazed with Ice Blue Celadon. They have no design on them, but next week I will be adding a design to them. It will be something that is a little bit long and that flows from the inside to the outside, like leafs or flowers. I'm not sure yet what design I want to put on it. The way we will add the image to it, is through image transfering.
The most challenging part of making these two tumblers, was the porcelain. The reason why, is because porcelain seems very sensitive, and you really have to take your time with it. The reason why it was challenging, is because I tried to put it all together at once, while it wasn't fully  solid. I tried to smooth the lines where they connect, and I tried to add the bottoms to it. But then I realized that I just had to let it sit for a day and let it become solid a bit.
The thing that I disliked, was how soft and sensitive the porcelain was, I thought I was going to be able to be in charge of the clay, but then I realized that the porcelain was in charge, and that it was all going to be done on the porcelains time, and not on my time.
The part that I like the most about this piece, is the glaze, I really like the color of the glaze. I am excited to see how it looks with the image transfer on it!

The second project that I began to work on, where tumblers. Since I had already made cups before, it was easy to make tumblers. To make these tumblers, I used b-mix clay. When making them, we had a paper template already cut out. so we just had to trace it over the clay. That made things more easy, because that way I didn't have to measure things and make sure that they were the right height. The technique that I used for this project was wax resist. It is where you add wax to the cup, before it is bone dry, then you let it sit for 24hrs, then you use a sponge and rub it on the cup. This makes the part where you put the wax on come up and that way you can see the pattern. The pattern used on my cup was lines going vertically, then horizontally, this created squares. In between the squares, I made more squares. The type of glaze that I used for this project was Ice Blue Celadon.
The most challenging part of this project, was figureing out what technique I wanted to use, since I wanted to test some of them out. Another challenging part was that I did not know what pattern I wanted to do for my cups. But Lisa showed me some patterns on a post card and I fugured it out. Lastly, another challenging part of this project was trying to make the lines on my tumblers be even. that did not happen. But I am ok with that.
There was not much that I disliked about doing this project.
The thing that I learned from this project, is that when makin a desighn it doesn't always have to look perfect, somtimes its ok for it to not look super perfect. Because the only way it is going to look perfect, is if it is manufactured.
The thing that I liked about this project, is how that the tumblers are tall, and they are not small. And I like the glaze that was put on it. It reminds me of the glass blue coca-cola cups.

This is my third set of cups with a tray. My set of cups is modeled after Lynda Ladwig. Lynda makes thin cups, and I am making thin cups as well.
My set of cups includes a tray, and four cups, my cups are fve in. tall. They are glazed with satin white glaze. For this set of cups, originally I had only three cups, but Lisa said that my tray would look better with four cups. As you can tell the second cup on the left is a lighter color than the other cups. The reason why, is because that cup was fired at a different temperature, that it made it look like a light brown cramy color. Also, the two cups that are at each end, are taller than the ones in the middle, that is because they where made at different times and they dried differently.
If I could change something about this project, I would have asked someone eithre a student or the teacher, weather I should have added a fourth cup on not. That way they could all have been fired at the same temperature, and there wouldnt be one that doesnt look like it fits in, because it has a different color.
The thing that I like about this project, is that this set does not include alot of cups, and I think it looks really nice with just four cups. I feel good about this piece!
The thing that I learned about creating this piece, is that after working of projects that are similare to this one, it is easy to make it afrer you have had the proper training.

This was my second set of a tray and cups that I made. My set of cups are modeled after Lynda Ladwig, she makes thin cups, and my cups are made thin as well. My set of tray includes nine cups. They are all five inches tall. But since on some of them I didn't add the bottoms they got a little bit dry, that when I added the bottoms, the tops shrunk a little bit more when they where fired. so on some of them the bottoms are wider and the tops are thinner. As you can see, my cups separate by two different glaze colors. although I used the satin white glaze, some of my cups where fired at different temperatures, which caused some of them to look like a light creamy brown. while others have a nice white color.
The thing that I like about my cups, is how some of them turned into a light brown creamy color. I think that's really cool!
The thing that I dislike about my cups, is how they are not all the same size, if I could change something about this process, I would have been more patient with  my cups, instead of wanting to get this project done.
One thing that I would change, is the way that I glaze my cups, if you notice, on my cups, you can see on some of them how it looks like they have a second coat of glaze at the top of the cup. The reason why that happened, was because when I went to put glaze on the rim; when I dipped it in, I put it in past the rim, that it made the glaze thicker, which makes it look like part of my cup has more glaze than the other. To prevent theis from happening, I am going to not dip my cup so far into the glaze next time.

The thing that I learned from creating this project, is that sometimes you cannot always rush through a project, because something can happen, and can go wrong. The thing that went wrong with my project, is that I was in a hurry to get my cups glazed, that when I was placing them on the counter to dry, two of my cups fell and broke, which meant that I had to go back and re-make two more cups, and this made my project go longer, because I had to go through the process all over again. To me, going through the process again, was a good thing, because it taught me to take things slow and just be patient with them, especially with life, because many times we rush through things, and they don't end up right, then you have to go back and re-do them again, instead of only having to do them once. Sometimes re-doing thing again teaches you a better lesson, then actually doing the project the first time correctly. Even though I had to wait for my cups for a little t\bit, to get fired, I was able to work on other projects.

This is the first tray that I ever made, and here you can see where it cracked, and how even though I fixed it, you can still see how it cracked again aftter I fired it. The crack was pretty big, it almost took up half of my tray. Im glad my tray didnt break, when it got fired, but that it only cracked.

          This is the first project I began in pottery. I made a set of cups, small medium and lagrge. All including a tray. The best part of my piece, is my cups, they are thin cups, and I am modeling after Lynda Ladwig who also makes thin cups. Making thin cups is easier, and they are not as heavy. They are very light. My first one was a small set with six cups they are about two in a half inches tall. I glazed them with satin white glaze. 

        The most challenging part of this project, was making the tray. The reason why, is because it was my first tray and I wasn't sure if it was going to make it. Since I am a procrastinator, life hit me, and I became lazy. I took too long to make my tray that when I went to let it dry it cracked. Lisa said that the tray would not make it, and that I should make a new tray. But I did not listen to her. I was too lazy and I figured I would just go with it, cross my fingers and hope my tray would survive. Eventually my tray did survive. it made it through a long process. If I could have changed something, I would have re-made my tray. The reason why, is because it took too long for my tray to get well. And in that time I could have made a new tray, and moved on with my project. Me waiting on my tray made my project go on longer, that I am still finishing it in second semester.

        The thing I learned about creating this piece, is that sometimes waiting can be a long process and healing can take a long time especially if you have an injury. Healing takes time. and sometimes its ok to let time heal you and leave a scar of rememberance, instead of forgeting your accident ever happened and trying to start all over again. Its ok to have a scar, because when you look back at it, you can see how far you have come, and how much you have grown.