pottery part 2
Welcome back to the second installment of my pottery series. Now we move from hand-building techniques to everyone's (or at least my) favorite technique-- wheel throwing!
This photo, as well as the two photos below, show the first pot (if you could call it that) I ever threw on the wheel.
The ridges on the sides of the pot were made by me holding my finger in one place, pressing lightly, and having the clay spin around it. I did that three times to create the three different ridges.
My head counselor, Emily, supervised me as I threw this pot. She centered it for me (centering being getting the clay to not swerve around on the wheel), which is why the the circle it makes is so nice.
And this is that same pot after I glazed it. I wanted to to do a different color for every different ridge, and I got the idea to use sunset-like colors.
On the inside, I glazed the pot all black, to sort of continue with the night theme. Also, I think the black glaze is particularly shiny and clean-looking, one of the better glazes we have, so it looks sleek to me.
And this is just another view of the pot. I think, for my first attempt, this came out really well. I'm giving it to my mom. But, as you can see by my next attempt, me unsupervised starts out pretty... uh... ridiculous.
Okay, from the aerial shot, it doesn't look so bad. But just wait.
Even from this angle, it doesn't look so bad... except for the fact that while I was pushing a hole to the bottom, I didn't quite make it all the way there so my bowl became somewhat of a dish on a pedestal.
But this is the worst, and the funniest, part of the dish. The drastic dip in the side of the dish comes from the fact that I didn't center correctly (I didn't really know how at that point) and also that I basically worked this one to death so if the sides were ever even they didn't stay that way for long.
I decided to glaze this one with one coat of red, one coat of royal blue, and another coat of red on top to get this sort of marblized effect.
I was going to shave off the sides and some of the bottom to even everything out before it was fired...
... But I thought it was so much funnier and awesomer this way. I'm taking this one to school with me, definitely, so everyone can laugh at my lack of ceramic skills.
So I hope you all at least had a good laugh at that second one. Trust me, my wheel throwing skills get better as time progresses, as you will see in my next post. So stay tuned!
This photo, as well as the two photos below, show the first pot (if you could call it that) I ever threw on the wheel.
The ridges on the sides of the pot were made by me holding my finger in one place, pressing lightly, and having the clay spin around it. I did that three times to create the three different ridges.
My head counselor, Emily, supervised me as I threw this pot. She centered it for me (centering being getting the clay to not swerve around on the wheel), which is why the the circle it makes is so nice.
And this is that same pot after I glazed it. I wanted to to do a different color for every different ridge, and I got the idea to use sunset-like colors.
On the inside, I glazed the pot all black, to sort of continue with the night theme. Also, I think the black glaze is particularly shiny and clean-looking, one of the better glazes we have, so it looks sleek to me.
And this is just another view of the pot. I think, for my first attempt, this came out really well. I'm giving it to my mom. But, as you can see by my next attempt, me unsupervised starts out pretty... uh... ridiculous.
Okay, from the aerial shot, it doesn't look so bad. But just wait.
Even from this angle, it doesn't look so bad... except for the fact that while I was pushing a hole to the bottom, I didn't quite make it all the way there so my bowl became somewhat of a dish on a pedestal.
But this is the worst, and the funniest, part of the dish. The drastic dip in the side of the dish comes from the fact that I didn't center correctly (I didn't really know how at that point) and also that I basically worked this one to death so if the sides were ever even they didn't stay that way for long.
I decided to glaze this one with one coat of red, one coat of royal blue, and another coat of red on top to get this sort of marblized effect.
I was going to shave off the sides and some of the bottom to even everything out before it was fired...
... But I thought it was so much funnier and awesomer this way. I'm taking this one to school with me, definitely, so everyone can laugh at my lack of ceramic skills.
So I hope you all at least had a good laugh at that second one. Trust me, my wheel throwing skills get better as time progresses, as you will see in my next post. So stay tuned!