My new coffee mug

It's been a while since I treated myself to a new coffee mug but I've worked so hard getting this red glaze to work I think it's important to keep the first one out of the kiln. I have put a Rutile glaze on the inside and allowed it to run over the Kaki red glaze. Very simple to do yet effective....a definite keeper.

This firing was mainly loaded with Rutile over Temnoku, it's good to be at the point of getting over 80% sellable pots out of a firing and these have a real touch of class about them.

Of course there were a few tests.

I'm very taken with this one, a clear glaze with others trailed over...plenty of potential especially since I'm looking for simplicity in decoration techniques and allowing the glazes to do all the work.

This mug was painted with stained slip and then decorated with iron pigment before biscuit firing and glazing with a clear glaze. Unfortunately the iron pigment wasn't quite thick or strong enough to get the iron to burn through the glaze.

You can see here on the handle the effect I was looking for, next time I may trail the pigment on....but having said that I like the brush marks so may be the way to go would be to increase the amount of iron.

This Kaki over Temnoku was a spur of the moment choice and was placed in a cooler part of the kiln...I love it, it has a lovely chocolatey quality to it. My kiln has a large temperature difference with the top shelve being about 40 deg. C cooler than the bottom. So finding cooler firing effects is quite important.

My Macintoshy designs turned out well but whether I keep doing them remains to be seen.

I was a little surprised at how runny the red glazes are and was hoping for the trailed glazes to sit on top a bit more, may be trying them in the cool part of the kiln will help.

All in all it was a good little firing and puts me on track. Plenty for me to think about and I'm looking forward to the usual 4 o'clock in the morning eureka moment that  takes me off into the next new direction.

This weeks pots

Oil pourer

Temnoku with Rutile overglaze. These are with the old iron oxide but I doubled the amount. Very pleased with the result.

These are made with coloured slip,  it has taken several firings to get the percentages right.

The first two are my normal clay painted with cobalt slip,  even though not completely white I'm still pleased,  there is a rustic quality to them. The third one is a porcelain white clay from Scarva,  its painted with the same cobalt but has its own special low expansion glaze.  The cobalt has run a bit so may try it in a cooler part of the kiln.

Some also rans

First successful glaze test firing

Oh it feels so good to have finally overcome a major problem. Having changed to a different supply of red iron oxide I now have control over my glazes again. All of the red glazes I've test have worked and worked well. My long standing black glaze (Temnoku) is actually black and not a yucky dirty green. Up until now I felt a bit of a fraud only able to produce dull and dreary pots.

Linking my pottery blog to facebook

This is a quick test to see if my blog is linked to facebook

A beginning

My name is Chris Geall and I am a landscape artist but  I started out many years ago on my artistic career as a potter. For  the last 15 years I have been intending to get back into it but failed each time I've  attempted it. Hopefully  this time will be different.

I'm going to use this blog as a way of documenting and sharing this little adventure.

I started out some eight weeks ago and I've only really just got to the point where I am seriously testing glazes ....it hasn't  been the easiest of starts but I think I'm getting close to where I need to be......hence the reason for the Blog.

This is the the kiln going on tonight and will be opened again on Sunday. At the top of the post you'll see a large number of test tiles, these are mainly testing a new batch of red iron oxide. I've  been all around the houses trying to find out why virtually all my glazes just aren't  doing what they should.

It's been a common thread in my previous attempts to get going again dealing with glaze materials that aren't  what they should be. I have now switched suppliers and hopefully I can start trusting labels again.

So my newly recommended suppliers are : Bath pottery supplies and Scarva pottery supplies.