Well, it sounded better than it’s been a bit glassy although I seem to have caught another one of Sofia’s illnesses and it might be more accurate to say I’ve been a bit bleary. So anyway, I saw this post a while back on Keith Phillips’ blog and I really love love love the way this looks. So I wanted to give it a try and not sure with my clay body whether the slip will crackle but either way, I still think I will like the effect and I’m kinda thinking I might like the combination of it with the shellac process. So on to do my little test. First I found a black and white illustration of a hop (to be modified if I prove the concept well) and enlarged them and printed two on a piece of printer paper. Then I spent about 15 minutes cutting one out with an exacto knife…
By the way, that would be way too long even for me to consider doing multiple times. Then I took the flimsy printer inky hop cutout and stuck it to the side of a not-quite-dry-enough beer glass…
Then I dipped in the too wet slip, twice (and the printer ink ran down the side looking rather nice)…
After it dried a bit, I removed the stencil…
Now if this is something I’d like to pursue and at this stage it feels that way (of course it always does at this stage), I will need to cut stencils inexpensively and not by hand. Of course Mr. Joel cuts multiples in a very creative way… with a jeweler’s saw. I think Keith uses a “craft robo” stencil cutter and they run about 260.00 and I cannot invest in that without knowing whether I even want to really do it, although for years I wanted a way to get from photoshop to the pot’s surface. My good friend Vern has a high-end stencil cutter and I’m trying to figure out what kind of media those scrapbooking stencil cutters use because he’s only used his on vinyl. Anyway, we’ll see. I’ve posted a few more bowls on etsy (clicking goes to etsy)…
Sofia's Dad's Pots 
June 10, 2010 at 8:31 am |
I’d put in an order for a couple – i think it is worth pursuing – I am sure you can make it work!
June 10, 2010 at 8:39 am |
Loving the hop-on-a-beer-glass idea!! (Although when I just typed that out, it sounds very dangerous and I wouldn’t recommend it unless you know what you are doing.) Can’t wait to see the final product.
June 10, 2010 at 8:49 am |
I was also looking at Keith’s slip work the other day specifically the cup you linked to – inspiring stuff! Last year I did some stencil work with newsprint, but as you deduced is very labor intensive. I was able to reuse my stencils about 3 times allowing them to dry out between uses and peeling away very carefully. I’m sure you could run newsprint cut to size through a printer. Feel better….
June 10, 2010 at 9:14 am |
Looking forward to seeing how this turns out!
June 10, 2010 at 9:19 am |
There are “printers” that cut out papers , in fact you give them the directions and a blade cuts out the paper
They are not even that expensive or at least are woth the investement if you’d like to contiune that.
and
I’d love to have one myself, but they are not supporting Linux yet 😦
June 10, 2010 at 10:54 am |
Interesting. At first I thought you put the stencil on and covered it with shellac. Post pics when it’s done. 🙂
June 10, 2010 at 11:10 am |
Kip O’Krongly uses a lot of stencils in her work:
http://kipokrongly.blogspot.com/
With all of the scrap booking going on there are all types of cutters available now at Michael’s and even Walm@rt. I think it’s best to put in the time with an original stencil (using a vinyl table cloth) that is reusable and will last longer. I like the stencil you made -cool.
June 10, 2010 at 11:16 am |
Very cool, Jim. 😀
June 10, 2010 at 2:11 pm |
I use a cutter called cricut by provo craft and they start at $99.00 up. I use my with other software called SCAL2 and inkscape and with those things the sky is your limit. You can cut just about anything you want.
June 10, 2010 at 10:53 pm |
all this talk about stencils and i’m amazed that there’s a machine cutter now!!..I like the vinyl stencil idea and i’m also wondering about a sprig? think of the intricate work that ‘wedgewood’ did and they were all sprigs..
it would require making a plaster mold and may be fun to tinker with…
until you head back to the brush and shelac work of course… 😛
………..WP keeps going to sleep on me…3rd time lucky
June 13, 2010 at 4:10 pm |
Don’t forget your vitmin D3.
June 16, 2010 at 7:49 am |
LOVE IT!