Glasswork: using hot glass

A snowball, made by spinning the glass in a hoop on the floor, to get air into it, and then the glass was gathered up and rolled into a ball using kevlar gloves.

I then had a go at gathering glass from the furnace, and using the jacks to cut into the glass, to create a blob which would snap off neatly from the iron.

I then made an icicle, by pulling the blob out with tweezers, and then sticking the end back on itself. I then put one side of the tweezers into the loop and twisted the iron whilst pulling out with the tweezers to create a long icicle.

I then made some flowers, a bird (or attempted to make a bird) and another small animal which i'm not sure what it is. I experimented getting used to using the tools and using water to make a weak part of the glass that would break off to get the piece in the kiln.

Metalwork: Soldering and decorating the ring

i decide my half sphere would be a birds nest, so i used a piercing saw to cut out the shape of a swallow. i first cut out the basic outline, then cut the 'v' out of it's tail. i had to be very careful on corners to make sure i didn't turn the saw too suddenly, which would snap the blade.

 I then cut out a tree shape, using cut lines to show the branches.

 I soldered all the pieces together, first soldering the tree to the inside of the ring, so it came out sideways, and then I soldered the bird into the nest. The next bit was quite difficult, because i had to solder the nest onto the ring, without disturbing any of the joints i had already soldered. i used the bricks to hold the ring and the nest in the right position while i soldered them.

 I quenched the whole ring and pickled it in the acid to take the flux off. This is the finished ring. I hope to polish it some more so the surface is more even and shiny.

Illustration: Observational bird drawings

 In our first day of illustration, we were doing observational drawings of stuffed birds.

 The first drawing we did was with our non-drawing hand, so for me my left hand. This was to create a looser drawing, and to capture the basic shape and essence of the bird. We then did another drawing of the same bird, on top of the previous drawing. I like this because of all the overlapping shapes and messy lines.

 This owl was drawn without looking at the paper, just looking at the owl. At one point. my graphite stick fell off the edge of the paper. The basic shapes are all there, but aren't all in the right place.























This toucan is drawn using the same method, but with a felt tip pen. I like the shape of his beak and his feet. It looks like a toucan even though his head isn't complete.

This is my favourite of my bird sketches, it was done mainly looking at the bird, and only glancing at the page. I like it because it is very simple but also very accurate to the real bird.