Pottery, Photography, Design - Brandon "Fuzzy" Schwartz
Back in March I took on another photo opportunity. I agreed to photograph another wedding. After meeting the couple to discuss the details and sign some papers I took some engagement photos. Here you can see a few that I like:
The wedding will take place later this month. My wife even let me get some more photo equipment for the big event!
Another milestone of my art career has been reached, this time in the clay department. I recently completed my very first commissioned ceramic work. Brian Shepherd, notorious for putting on, running in, and promoting 5K and 1 mile races, asked me to create some awards for the annual Think Spring Run this year. He wanted a total of almost 70 medals in 3 different sizes for the race held on March 1st.
I started by deciding the size and shape. Since there was such a large quantity I decided to press clay into plastic lids to get the round shape with a ridge. I carved the letters into the prototype by hand and then poured plaster onto it to make a stamp to use for the rest of the medals. After molding and stamping I added a little design around the edge and then cleaned them up when they were leather hard. I bisque fired them with a few other things that I’ve been working on and then my wife helped me glaze them. We dipped them in one of 3 different low fire glazes from Amaco. The biggest medals were glazed with Peacock which was supposed to be a neat blue-green color but for some reason it came out brown. It looks good as long as you aren’t expecting blue-green… After they were fired I attached some strips of leather so they could be hung around the necks of the top runners. I didn’t get to go to the race but I heard that people liked them.
designing and glazing
fired and finished
The kiln is up and running! I fired it up last Sunday to see what it could do and I wasn’t dissappointed. I did a Fast Glaze fire to cone 06. It took exactly 4 hours from start to shut off. Then I let it cool overnight. According to the test cones it overfired slightly. Everything else was fine. The gargae didn’t burn down, the electrical hookup seemed to function as it should and the vent did it’s job. Except the vent system isn’t fully installed so I just shot the fumes out the garage door and some of them came back inside. When I actually fire it for real I’ll either have the vent completely in place or I’ll put on the 8′ tube to get the fumes away from the house. So now I’m ready to go. I’m working on getting a full bisque load ready to fire.
This is how I stay warm since my wife won’t turn the heat on…
Some more good news! My wife let me spend our retirement fund on some necessary supplies. Last week I recieved my shipment. Plenty of glazes and some nifty tools and gadgets to improve my ceramic production and get me through my first glaze firing. Apparently I timed it just right so the order was delivered in between cold spells which kept the glaze from freezing. I hope to get some family members down here this month to help with an extreme studio makeover. My brother (the electrician) and my dad (who was a construction worker in another life) said they would come down some time and help me enclose my clay studio and add some more lighting and outlets. My plan is finally coming together!
Now I’m ready to hit mass production phase…
It’s here! Yesterday at about 1:00 I recieved the shipment. The FedEx guy pulled up in his freight hauler and all 53′ of the trailer. I had to help him get it to the liftgate and then I helped push it all the way up the driveway and into the garage. I sliced off all the plastic wrap and made sure all the pieces were there and that nothing looked like it had fallen off a truck…
It is one impressive piece of equipment! Now that it’s actually in my garage it is bigger than I pictured. I still have to read about half the manual and then I’ll probably re-read it to make sure I know what I’m doing. It looks like the holes were already drilled for the vent so I won’t have to do that. I guess all I really need to do is put it on the stand, plug it in, and fire away…. but I’ll probably do some more research so I don’t burn down the house or something….
Here are a few pictures:
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Another step in my plan to take over the world!
Early this fall I was asked to do a family portrait by one of my co-workers. She wanted some outdoor shots with the changing leaves so we went to Bonneyville Mill Park one Saturday afternoon. A lot of the leaves were already past their prime but we did alright. The two boys were fun to work with. I shot everything in RAW for this project so I could play around with DPP3 a little more. I was pretty happy with the results and the family seemed to really like the pictures so I would say it was another successful adventure.
Here you can see a few photos from the portrait session:
