The Road to a Happy Accident

Today I decided to make the "Lightening Cane", from the Caning Corner in the Summer 05 issue of PolymerCafe', by McCartney Lade. Not sure what I did wrong mine didn't look remotely like the one in the magazine. Either I'm dyslexic or there is something wrong with the photos in the magazine. There is no way you can get from Step 5 to Step 6. So anyway, I ended up with this huge cane that I really didn't like. So, what to do, well, you reduce it and cut it about five times and put it back together. I ended up loving it. The happy accident. Below is a veneer made from the results and the cane . I can't wait to make some bracelets with this veneer on them and maybe some beads. They will be beautiful.

The Cutting Edge journey

Today I used Dan Cormier's "Cutting Edge" slicer. I used his tutorial from the Winter 05/06 issue of Polymer Cafe'. What fun, my first attempt (the one with the red clay at the top and bottom) just didn't turn out so well. Dan uses the straight horizontal and vertical cuts as the first design to try in the article, but I found it to be the hardest to do. Making those straight perfect cuts was almost impossible. You are told to use the dull side of the tissue blade and that was trying at best. It realigns the mica particles which creates the uniqueness of this process but cutting down through six slabs of Kato clay run through the pasta Machine on #1 was thought. The results are worth it but that didn't make it any easier.

In the photo with all the different sets is one slice, in the upper right corner, of the first attempt and then three other sets I tried. After the second slice on the first attempt I knew I didn't like it. I much prefer the curved slices, I used a round egg ring to make the cuts (it had never been used for it's original purpose so I figured we would never miss it). If you look closely you can see that I turned one piece of each set over to show the other side. (it's the slice on the right of each set). Both sides of each slice look completely different due to the direction the mica has been shifted. One side actually looks raised and the other indented. It's hard to see here, guess you just have to trust me or try it yourself. I got the slicer from Polymer Clay Express, it comes in a kit with everything you need to try making the slices. The only other thing you need is the article.

The color is wonderful. It's one 3oz package of Kato silver and 1oz of blue. I want to try it with green and purple as the second colors. I bet they would be beautiful too. I baked one slice of each slab and will sand and buff them tonight. According to the article they really look great after they have been sanded and buffed. One of the great things about this process is that if you don't like the results of your first couple of slices you can just roll it all back up and try it again. Nothing lost but a bit of time. The next step is to decide what to do with the slices. A veneer for some beads or maybe a pendant. I still have two of the slabs, I only took four slices off of each and decided to save the rest until I decide what I want to do with them. For now I will dream, I get my best ideas at night in the dark.

Mega-sil molds

I played with the Mega-sil silicone molding compound today. What fun, I made mostly molds of buttons. Here are the results. These are piece of clay that I pushed into the molds. The flat piece was just a piece of clay that I created texture with by using the same buttons. I baked them first and then put pearlex powders on them, then painted them with Future. What I discovered was that I should have put the powder on before I baked them. The Future washed a lot of the powder off. Lessons learned.

Tomato beads

Yep, that's what we called them. Ordered by my friend Deb. Tomato colored beads with some black and white graphics for interest. The shine is from using Future floor acrylic finish. Two coats and then a quick bake for 20 minutes at 250. Really adds a nice finish.

More on the Color Scale journey

Here are the rest of the Kato Color Scales. I had to order some orange, green, magenta and turquoise before I could continue. I haven't done the turquoise yet and I don't think I will even bother with the purple as it will most likely only give me a large selection of the peuce family and I would rarely do those. Here I did the yellow to orange, orange to red, blue to green and green to yellow. I love the lime greens in there. Notice that in the original red to yellow the same peaches are there and in the blue to yellow the same lime greens are there. So what we learned is that we can either use a yellow and green mix to get a really bright lime green or a yellow and blue to get a more muted lime green. Interesting, the possibilities are endless. I will most likely do the turquoise to magenta and turquoise to green as opposed to turquoise to blue which would not yeald many steps. Another thing I learned was that there are always more steps between the weaker colors to the middle than the stronger of the two to the middle. Have to remember that when I try to actually mix two colors.