Possible commissioned piece

[Kev]

I've been asked to do a commissioned piece with butterflies as a Mother's Day gift. So I thought I would combine fusing and sandblasting and came up with this. This will be slumped into a tray of some fashion, whether one with upturned corners, or one that forms a gentle arch/curve.

I will begin by fusing together, a sheet of green with a sheet of thin black on top of it. The black will be sandblasted off where the green is showing in the design. The orange of the butterflies will be tack fused onto the black area in which they sit after the sandblasting is completed, then the entire piece will be slumped into a mold.

[Audrey]

Sounds very ambitious to a foreigner like me. Should be quite lovely. Be sure to share every step of the way as usual.

[Kev]

Will do.

[Graham]

a sheet of green with a sheet of thin black on top of it. The black will be sandblasted off where the green is showing in the design.

How thin is that thin sheet of black??
Flashed glass is like a mil or so (probably less). Even a thin sheet of black will take a lot of blasting. I'm not sayin it can't be done, but that will take a while to blast it off. I'd suggest maybe to double up on the thickness of your resist. It's tough stuff, but not so tough that it won't get frayed along the edges with prolonged blasting.

[JoanFrances]

sounds like an interesting process, not that I followed any of what you said, cause I haven't done anything like that..  Will be watching this one.  Good luck and fun Kev

[Kev]

Some of the resist I will be ordering will allow carving up to 1/4 inch deep and the other states 1/8". The thin glass is less than 1/8"....so it should be able to handle it....time will tell and we will all learn as I go along..lol.

My other option is to paint it black and then just do a surface blasting...I'll have to decide after I do a trial piece using the other method. The initial method would add more dimension to the piece, whereas the painted version would not.

[Anne]

at least you have lots of time to work it out Kev.  Looking forward to seeing what you do have to do to get this result. !!

[Graham]

Some of the resist I will be ordering will allow carving up to 1/4 inch deep and the other states 1/8". The thin glass is less than 1/8"....so it should be able to handle it....time will tell and we will all learn as I go along..lol.

My other option is to paint it black and then just do a surface blasting...I'll have to decide after I do a trial piece using the other method. The initial method would add more dimension to the piece, whereas the painted version would not.

Venture resist comes in 4 and 8 mil. I suppose that's the industry standard. I guess that's to do the 1/8 and 1/4 in carving. I haven't done a lot of "carving" but I know that my first try was with 4 mil and after one fuzzy edge, I doubled up and it went OK after that. I guess I dug down to about 3/16ths.

Paint and blast would sure be a lot easier. but I know you gots a new toy and want to see it's limitations, so easiest may not be most desirable. Go Get 'Em!!

[Kev]

I have not ordered any resist yet, but suspect I will be using the 8mil the most as I do want to try my hand at the carving thing..sounds like fun! I suspect the 4ml would be good for more or less frosting the surface, which will have it's place I'm sure.

The only thing with painting is that in order to get it completely opaque, It's taken me in the past a few applications  of paint, which means more firings, but I can also see me doing that on some pieces as well.

[ct4mom]

Well this is all greek to me so I will just have to watch as it goes.   By the way nice design.

[Kev]

Thanks Di. I'll explain it as I go, and we can learn together.

[TodB]

Kev:
Another option is to just paint it. A fairly opaque, smooth application of black paint (needs some gum in it, but not too much) is fairly easy to do. You'd then rub white chalk on the back of the butterfly pattern paper, trace the pattern onto the black paint. Get out the sticks & scrubs and scrape off anything that doesn't look like a butterfly. You'd have less texture this way.

Yet another option is "kiln carving" which is probably better defined on "Warm Glass" than I could ever do.
Whichever method you choose, I'm sure you'll have fun and it will turn out well. - Tod

[JoanFrances]

I will be looking forward to following this thread Kev, you do a great job explaining things.  Good luck and have fun

[Kev]

Part of the exercise with this project is learning to sandblast and adding texture to a piece, so even if I painted it, I would still want a bit of differentiation between the black and other color by means of texture, but that might be an option yet. ...Thanks Tod

[Wayne]

If I were you, I would fuse a small test piece of black on green to test the ability of the new equipment on carving with detail.

[Kev]

That's my intention.

[Malinda]

Kev, are you still working your day job? My oh my, you don't do anything easy EVER do you?? Can't wait to see how this pans out, I'm sure great though....

[Kev]

Yeppers...back to work tomorrow.

Hopefully this project is not going to be that difficult at all, thought it will be a learning experience for sure.

[TodB]

"Part of the exercise with this project is learning to sandblast and adding texture to a piece, so even if I painted it, I would still want a bit of differentiation between the black and other color by means of texture, but that might be an option yet. ...Thanks Tod "

Somehow, I knew you were going to say that! - Tod

[Kev]

Can you tell I'm itching to blast?...LOL