Yellow and Blue Fish Fused Glass Sun Catcher

I made this fused glass fish sun catcher before my last Craft Fair.  What do you think of it?  Are the white circles obviously air bubbles?  Or, were you wondering what the heck are those white circles?

If you look real close at the blue glass, you will start to see different colors, like purple.  This glass is iridized and looks much more impressive in the sunlight.  I don’t have a name for this fish, yet.  Any suggestions?

All the glass is Spectrum 96 Fusible.  I used one layer of clear and then added the other colors on top.  I fired it to a medium tack fuse, so the fish would have some dimension.  My husband drilled the two holes in the top for hanging the glass fish sun catcher.  I used jewelry wire that is coated with plastic to hang it and added a few beads.

I recently realized that I love making fused glass sun catchers, but I just don’t make enough of them.  I need to change that 🙂

I have made three glass snowman fused glass sun catchers for my upcoming shows.  When I get a picture of one, I will definitely post it.

Christine — Glass Artist

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Check out my Glass Website: http://www.mastersglassart.com

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How I Made That Blue and Almond Glass Vase

I told you that I would explain how I made the Glass Vase from the last post.

First, I made some cobalt blue opal glass lace.  It took me a few tries to get a nice looking piece 🙂

I cut three circles, about 7″ in diameter, one of 96 Almond Opal Glass, another of 96 Clear Glass, and another of 96 Hi Fire Black Irid Glass.  I fused all three circles with the blue lace on top of the Almond Opal Glass.  The Black Irid Glass was on the bottom and the clear glass in the middle.

To make the vase, I used my 9″ drop ring mold and propped it up 6″ with kiln posts.  I placed the fused circle on the mold with the blue glass lace on the bottom and the black irid glass on top.  I used my standard firing schedule for drop rings.  As I was watching it drop, I noticed that the glass was not nicely rounded like it should be.  I couldn’t figure out why it was kind of blotchy (is that the right term?).  Anyway, it must have been because I used the black irid glass.  I have made several glass vases with glass lace and they didn’t come out like this one.

The middle to upper part of the glass vase is a dark color because the Almond Glass thinned out at this point exposing the black irid glass.  I didn’t know that this was going to happen — quite a surprise!

If you look inside the glass vase, you will see a very pretty black irid glass.  It turned into many beautiful colors.

Tell me what you think of my glass vase!  Do you like it or do you think it is pretty ugly? 

I’d love to get comments about it!

Christine — Glass Artist

Check out my Glass Website!  The link is in the About Me Section in the upper right corner.

Can You Guess How I Made This Glass Vase!

Isn’t this an interesting glass piece?  What is that blue splotchy glass?  How come the glass in the upper section turned a dark color?  How did she make that glass vase?

It is a lengthy description, so I will tell you on my next post.

Christine — Glass Artist

Check out my website!  The link is in the About Me Section on the upper right.

My Next Basket Weave Glass Plate

This is my second basket weave glass plate that I have made.  I really,  really love this glass piece, it is one of my favorites.

Many of you may have read about a similar plate that I made about two months ago.  Here is the link to that particular post: https://glassart.wordpress.com/2007/09/25/.

Go ahead, check out the other post.  I have a question on that post and I haven’t  gotten the correct answer for it,  yet.

Christine — Glass Artist

http://www.mastersglassart.com

Black and Gold Dichroic Glass Pendant

Isn’t this an elegant glass pendant?  The gold dichroic adds a touch of sparkle!  Wouldn’t it look so pretty with a black sweater or top?  I think it would go with a lot of colors.

I used a thin piece of black glass (90) on the bottom and then added the squares of black glass and the gold dichroic.  I added a piece of clear on top and then did a full fuse.  The corners rounded off nicely all by themselves.

I used a thin black piece of glass on the bottom, because the gold dichroic glass is thin.  When I do a full fuse with pendants, I like to have at least 6 mm of glass, so it comes out with nice smooth edges.  Thin glass is 2 mm thick and regular glass is 3 mm (1/8″) thick.  When glass is heated up, it wants to be 6 mm (1/4″) thick.  So, if you have something that is only 3 mm thick and you do a full fuse, the edges will pull in, because the glass wants to be thicker.  The edges would need to be ground to get them straight and then the glass would need to be fire-polished to shine up those edges.  Just too much work, unless using 3 mm of glass is what you want to use for a particular project.

Christine — Glass Artist

http://www.mastersglassart.com

Blue and Silver Dichroic Glass Pendant

Don’t you just love the colors in this glass pendant?  I will tell you my secret of how I got the colors that way — this is how I bought the dichroic glass!!  It comes in stripes like this, so it is so much fun to design various glass pendants.  I can cut the glass so the dark blue is on the top and have silver beneath it.  I can also cut a longer piece to get a couple of the stripes of the blue and silver dichroic glass.

I was just visiting my mom in Minneapolis (I live in Oregon) and I thought she would like these colors in a glass pendant.  She decided that she liked it and wanted to get it.   I love giving my glass pendants to family.  I know they will enjoy wearing them.

Christine — Glass Artist

http://www.mastersglassart.com

White Glass Dichroic Pendant

This gorgeous glass pendant was a fun pendant to create. I had some off-white translucent glass mixed in with my other System 96 glass. I thought I would use some of it for a dichroic glass pendant and see how it turned out. I cut a piece of pink/teal dichroic glass on clear (System 96) that was the same size as the off-white glass. I added the black glass circle and black glass stringers for a pleasing design. I was pleasantly surprised with the final result!!

Since I really liked how this glass pendant turned out with the off-white glass, I wanted to get more of it. All I had were scraps, so I must have gotten the scraps at my local glass shop. I had no idea what color the glass was and I didn’t know how I was going to figure it out. I went back to my local glass shop, they have new owners now, and they had no idea what kind of glass it was. It didn’t really look like any of the Spectrum 96 glass colors, but it is hard to tell from a catalog.

I went to a different glass shop with a sample of the glass and the owner said that it is a System 96, but didn’t know what color. I looked more closely at the Spectrum 96 catalog and I think I have found the right color. The glass really looks like a straw color by Uroboros Glass, System 96. Uroboros Glass is a lot more expensive than Spectrum, so I don’t buy it. However, I may have to order this one, because I really like how it looks and the different projects I could incorporate it in.

Christine — Glass Artist

http://www.mastersglassart.com

Orange Dichroic Glass Pendant

I bought a different brand of dichroic glass made by Austin Thin Films.  I wanted to see what their dichroic glass was like.  At first, I bought a couple of sample boxes that contained all their colors, each color on a small piece of glass.  I experimented with all the colors on clear glass.  I cut small pieces of each color and sandwiched them between clear glass.  This showed me what the colors would look like after they were fired.

I picked out a few of the colors that I liked and ordered some larger pieces.  They will put the dichroic on different textures of glass, like ripple, accordian, fibroid and others.

The dichroic in this orange pendant was red before I fired it.  I have found that most of the dichroic glass that starts out red will change to an orange or a red/orange.  This glass pendant has a ripple texture and is on a black glass.

I put a piece of clear over the dichroic glass, fused it, and this is how it came out.  I really like the textures and how they change after fusing them.  The blue dichroic in this glass pendant was in the valleys of the ripple texture.

Christine — Glass Artist

www.masterglassart.com

Red and Black Basket Weave Glass Bowl

I made this glass bowl quite awhile ago.  It was my favorite glass piece for quite awhile, well, it still is one of my favorites!  I don’t think I showed you a picture of it before.  I am showing it to you now, because a nice couple that we know just told me that they want to buy this glass bowl, if I hadn’t sold it yet.  Wow!  How exciting!

For a long while, I didn’t care if I sold it or not.  It was my “signature piece.”   I will certainly miss this glass bowl, but I know where it is if I want to see it again and it will be going to a nice home!

I made this glass bowl before I had any fancy equipment.   Can you believe that I actually made templates for each of the strips?  I didn’t have a strip cutter yet, so that was the only way I could get nice and even edges.  It took me a long, long, time to grind the edges, but it was a labor of love.  I stacked the strips using every other one, which resulted in four layers.  This is the same technique that I have used with my other glass basket weave plates and glass vases. 

Christine — Glass Artist

www.mastersglassart.com

“Jet Stream” Dichroic Earrings

The name of the dichroic glass is called “Jet Stream.”  I bought it from artisandichroic.com.  I am not really sure why they named it “Jet Stream.”  However, I name most of my glass pieces and some people probably wonder why I named it what I did 🙂

These dichroic earrings are just one layer of glass.  My husband drilled the holes for the earring findings.  I put a small piece of kiln shelf paper in the hole so it wouldn’t seal back up.  I put the glass earrings in my small Skutt Firebox kiln and did a fire polish to round off the edges and corners. 

The colors of these dichroic earrings really change after firing.  You can see how the earring on the right has a little more green in it.  The colors also change as you move them around in the sunlight.  These are really cool earrings if I do say so myself 🙂

Christine — Glass Artist

www.mastersglassart.com