Advice?
I recently started pottery at home and am experimenting with glazes. I got my first haul back from a local kiln and while some look cool, I’m noticing some common issues.
All are speckled white clay, bisque to cone 4 and fired to cone 6.
All glazes are MAYCO (Cinnabar, Night Moth, ink spots and Speckled green thumb)
All glazes were applied 2-4 coats as per the directions on each bottle.
1 - cinnabar top, night moth bottom and a band of ink spots
2 - ink spots top, cinnabar bottom
3 - speckled green thumb top, night moth bottom
4 - designer liner body (love!) but speckled green thumb handle and inside (boo!)
My biggest takeaways:
- cinnabar is a lumpy reddish brown and not the rich glossy red I expected.
- Night moth is a dark dark brown and matte with no crystals
- speckled green thumb came out patchy and much more muted than the test tile
- ink spots are more brown and runny than black specks (but more or less match the cone 6 image from the Mayco website)
Aside from color variation, I am seeing alot of bubbles, texture and no gloss.
The only pieces that ended up with a smooth glossy finish was the Speckled Green thumb (albeit the wrong color) and ink spots.
Am I putting the glaze on too thick?