E13 Pottery Shorts: Controlled Drying
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- Опубліковано 12 тра 2021
- Welcome to Pottery Shorts, brought to you by The Potter’s Round Table, the topic for this episode is Controlled Drying.
How many times have you gone through the wedging and throwing or hand-building process, only to have a crack form during the drying process? Drying clay can create a lot of stress on rims or large flat areas and can ruin your pottery. In this episode Phil explains the drying process and provides tips for controlled drying that will help lessen the stresses within your ceramics. Enjoy the show.
The Potters’ Round Table is brought to you by Washington Street Studios, a community pottery studio, gallery, and pottery school located in Harpers Ferry / Bolivar, WV. We exist to provide ceramic artists an affordable, fully equipped studio space for aspiring, emerging and established artists to share their creative energy and knowledge in an environment designed to support the ceramic artist. If you want to learn more about Washington Street Studios, visit our website at www.hfclay.com/.
At Washington Street Studios, we believe the sharing of creative energy and knowledge will improve the quality of our art and increase the appreciation of art within our community. We are striving to create an environment where the arts are shared and appreciated. We want to grow as a family of artists and contribute to our community.
This video is one of our steps to share our passion for the ceramic arts, creative energy and knowledge with other artists and art lovers. We also created an audio version to expand our audience. If you are looking for the podcast of our show search for the ‘The Potters Round Table’ on your podcast platform of choice or go to anchor.fm/thepottersroundtable.
Loving these videos, thank you so much for sharing your knowledge so freely. Was very sorry to hear that Phil passed this year, what a great loss but he has certainly left a legacy in his sharing of knowledge and creating community. What a great guy!
Phil would be happy that the community is enjoying the videos!
Our local seamstress who uses the dry cleaner bags was kind enough to give me a half dozen. Felt only right to give her a sponge holder in return. Still using after 3 years.
Cheers and thanks for the short Short.
Freddie, that sounds like a fair deal! Thanks for sharing.
My issue has always been warping, My solution is to hit lip with a heat gun to a little. Then I cover over the pots by building a tent, the tent is built by laying news papers over the pots in layers until they are fully covered. The paper doesn't stick to the pots like plastic.
John, does the warping happen during drying or firing? Just wondering.
Does the newspaper even the drying throughout the pot?
@Washington Street Studios
The warping happens during drying, there are always different air currents moving around the room naturally which causes the warping.
The draping of news papers over the pots has made a noticeable difference.
The news papers have become a game changer compared to previous drying methods.
Once the clays has an evening to dry I’ll sometimes put the whole pot in a thin plastic garbage pail liner and let it equalize a night.
I trim and foot the bottoms of all my pots so controlled drying is necessary with porcelain.
The news paper is a good aid for first stage drying, once the pots stiffened up some I may put plastic over the top section and allow the bottom to dry exposed till trimming consistency is achieved.
If I do sculpture on a pot I’ll bag it and dry it slowly.
Those 2,3 or 5 gallon trash can liners that come in a roll from amazon are very thin clear lightweight plastic and a close line clip seals them up easily and safely
John, thank you for the explanation. You process works to solve many different barriers to successful drying, and with porcelain too! Using newsprint to cover the work in a drafty environment is a genius move! And you equalize the drying by covering the piece later in the process. It looks like you cover every drying risk area. When is the last time you had a drying crack? I'm guessing you don't see many.
I appreciate the detailed response and it will help our community when dealing with the same type of issues!
Keep watching.
More useful info - thank you
Joan, we love making the videos and are glad you find them useful. Please share the channel with your friends and fellow potters to help us grow our community.
I use my dog's 20 kg feed bags whenever their size is enough. It is made of a very strong and thick plastic. It will keep a piece wet for aeons!
Naturamorpho, sounds like that would work very well. And you have a continuous supply!
Thanks for another informative video 👍
You are welcome mosseyw, thanks for watching!
I have left a sculpture in a plastic box for a number weeks now.
I just checked it and it is way past the 1st phase.
It appears to have a powdery mould on the surface.
Should I have taken it out of the box earlier and will it be OK.
I have been told that you cannot dry too slowly ?
I love you channel by the way.
The bad part about taking wet, organic matter and storing it in a cool, damp space is that stuff grows!
You can't dry too slowly, the sculpture should be fine and whatever is growing on it should disappear during the firing. I use a 'magic box', which is a plastic box with a couple inches of plaster on the bottom. I can keep a piece in the leather hard state for weeks and still be able to trim and paddle the piece. And I do get some interesting growth as a result!