Torch fired enamelling, working with beads

You I love to enamel and the way I usually do that is in the kiln, but today I tried my hand at some torch  fired enamelling. I had taken a course a long time ago with Barbara Lewis and not only did I get online video lessons but she also sent across a a lot of colours, stamped and plain copper blanks, beads,  & other accessories like decals ( these are printed designs that can be fired directly onto the enamel colours, these can also be words & pictures) , cats Whiskers ( thin strands of enamel colours Thracian be fired donto the last layer of enamel. 

For a long time I didn't do anything with them but recently I put together a box of all unfinished projects and I found  some electro formed & enamelled leaves. 

I thought would try to us them in a design and one thing led to another I thought the enamelled beads would go very well with the leaf. So naturally I got out all my torch fired enamel stuff and before you knew it I had a huge mess of things going on.

 Torch fired enamelling s quite different from regular enamelling in that it is very spontaneous. A very basic explanation would be heat the metal dip it in colour & Fire it directly by holding it in the torch flame. Welding rods are used to hold the metal pieces in the flame. 

The above pictures you can see my success which you will be soon seeing made into Jewelry but below are a few failures, hey what's enamelling without a few goof ups : P 

 This one on the right with purple enamel is originally like the one on the left, but I clogged up the filigree work with too much enamel.

Next post will feature the Jewelry I made with these beads.

Lights Camera..... Prop!

One of the jobs that involve being an artist, any artist really is to take photographs of your work, be they paintings, sculptures, assemblage art or yes of course Jewelry. I mean  unless we take pictures and post them on blogs, websites & social media, there is no way all you amazing folks are going to know what we are upto holed up in our studios, are you? 

I am a metal artist but I make a lot of Jewelry, in fact that is what I gave been concentrating on for the past 5 years. 

Taking photos of art and especially Jewelry in such a way that they are shown in the best light and all the detailing & hard work that goes into it are clearly visible is not an easy job. Jewelry usually has subtle  textures, precious or semiprecious stones, intricate enamel work or some delicate wire work. Each of these details need to be clearly visible, this usually means having plenty of light, clean backgrounds & a whole bunch of props. These can range from blue tack to hold the piece of Jewelry up without being visible, to various textured papers, to third hands, fabrics and the list goes on.

Of course it goes without saying, you need a good digital camera like an SLR and a nice lens. Now I am no expert and this not a "how to take pictures " blog post so I am not going to get into details about cameras & lenses. 

 

Apart from the equipment I mentioned above I also have props that I put together out of the most unlikely of objects. 

For example I use this cut out portion of a paper roll to hold up my bracelets. 

Now I mentioned third hand and I do have one that I use both when I am soldering and when I need to hold up a background or support my Jewelry in some way. Besides this one I also have one that I fashioned myself out of some wood scrap, an old brush handle & a clothes pin. 

This contraption is not very sturdy but it does the job since most of my props are pretty light weight. 

 

More necklaces from my bead stash

Still working on using up my bead stash and while it's been fun all the new work had to be photographed & edited & uploaded so these past few days I got caught up doing the same. Meanwhile I completely forgot to post the pictures of all the new necklaces here. So here they are.

Black gold
Brass, black beads
©2015 Nayna Studios™

Floral necklace with terracotta beads
Copper, Brass, Green glass beads, Terracotta beads and white metal floral beads
©2015 Nayna Studios™

Three leaf necklace
Copper, Vitreous enamel, green, blue, and red beads
©2015 Nayna Studios™

Blue ladies

A while back I created some blue patina pendants, these were a series of sea creatures, and just because I wanted to add some more magic to the magical creatures I added a Mermaid to the series. That mermaid turned out to be very popular & a friend/ client suggested I work on some women oriented designs.  So I came up with some pendants in blue patina with enamel accents.

Some of these ladies have accents in enamel, but the newest ones are without adornments.

    

Clearing the bead stash

      Being a jewellery artist comes with a lot of fun jobs some of which include coming up with fun & creative designs, experimenting with techniques, working with gorgeous stones & colourful beads. Of course that means going to some amazing bead & gems dealers to buy them. The flip side? Ending up with way too many beads & gems that not only take up space but also end up tying up finances. So what is the antidote, make jewellery that uses up the beads of course ;)

Till date I have worked on about seven necklaces! Yup am preening a little :D

Here is the first of them 

Papyrus Necklace with lapis
© 2015 Nayna Studios™
Copper, brass, beads and Lapis Lazuli

 This particular necklace has an Egyptian influence to it , Not only did I get a chance to use some pretty barrel shaped beads in moss green but also a drop shaped Lapis Lazuli as the focal point of the papyrus flower shaped pendant. 

Something new for Valentine's day

These past few days I had been thinking of what I could do to create some special jewellery for Valentine's day. I thought of making some heart pendants and earrings, but I also wanted to create something special, something that would personalise the jewellery for the wearer. So I came up with this idea  of incorporating a container pendant in either a bracelet or a necklace that could be used to add a secret message by the wearer. 

These are the container tubes that I have created . Right now they have been cleaned and will be going into the tumbler tomorrow along with some heart pendants. hey it is Valentine's Day so some heart themed jewellery is called for : D