Transcripts
1. Introduction to Mugs: Hello, My name is Sam and welcome to my home here in
the ills of Central Virginia, also known as
spotted ors pottery. I started making ceramics seven years ago
after I got out of the Navy and decided to go back to school and
finish my degree. And there have been
a clay class and I quickly fell in love with it. Now, like many other
veterans who went back to school after
their service, ceramics class was
a popular choice as it gave everyone,
not just us, the time and space to
do something tactile and challenging while
also being creative. When you're working
with clay, it's right in front of
you and it requires your attention and your care and naturally draws your focus, which helps take
the mind away from stressors and other anxieties. A combination of
mental stimulation and working with our hands is a
very comfortable activity. Just not a primal level. The cave people are
not loved craft. It's a quality we've carried
through the millennia, which is something
I like to think about and makes
you feel connected to people in general. It's something that I love to do and it's something
that we all share. And I, I really liked that. I make a variety of forms from functional items
for everyday use around the house like mugs, bowls and plates,
sculptural pieces for decoration like masks. And I have a special
place in my heart. Making forums for Ikebana, for Japanese flower arranging. Rhyme make an interesting
vessel and someone else makes an incredible
flower display with it. But it's,
it's pretty cool. We're working with our
hands is satisfied. And even more
satisfying than that is using an item that
you made yourself. No matter what it is really, it's a very rewarding feeling. Probably the most
popular item in this category is the
focus of today's class. We'll be learning
about one of the most recognizable and welcoming
forms of the modern day. The mug. Most people have a mug and all of those people
have a favorite mug. And whether it's me by hand, are printed out of a factory. It's still a very
personal item that you spend a lot of very
important time with. But using a handmade mug will always feel better
than a printed one. That's just science. So we will be
establishing the basics of making a mug on the wheel, covering the
fundamental knowledge and skills needed to make one, including our three
core concepts, learn to use leverage, stability, and sensitivity to accomplish our
goals on the wheel. And give you the
freedom to go from there and explore with
different styles, decorative elements, or
whatever else you want to do. The MAC is a simple form and it leaves the door open
for all sorts of wild interpretations and
alterations and decorations. In this class, we'll be
covering a few basic mugshots, cylinder, the cone
and the funnel. And one simple handle
making this down will be loosely shaping and then pulling some handles that are comfortable and easy to use. All of that starts with
getting our workspace, tools, clay and
ourselves prepared. Then we'll be watching our clay, talking about how to do that
and why it's important. Then getting our clay on
the wheel, centering it, opening it up, lifting the walls and making three shapes
of mug, the reference. After that we'll
pull our handles discussing how that works
and how to go about it. And we'll attach
that handles and do any finishing touches
that might be needed. So sit back in your
chair or forward on your wheel and
let's get started.
2. Preparation: First, let's go over the tools
needed for today's class. The most obvious piece
we need for throwing anything on the wheel
is, well allele. If you don't have
access to a wheel, I would recommend finding
a local studio that either as classes or equipment
that you can rent herself. If buying isn't in the budget, then we'll grab a bucket of slightly warm water and
layout our hand tools. I like to keep it simple
with a small sponge, a couple of flexible ribs, my straight cedar ribs, the bamboo knife, and my administrative tools like
wire and kneel to me. I'll select to use a
plastic bag to throw on, but isn't absolutely necessary as long as you
remember to take out the pins that hold
that bad in place before throwing your hands. Will thank you.
Lastly, for the tools, it's very helpful to
have a towel or apron on hand as it helps to
manage some of the mess. And we'll keep a lot of the
clay off of your clothing. Next we'll prepare our clay. I'm going to make
them three mugs, three different shapes, but all will be one pound of clay. One pound will give us a
pretty standard size mug. A lot of people
do love big mugs. So if that's the
route you want to take us at least a
pound and a half. I'm using a recycle clay
that's a mix of solid wood, are really sandy
clay called 950. And B makes wood, which has
a lot of porcelain on it. And that gives us
clay all sorts of superpowers when it
comes to throw in, It's a very nice clay
body to work with. We have our clay, so let's use our wild wire tool to cut off one pound chunks and
put them on the scale. Once we have them all weighed, it's time to which wedging clay is a very
important part of the process. And as a method of
pushing the clay into itself over and over, driving out air bubbles
evening out the water content and it even
wakes the clay up a bit. As many clays are what's
called pixel tropic. Meaning the more it's
moved around the looser the molecules become
enhancing its plasticity. So don't be surprised
if you see a potter throwing a bag a claim on
the crown multiple times, as there are probably just
getting those molecules moving and also maybe working through some
internal challenges. I try not to judge, but if this isn't done with it, they're extra tropic clay. You'll be much harder and
therefore much difficult, much more difficult
to work with. But wedging also helps with this process of
waiting the clay up. And I also like
to think of it as a handshake before
getting started. As lets me know what
state the clay is n and what I can
expect when throwing. I use the spiral
budgeting technique, where I push the clay into
itself with a slight rotation, then rocket back with
a slight rotation, creating a spiral in the Cloud. Lets me know I'm
making these layers. You can pressing them
into each other. I'll typically do 30 or so
iterations when wedging, pat them into a ball and
set them by my wheel. Once we're done, we'll have
a seat at our wheel and get the clay center.
Let's keep going.
3. Centering: All right, Now that we have our clay or tools or
wheel and ourselves ready and it's time to get our clay on the
wheel and centered. So I'm going to put just a
thin layer just for them. Moist sponge, not a wet
sponge with moist sponge just kind of put
a little layer of water down on my back here. And that's going to help
the clay stick to that, that might throw it on there. It's gonna take my first, I'll click the
pattern around us. This nice solid sided doesn't have any splits and
like I wouldn't want to throw this side down because of these little folds
in the clay might cause a crack later
on the bottom. So I'm gonna make
sure in throw down on the smooth, smooth
side of the clay. Let's write that down in the back and you can throw
it down like I just did and try to aim for the center or you can just place it there and pat it will spin the
wheel, didn't do too bad. It's pretty close to the center. Now when we actually start to get into the centering itself, Here's where my kinda three core ideas of throwing
really come into play. I remember that first
one is leveraged, making sure that you're
using your body and as many parts of your body
and your skeletal system to support yourself. Then with that,
leverage will find stability and that'll
help you make a space for the
clay while you're centering or doing anything
else with the Clegg. And last, once you have that leverage, once
you have that, once you have that stability, then you can get
into sensitivity. And that's when you
really start to feel the finer movements of the clay while you're
working with there. So I'm gonna get a little
water on my sponge here, get that spinning, put
that water on the clay. And then for my
leverage own embrace my left elbow right here against my hip and would
like clay spinning, I'm going to rest the
base of my hand right here and the rest of the blade of my
hand against the bat, the base of my hand is going
to rest against that clay. And that's going to provide
the backdrop for me. It's going to provide
that sideways pressure. But if I just provide
sideways pressure, pushed off the bat. So that's where the
right-hand comes in and applies that
downward pressure. And that's when I
started to create a little space for the case, even with just a little
bit of pressure, you can see how much that clays already gotten to the center of the
bat where I want it. So one more time in a brace, this left-hand really
pushed and you can see just that left-hand
alone and starts to really push it around and
get it towards the center. This is I don't just
want to come and they come in pressing down
with our right hand. And you can see, I'm pressing. You can see what that
pressure is right there. The ball of my thumb, left-hand resting here with the
blade and base of my hand. And then that right-hand
using the ball of my thumb to press
down on that senate. Know what I'm doing is just
creating a little space, creating a little
little room for the clay to be an
instead of filling them, forcing the clay
into any position I'm fighting with the clay. I tried to think of it as i'm I'm creating a space for the clay to be in that I can
work with it comfortably. All right. Looks pretty good. Usually scrape away a
little clay right there. Take off any excess water. And we have some centered clay. And don't, don't be afraid to
take your time doing this. It can really, well, it can be, it can be tricky for beginners, can be tricky for
anybody sometimes. So don't be afraid
to take your time. I wouldn't spend too
much time centering as the longer use center and the more water you are
applying for the clay, the more clay as being washed away with all the
slip you're creating. You know, when you throw That's all clay coming off of it, coming out, coming
off of the body here. So you don't preserve as
much of that as possible. So you don't want to
spend all day centering, but it's also not
bad to get practice. So we have this clay centered. Now we'll get into
opening it up.
4. Throwing and Shaping part 1: Now that we have our clay
centered on the button, we're going to open it up and lift the walls into the
shape that we want. Add a little more
water at the top here. I'm going to take my
right hand and just rest the curve of my thumb here on
the top and just slowly press down
with my other thumb. Just to create this
little dimple right here. Not a big one,
just a little one. But whenever I'm using
my hands on the clay, I like to support it with something else and kind of treat any part of my
hand that's coming in contact with the clay. I'll treat that
as a tool and try to support it with
my other hand. And that just makes it makes it easier on your
hands and gives you more gives you more stability while you're working
with the clay. And that's really important
for low water in there. And then I'll hold
my left thumb. Like a tool right
here. Like a pencil? Yes, sir. Whatever you hold like that. I'm just going to
drive the point of my thumb down into the clay. Once I've done that, I'm
going to take the water out, grab my needle tool, and we're going to
use this to check the depth of the clay. So we've got a few millimeters of Clare there and
that's perfect. That's exactly what I want. It's just it's just thick
enough where it'll be sturdy. You want to have to worry about breaking it anytime you set it down and it can be used in the dishwasher and all that, but also not too thick
where it's overly heavy or ungainly are
uncomfortable to use. Once we have that
depth established, open a little more
water in here with that same hand position
and we'll put the point of my thumb and then I'm gonna
pull it back towards me. I'm gonna open that up. And I'm gonna open that up
around a finger spread across. That should be a good
width for among. Nice comfortable spread
on my fingers there. And that's, I guess 3.5
inches. I don't know. It will start to
just use your hand as a measuring tool
after a while. Now that I've got
this opened up, I need to lift this
clay vertically. I'm going to put
some water on that. Now what I'm gonna do
is I'm gonna start with my right hand and just kind of just with this kind
of hand position, I'm going to rest it
under this clay here. And then from the inside, I'm going to push out and over my right hand and
then lift up and create this little extruder. You can do it pinch where
your hands are even, but that creates a
weak spot in the clay while you're lifting
creates a really thin spot. When you offset
your hands a little bit and you pull up like that. Let's the clay will just not be thinned out
so much in any one spot. It acts as an extruder and it creates a longer process
with a clay as being squeezed and lift it up. But
however you're comfortable. Going crazy, place
my right hand here. I'm going to press out and over. I'm also going to use
this outside hand. Push the clay in a little bit, get a little rock and REM there. Then with all of this
movement I have here, let me take my sponge
and compress that room and get that clay even back out. Now whenever we're making a cylinder shape of this first mug is going
to be a cylinder. You want to be
cautious of letting any of the clay of flare
out while you're lifting. You want to keep
everything as close to the center of the
wheel as possible. And that's because when
you're spinning this wheel, there's a lot of forces
acting on the clay, a lot of centrifugal force. And you're trying
to get it to defy centrifugal force
as well as gravity. You're trying to lift this
clay up in a cylinder shape. The closer you have it. What I'm gonna do here is I'm
gonna keep lifting it up. I'm gonna cone this in a little
bit and just try to keep that clay as close to the center of the
wheel as possible. And that just decreases. It's centrifugal force
acting on the pot. It's not as important
when it's a smaller, more contained shaped like this, but it becomes
especially important when you're working on bowls. Plates are especially anything like a large bowl,
anything like that. We're going to get one
more little lift data here. Little more water. And don't be afraid about using too much water or having a bunch of water in the pot
while you're working on it, don't let it sit
in there too long. But for the most part, it's not something you really
need to worry about. Nice and easy. And also you'll
notice I'm keeping my hands connected
while I'm doing this, while I'm lifting, I have
my thumbs crossed over like this and that just
helps me keep all right. Keep a bearing on where the other hand is that
if I have them separate, that I'm relying on my
elbows and shoulders to navigate where if I cross my thumbs and have the
hand support each other, then I have a much more
direct relationship with each side of the clay
while I'm working with it, while I'm trying to lift it up, pull some of this water out. Let's see. That's that's a fine thickness. Then do that'll do. For this mug, I'm going to have a cylinder shape.
That's what I want. I'm gonna come in, I'm
going to use my strengths, cedar ribs here to the side. And then I'm just going to
push out from the inside and push the clay into the
side of my rib here. That's gonna do a
couple of things. Aside from making
too much noise, It's going to scrape
off this excess, slip off the, off the
surface of the pot, but it's also going to
compress this clay. It's going to even it
out a little bit more, just giving it that
extra bit of strength. That's definitely what you need, especially when you're dealing
with functional items. You want them to be as durable as possible because people are gonna be using them, toss them in the sink
and toss them in the microwave or the dishwasher. And you expect them to hold
up amidst all that use. In order to do that, you want to do things like
compressing the bottom, compressing the walls and
also compressing the rim. As you go. On compressing the Rem, you can either just use
your sponge, that's fine. You can even use the
crook of your hand like that if you
have enough space. Sometimes, often I'll
just make a little little v with my
thumb and forefinger. They're just kind of
settled on like that. And what that does,
it just creates a little I guess we'd
call them lip line, where it just makes
it a little more comfortable to drink from. So I'm going to
compress this a little bit more with my smaller room. Somebody's details worked out. This mug is just gonna
be a straight cylinder, but we're gonna give
it just a little bit. But just a tiny bit of
flare on the top there. Just a little bit. Just so it's not completely
just a cylinder. You're gonna give it just a little bit of
interest right there. And that will also create a
nice little landing platform for while somebody's
drinking out of it. And I'm going to take my
bamboo knife right here. And I'm just going
to scrape away some of these clay off the side. Gonna have that a
nice straight line. Scrape this claim
bucket script that's, I'll flip it over. Scripted clean off the bat. One more push from
the side there. That'll do it for now. That'll,
that'll do it for now. And then later, later on we can trim it or mess around with little more once it's a little drier and a little
more bearable. But for now we have our first, we have our first body, our first mug shape,
the cylinder. We have this, we'll cut
it off and set it aside. And then we'll throw
our other two, which will be a funnel
shape like that, and then a cone shape like that. All right, So now we're
gonna get this cutoff with our wire tool and grab
it with both hands. Use these wooden anchors
are usually wrap it around one special but smaller. And then with that
tension when he's both my thumbs and press down and I'm gonna press
that down against the bat. You can pull it
just straight back. I like to get the
wheels turning just a little bit, then pull it back. It's not a huge deal, but what it does do
which can come in handy. If you're just pulling
straight back, you're stretching that
clay one direction and it'll pull it and it can
just mess with things. If you have something
that you're trying to do specifically, it can pull things out of whack. So if you have the wheel
spinning and pull it, it distributes that force
around the base of the pot instead of just going one
direction against the pot. So once we have that cut with a dry wall and retry hands and just get my hands
around that rocket off. We'll set it over here. We have our first mug. Now that we have our
first shape done, let's throw these other two. Will speed through those a
little bit and then stop when we're ready to shape
our two different shapes, our cone and our funnel. Alright, now that we have
our second cylinder throne, we're going to turn this
out into a funnel shape. The first thing I'm
gonna do is come in with my rib extremity is
my CDA rib here. Compress this again,
compress these balls of it. I'm do that by holding this
off to the side and pressing the clay out to the
side of my tool here. Slowly work my way up. We have a nice
compressed wall there. Instead of last time. Just leaving it in, just keeping the walls
nice and straight. I'm going to open
this up a little bit. I'm gonna do that by just
getting my left hand wet. I'm just going to press
it against the room here and just slowly start
to pull that out. Flare that room
out a little bit. Flare it out a little bit. And then I'm going
to drive my hand down along the wall of
the clay from the inside, pushing that clay
out a little bit. We want to keep somewhat
of a straight wall. Somewhat, somewhat. We'll give it a little
bit of curve to it. That sounds fun. Little more water
on my hand here. Knock that out a little bit. Drive my fingertips
down inside speeds.
5. Throwing and Shaping part 2: Now there's all sorts of
great tools out there, and I've got a lot
of great tools here. But I like to use as much of my hands as possible
while I'm doing this. Obviously tools are necessary in many points throughout
the process. But even when it, when
it comes to shaping, I really liked just
using the size of my hand helps me control what's happening
a little bit more. There's an impulse,
especially beginners to use a lot of tools because they
think it'll make it easier. But really you're just
adding one more element, one more factor in the equation that you have to
deal with longer throwing. I recommend especially
the beginners, as much as you
can, not the whole time, but as much as you can. Try to use your hands to
shape and push things around that will help develop your sensitivity
and just make you better. In general, with this, I'm gonna do one more. No more water in here. More than knock this
out a little bit. Give it that little
bit of flair. Those phenomena
bring coming scripts and use that curve of the rib to push out
their room a little bit. Let me give you just a
little bit extra extra. They're actually not that
much. Needed as much. We don't really need as
much with the funnel shape. Then what I will do
is use this Rube on the inside and create
a slight bevel there. Because drinking
from a horizontal, horizontal plane is just
not very comfortable. Since we want this
to be as comfortable as possible for somebody to use. Pull the water out
of the bottom there. Then I'm going to use
my bamboo knife here. Pushing from the scripts
animal clay away. I'm going to turn
that night over, scraped off and wipe it off a
little bit and then come in and do one more Good Press here to kind of
follow this line. What I'm looking for now is just to continue
this motion here, pressing just a little
bit more script. There we go. Just
a little bit more, a little bit right now. There we go. So I had a little
lump right there that I was trying to get
rid of and we did. We can make it a little bit. Slight imperfections
are kinda funny. I was like finding
little imperfections and I'm using other
people's stuff or even my own stuff that kind of demonstrates the
fluidity of the process. When you have a fixed
inanimate object, It's nice to be reminded
of how it came to be and be reminded that
it wasn't always a fixed, fixed thing was very plastic at 1 and it was influenced by somebody and you came
something static. And that's kind of
exciting to think. Well maybe that's a
little too. The weeds and philosophical for now. Good spot on the screen. This off the bat here. I'm also going to
cut just a very slight little w
here at the bottom. That's just going
to kind of mimic the rest with a cylinder. I'm a little more comfortable giving it a straight bottom, although we'll trim
it a little bit. But with this, I want to cut in just a slight
little pebble here that's going to help mimic everything else
that's going on, these changes in direction. But it's also going to give it just a little bit
of lift is going to create this little
shade line that just makes the pot feel
like it's standing up a little bit more,
which is funneled. Okay, now we have this, let's get this cutoff placed
in the side and we'll get our cone-shaped going around. You can see right there, right here where the clay got pulled out that direction so you can see how that Clay gets moved and pushed by the liar. That's also why you want to
make sure you're pressing the wire down so it
stays against the back. If you have a loose
grip and it hits that clay and actually
went right up. And I'll end up cutting into the pot and creating this nice, lovely aren't that
makes it unusable. So the sides are
dry now the slip off of my hands are dry.
Get a grip around it. Rocket back a little bit there. Correct. Any little imperfections
that I've put in there? The script is clout
and we'll get our third cylinder throne. And then shape that. Now that we have
our third cylinder, we can create our cone shape. That I know you've all
been eagerly awaiting. Pull little water out of there. Then what you want to notice. When you're working
with the same amount of clay and making
different shapes, is that all shapes will not allow you the same
amount of freedom. Well, we'll get into that later. Cylinder will kind of give you the minimum amount
of Plato work with. A narrow bottom
will give you much more clay to work with. Because there's less of
that clay against the bat. This since it's a wide bottom, is going to give me
the least amount of clay to work with up here, because most of it is
going to be down here, caught just in the horizontal base that I have established. What are the things I can
do to kind of give the illusion a little
more width is used, some of this clay down
here and I'm gonna push out little bit. What I'm going to end
up doing is creating a heavy bubble right here. So I'm going to push this out. I'm gonna use my
hand and kind of follow that line
up a little bit. That'll help me get
this shape that I want with the
claim that I have, not have to rely so much on
getting all that pushed out. I'm gonna add a little
more water here. Now I'm gonna come
in with my rib. Now I'm gonna push out again. Let me push out into this rib. Establish this line. Back down to shuttle script that slip off,
compress those roles. Nice, durable, more
water out of here. Now we have about the shape
that I'm looking for. Just this nice wide bottom
that tapers in at the top. Lip a little bit more. Flair. Now, we're gonna
play with this down here. So I'm gonna take
my throwing knife again in with the
blade pointed up here. I'm going to drive
it into the side. I'm gonna drive it
in at an angle. Cut this clan and
bottom here by little. Create this nice heavy
bevel on the bottom. And that'll just accentuate all of this that's
happening up here. Give it some lift. It a
little more interesting. Let me go. I'm going to sharpen this
line up just a little bit. Just a little bit. Now we
have our third mug shade, less than water out
of the bottom there. My hands dry. Towel
comes in handy. Weapon, long pants, wire.
6. Handles part 1: Okay, now we're ready to
get our handles pull. So what I'm going to
need is a piece of clay and bamboo cutting
knife and a bucket of water. We're going to need that
to pull the handles. I'm going to try to do
most of these handles out of one lump of
clay from someone, start to pack this around and start to get
it into a Keras. She seems kind of padding IT background
and applying more pressure here
at the bottom. And he's going to squeeze a
little bit, scared to work. So I'm only going to be working with this little bit of clicks. I'm willing to be pulling
one handle at a time. Let out, and it was gonna kinda
happen on the table here. So to give it a
little more flatness, little more of an angle here. What I'm doing is
I'm kind of smack in the wooden pulling
back a little bit, a smack and pullback. Go back. Now just starts to stretch
that out a little bit and we'll make it a
lot easier for me when I go to start pulling it. So when I start pulling, I'm going to dip this in the water. Now the totally carbon,
I want to leave a big chunk up here
for me to hold onto. I don't wanna get
this wet because that'll make it too
slippery to hold onto. So I'm gonna keep
this up here dry, keep a good grip on that. And then only use my right hand with the water and
use that to pull. So when you start to
pull, usually it's kinda make a little
rectangle there with your hand and you start
to pull down a little bit and you wrap
that finger around. You wanna make sure your
hands There's plenty wet while you're doing this. The Muslim going to rotate it. And that'll help get any, um, and he lopsidedness and
consistencies kind of worked out. Nice and easy. Some people that can
do this really fast. I'd like to take
my time with it. And once I have that, what I'm gonna do
is I'm going to use these two fingers
now and do that. And that's gonna help me smooth out these sides a little bit. Let's switch it
around so I don't have it going in one direction. And they come back
with this ending or it's not like a nice
flat strap handle. I like it to be really wide. You pretty fun. I'm just going to come down and just
do a couple on each side. And something else I
want to make sure I have is a taper here. I wanted to be Fen pretty even and then start to
flare out because that's going to be the part that I attached to the mug and I'm going to need to
be the strongest. Someone has these two
fingers again that just to just start smooth
out these sides have been and there we have it That's about sudden
muses handle trauma, handoff little bit, sorry, uses spongy drive my hand. Now I'm going to do,
now I'm going to have this basic candle
shape ready to go. I'm going to hold
like that and that in turn a little bit. And I'm going to set it on
its side on the table here. And then use my knife and
cut that off way up high. And something else I'm gonna
do every time I do that is I cut at an arc like this. I was coded a bit of an angle. And I will just make
it easier when I go to stick this on the mug, it'll have this nice rounded
side so I can just pop it right on the cylinder
and it'll be ready to go. All right, some of
the speed this up, get these other handles
made and we'll regroup. Okay. Now we have our
four handles night through four handles
because it's always a good idea to throw more handles
then you have pieces. You can see the first one that
I made it a little small. I was start with small handles, but then I started to get
to the size that I need to. So however, many are
throwing of something, usually give yourselves
a couple extra handles. Just gives you
more to work with, more choices and it's
also just good practice. So we're going to let our mugs and our handles
dry a little bit, or probably just blast
them with the heat gun. And we will go over
getting them attached. Now that our mug on
the banding wheel, I'm going to do just a
little bit of trimming. It's not enough
where I think it's worth putting it
back on the wheel. So I'm just using my
banding wheel here and my sugar form and just
take off a little bit. Not very much. I'm
just going to soften this edge up just a little bit. Nothing crazy. Just to bring that in a
little bit, little bit and come back with a sponge, smooth and even that out there. And just that little bit took a little flare that was there and just cut
it in a little bit, giving it that shade line, giving it that little bit
of left that we want. Now instead this one side
and do the others here. If they need it. This one
needs just a little bit. We'll do this one a
little more slowly. There. There we go. Just a tiny little bit. Smooth that out, not
knocking it off the table. Down. Then our funnel, which just has a couple of
little crust these here. So we've just got knocked off. But like I said,
nothing that would be enough for me
to put it back on the wheel to trim just
slightly more touch ups. Okay. Now that we have those
trim that we want, we're ready to put
our handles on.
7. Handles part 2: Now we have our mugs trimmed, leather hard or handled
selected for each one. We'll get into
putting these handles on and any finishing
touches Nell need. So we're gonna do our
cylinder Monday or first. And you can see right off the
bat, handles a little bit. That's okay. Doesn't matter. I'd rather have too
much handle than too little when it comes
to putting them on. So first thing I'm gonna
do is I'm going to put this handle right about,
right about here. So right about here.
If you can see that I'm just going
to score that. I don't want to
put it all the way up against the very top. Not just removes some of the seminal attention and makes it look a little clunkier. So I like to have it
just slightly below. So I scored that
with my needle tool. I'm going to take my handle, score that as well. And scoring is just cutting
a bunch of little scratches. So what we're gonna do is
we're going to apply slip, which is just play. That's really watered down. Essentially what I have
in my drawing bucket. And I'm going to use
it as a glue to match these two pieces
of clay together into one so that it doesn't
break and handling pop off. Sorry. It's called. All right. Somebody used my
brush. You can use a sponge, whatever you like. Clearwater. What's on there? Up a little bit on there. I'm going to hold this MOOC with my hand resting
on the inside, on the inside of
where the plan is pressure and lay that
on just to push that. And you notice I'm pushing
from down here a little bit, not from the very top. I don't want to pinch
that top holding, give it a width to
maintain this taper. It's taping that and a half. And so I have a good
idea of where that mugs with him is going to be. I'm going to press this that
into the base of the mug, someone to cut all of this off. And I wanted to go ahead
and establish that curve. It's not one of fall off. It just did a
moment ago and they keep pressing that firms can be sliding my hand
up the handle, just pressing it
into the platelet. Excess, slip away and start working that down kind of
welding that seem a little bit and see right there with lifted up and then that taper
helps with that as well. It helps to catch this handle. Helps to well,
handle to the mug. So it looks continuous to it. So it looks like
it's meant to be they're not it's just not
that it's just mashed on, pinched up and haphazard looking unless you're going for some people do want
that and that's fine. I can be pretty cool. But for the sake of this handle, we want it to look like
it's just up and write out our case. We have our talk attached
the way we like it. Now, this is going to
keep pressing the SEM. And you can see it
starting to split away a little bit and just
pop that right off. I'm not, I'm not as worried
about slipping and scoring. It's going to be pretty
strong, longer that as well. This on really well right here. It's really this top joint
that you want to put the most when you want to put
effort and care into all of it. But that's the one that
really is going to determine the longevity
of the handle. And we want to make
sure we have this well, that arm nice and tight and that I will let
let get all the way to the bottom of the muck
down fine with it's really just the top row and a half offset just a little
bit from the top. Sat down with them. Okay, so there's our first,
that's our cylinder. Now we'll move on
to our cone here. Let's take a look at
how this is going to look at their elliptic curve, this a little bit more. Get an idea of how wide that is. Come back with my needle tool. And just like the last one, not going all the way
to the top score, handle water. And just the SAML support
this from the inside. Attach this little rays back. This folder could
start grip in there. It's just that middle
slide is fallen, sir. Pressure into the
side of the month. And that's where I'm
just gonna rest. Essentially my fingertips,
right where that pressure is going
to form it will. Unless that's what you're
going for, then go for it. But that press on a little bit excess away bottom. Well, that helps if you keep it somewhat dry and helps your finger
kind of grip the clay. Thoughts opponent Dao. Drag it a little
bit. There you go. Over here and do the same thing. Anywhere you can reach. You want to be welding
that clay. Michelle. There. This side step to really kind of continue this
line is these two lines. And you often get, when
you pull animals by hand, it's going to try to accentuate
that towards the bottom. Now. Let's use our trimming knife. Cuts. All right, let's cut that
shape is kinda nice. Good. Snr we add our, Which one is that cone. Cone rug, our funnel handle, and take a look at
where everything is. All right. Answer and touch
it right about there. Then. Here the third
that's a pretty good size. I don't know. That's why you wanna
make sure things are leather heart squishing
that he's like I do. Or the side of where mug here. Score the inside of your handle. Then supporting from the inside. Reestablish this curve since
supports itself login. I'm just going to lightly attached this
slightly attention. This isn't bearing all the way. Well, I'm attaching sorry. Well, I'm attaching
keeps being dishonored. Sliding that up and
following the lines, these kind of bands that are already know accentuate
those a little bit. If anything. Extra mile away, their underside. Nice and sturdy. And this is where
you also can start making some aesthetic decisions. I like to have things look like they're a little smoother. Some people like to have
it look like they're very deliberately attached
to a kind of Nabi. There's all sorts of different cool stuff you
can do with handles. And I think this is
kinda just the most basic basic bare-bones
kind of handles to do. You're pulling the strap handles and just welding
on nice and smooth. Learning, learning those basics, getting those
foundations, and then starting to get a lot
more exploratory. And started a mess
around with different, different styles in different
directions and how things look when they're moving
away from the mug. Okay? Skewed data, local support
that can be inside. Press with talking a little bit down at the bottom
just to kind of mirror this funnel tapered
shape we had gone down. Now we haven't mentioned
give all these enough room to get F3, Alexander pinky on the bottom. There, we have it three
months here and is attached.
8. Final Thoughts: Well there we have it, three
mugs there'll be nice to use and hopefully bring someone a little joy
throughout their day. Thanks so much for spending
some time with me. I hope you are able to
learn something and now we inspire you to make
something new. Mugs are fun for
me to work with. And there's so many wild
varieties out there to explore and experiment with. And I would encourage
you to do just that, whether on social
media or if you can get to a gallery
or museum safely. Explore. Humans had
been working with clay for tens of thousands of
years, if not longer. And its history is very
rich and very amazing. But these three mugs, good baselines to work with and cultivating the skills
necessary to be solid on these basics will provide
you with a springboard to launch into the wild world of mugs and ceramics in general, with confidence and aptitude. If any of those seem
daunting or confusing, I would encourage you to watch my basics of throwing class. That's where we explore the fundamentals a
little more in depth. And we talk more
extensively about the three core aspects of leverage, stability,
and sensitivity. Important things
for any powder to keep in mind when
working on the wheel. If you'd like me to
go more in depth when it comes to making handles, whether it be pulling them
or any other technique, please let me know
or leave a comment below with any questions,
remarks, suggestions, anything. I answer pretty quickly and really love talking with
people about this stuff. So please feel free. And once again,
thanks for taking some time out of your day
to spend some time with me. I hope you enjoyed the video and that you'll join
me for the next one. Bye now.
Samuel Deering, Lets make some pots!
