I made a few test beads again yesterday, six in total. I am still working on the details of the new series. I also played with some of the new reactive glasses I had stashed away for many months and years. By now, these glasses are not new but they are to me. I have never been one to follow trends so tend to work on "new glasses" on my own time and schedule. I'll have to come back to the reactive glasses later when I have more time to play. I have so many waiting in the wings.
After encasing most of the test beads the last two days, I made on
e yesterday which I just left alone. And it only took this one bead for me to decide, "YES!". I decided that some details of "rawness" was lost when the bead was encased and I want this bead to look a bit roughed up. I've made previous test beads many months ago using similar techniques. Interestingly, portions of this bead appears to be etched without being etched. So I am ALMOST there - I have the shape, the texture and basic layout. The most important will be the canes and colors. That is the next step. I see this series as ever evolving because there is so much potential to add to the design in the future.And you thought a bead was just melted glass on a mandrel in a pleasing shape. There is a lot thinking involved as well as trial and error.
