5 Owls for Enamel Experiments - And Some Results

No, I haven't been resting, I've been doing more enamel experiments. Painted enamel, I have concluded - is something I will have to practice more at a later date as I haven't been getting on with it. Shame.
So - I'm back to etching - here are some owls I'm working on. I intend to try out different techniques with transparent enamel on them. They won't all be masterpieces, but at least I will have fun base shapes to work with...

Owls painted in stop-out fluid, about to go into the etching solution
These are all around 1 inch in height

Here is an example of the painted enamel experiments - they no longer exist as I stoned off the enamel to reuse the copper shapes.

Blue painting enamel on a white base - I wasn't too happy with these...

OK - here are my morning's results, in the order I made them (all on 120mm copper sheet).

Poppyheads - fired at 870C with copper flux directly onto the copper

Owl 1 - first a layer of black underglaze to bring out the details, then a layer
of copper flux sifted on top, fired, and another layer
sifted on top of that to build height.

Ferns - two layers of transparent turquoise,
(wet packed), stoned back then  flash fired to smooth.. Tumbled.

Floral - this looks nicer in the picture than it actually is...
Copper flux, then a layer of opal blue, stoned back and flash fired.
The opal blue clumped up in the flash firing

Owl 2 - copper flux, then two layers of transparent turquoise,
then  stoned back and  another layer of flux fired on top to smooth.

Two owls down, three to go.... Better end my lunch break :-)

Some hours later....
I'm running out of steam, but here's a fox just out of the kiln, still on the stilt. Once it's pickled the black lines will be copper coloured and the effect much more subtle...

Kiln at 750C, two layers of silver flux, stoned after the second layer and flash fired...