Thread: Taming Terra
View Single Post
  #27  
Old 2012-02-27, 2:57pm
bluffroadglass bluffroadglass is offline
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Sep 03, 2005
Posts: 682
Default

Just an update to let you guys know what's going on with this tutorial.

When I announced the tutorial and started writing it, I was under the impression that the "original formula" handpulled Terra that Double Helix is selling was made with exactly the same formula as the original Terra produced by DH in 2007. But when I got some of the new handpulled Terra in last week, I noticed several differences in working and striking characteristics between the new Terra and the original Terra. I wrote to Jed at DH and he confirmed that something is being done or added to the new Terra to "stabilize" it. Whatever is being done to stabilize the new Terra, it causes it to behave differently in the flame and to strike very differently than the original, at least for me.

I've been enjoying the new Terra and getting good colors from it, but even annealing at 870, which is about 50 degrees cooler than I ever annealed the original Terra, the colors come out of the kiln dark and muted unless the new Terra is encased. For this reason I haven't been able to duplicate the "Essential Terra" series beads that were to be featured in this tutorial with the new Terra. The beads I made with the original Terra were always unencased, and they just aren't the same with the encasing that is required with the new Terra in order to keep the vibrant colors.

My assumption is that those beads are the ones most people would be primarily interested in. Since not everybody has original Terra and after a full week of testing I haven't been able to successfully duplicate the Essential Terra beads with the new version of Terra (at least not without encasing the beads), I'm going to need some more time to decide how to handle the differences between the two Terras in the tutorial, and whether under the circumstances it's even worth finishing and releasing this tutorial at all.

One thing I'm considering is teaching both the original and the new Terra in the tutorial. This would consist of a section on striking original Terra, including a step-by-step on making the Essential Terra beads, and then a separate section on the current Terra showing how to strike and get the best color range from that, with a step-by-step on an encased design or two using the new Terra.

Could I ask for your input here? Would you guys be interested in a tutorial covering both versions, or should I just scrap the idea entirely until there's a version of Terra available that behaves exactly like the original? I'd really appreciate your opinions.

Thanks!
__________________
Kim


To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 5 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
Reply With Quote