The stages of making my purple flowery cabochon

I have been asked a couple of questions about my purple flowery cabochon pendant so here's a little more information  about how I made it. Looking at the colour differences due to the lighting in my pictures I really should go back to using my  photography set up but I took these pictures as a record for me rather than for sharing with you.

First I made 2 canes (typically I made them with little bits left over from another project so they were tiny and of course beautiful! If I had made them larger they wouldn't have been so nice, it's the cane law!).

The purple flower canes

I then hand formed a cabochon shape from scrap clay, starting with a ball shape which I cut in half and smoothed it down onto my work surface. I don't get the shape perfect at this stage as it will be squashed about when I add the decoration.


I covered the scrap clay cabochon shape with thin slices of the cane pressing them in firmly once I am happy with their arrangement and not worrying too much about the distortion of the shape of the pendant. I use a knitting needle (a short double ended metal one, it's my favourite smoothing tool) to smooth the cane slices so the joins were no longer visible. The cabochon then needs a little reforming (OK quite a lot sometimes!) and then gentle smoothing to remove finger marks. It is then baked, for more information about getting the ideal curing conditions  see my latest curing experiments

Cabochon after first baking, unsanded (yes this is a different one from pictures below)

When making this pendant I couldn't decide whether to give it a border 'frame' or not. So I took a picture without then added one and took a picture with the border so I could compare side by side. I decided the 'frame' added to the look of the pendant so was worth the extra time.

These pendants have been sanded but not buffed. I make the basic shape, bake and sand it then I add the backing, bail and a border. It's then baked and  repolished with the last few grades of sand paper only and buffed with my homemade dremel buffing wheel. I have tested it out and found you don't get a better shine particularly by sanding and rebaking but it does mean it is easier to sand right to the edge if there isn't a border in the way. It is better to add the backing, bail and border to a baked cabochon as you don't distort it whilst doing so.

Here's the finished piece!

Hopefully that answered the questions, if you have any more feel free to ask either by comment here or email me (see the contact me link above or to the left). Also if you are having trouble leaving comments can you let me know - by email I guess.  Thanks

Cara

Purple Flowers,pendants, micromesh and pens

My mum got more birthday presents made by me. I wasn't quite sure how my disc necklace would work out so I went back to something I knew would work just in case - a flowery cabochon. Again in purples. It turned out very well, I'm very pleased with it. She ended up with both.

I recently bought some new micromesh sheets in the 8000 and 12000 grits. Previously I had the basic hobby kit which went up to 6000. The difference in the shine is marked. Polishing up to 12000 grit micromesh means that you can buff to a glass like shine by hand on a tea towel! Add a little mechanical buffing on the dremel and they are glorious! With this one I made the cabochon (hand formed) then I baked and polished it then added the frame and rebaked.  I polished again through the last 3 grades briefly and then buffed. It certainly doesn't look like polymer clay any more!

I also made my first proper pen, with a pen kit rather than covering a cheap biro. Again for my mum, she was a little spoilt I think, but she deserves it!

In theory it's refillable but I had some trouble fitting the parts together so I am not sure how easily it will come apart to put refill in. Again it's polished with the new finer micromesh cloths and it's a thing of purple beauty! I wish I had made my polymer clay bits a tiny bit thinner so it doesn't bulge out from the central band. Next time I will - or I'll just cover the band with a different clay pattern too! I've ordered some more pen kits so watch this space for more. I have ordered some different types to try out. There are so many different ones out there it's hard to know which ones to buy.

I've made some other jewellery bits with the same 2 purple flower canes. As always I didn't make the canes big enough, if I didn't like them I would have lots of it of course! Sometimes canes just really turn out great. With these I love how the colours work together but because I wasn't sure if using all purples would be too much I only made very small canes. Luckily I am getting good at cutting thin so I have made them go a long way.

Latest jewellery - and it's all for me!

I haven't had any new jewellery for myself for a while now, I was busy making sale stock and completing orders. So far this year things have been quieter so finally made myself some new things. Here's some of them

3 blue and white skinny bangles. I am road testing these to see how they strong they are. Baked them extra long to try and make sure they were strong!

Blue and white oval cabochon pendant, I do love this simple blue and white flower cane. This is the second batch of the cane I've made and I can see I will be making more.

The blue and white colours are also the colour palette for this week in the Flickr Colour Palette a Week group - do come and join in with whatever medium you craft in.

Hollow beads made using the technique I learnt on Christine Dumont's Hollow Bead Workshop. She is just about to start an online workshop for these beads so follow the link and check it out.

Hollow beads strung as a necklace


I've more to show you tomorrow. Hope you all have a great weekend
Cara

Another sale and my new pendant!

I have been busy with another sale and 3 more on the way! Here is a picture of most of my sale set up, there's a bit more on the left which is missing but you get the general idea. It was at a party of my sisters (slighty strange) but good fun as I got to go to a party and talk about my passion most of the night!

Sale table

 I bought myself a new top and couldn't resist making a pendant to match! I have just discovered making cabochons thanks to Donna Kato's -The Art of Polymer Clay Creative Surface Effects book. I'll take a close up photo to show you in the daylight tomorrow. didn't have time when I made it as I made it the morning of the sale - like you do! I think it was my antidote to the overwhelming amount of stuff I was trying to do - ignore it all and play with clay!

Me wearing the pendant I made to match my new top