October 2016 Newsletter

Nick Agar was our demonstrator for our September meeting and is someone we had all been looking forward to. His demonstration was aimed entirely at decoration in such a way to reproduce ceramic ware. His first item was a bowl from a piece of box elder. Mounted on a face plate he turned the base to his desired shape and sanded it to a good finish. To achieve the ceramic look, he first sprays on a light coat of white paint from an aerosol spray can. Then using a mouth diffuser he blasts on a speckled effect in black and blue.

The rest of his decorating was done using air brushes. Expensive equipment to buy but brilliant in the right hands. He applied masking tape to cover the areas he didn’t want paint to touch and stencils to produce the butterflies and then used different colours to achieve what you see in the next three pictures.

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This part finished he cleaned it all off and re sanded the surface to start on his next part. He sprayed on a base coat of white and then demonstrated a variety of colours, all lightly applied, using different spray nozzles attached to the aerosol cans containing different colours. These nozzles are known as graffiti nozzles and can be bought on the internet. He reversed the bowl and textured the surface using arbotec tools and disc attachments and coloured it in the same way to produce a top and bottom as shown here. His third piece was a platter using sycamore. He turned and sanded the base which although a light coloured wood he gave it a light coat of white paint to maintain the ceramic look. This also acts as a sealant. Next he applied small strips and chips of masking tape which when removed would highlight the pattern design and painted it with a variety of colours using his air brush system. The next pictures show the procedure. He then reversed it to turn the face and give it its coat of white. Again he masked off areas he didn’t want painted and using stencils and very clever control of the airbrush he produced some very realistic maple leaves. You can make your own stencils that can be reused from a material called Frisc Film or Friscett which is possibly available from W H Smith. The end result was what you see here. Nick’s last piece was a Christmas tree decoration. He turned a ball and then textured it and sprayed it with different colours as shown here. And that was it for the day. An excellent demonstration but to go to these lengths though you have got to have a lot of pennies going spare. Our next meeting is on Saturday8th October and Mark Baker will be with us for the day. What will he be showing us? Only one way to find out. Come along and watch. It’s also our last opportunity to get our presentation for SAW on the 30th October. And don’t forget the fish and chip lunch is on the 22nd October. Graham BACK