The Road to Perfect Bowls

One of Joey's bowls, which I love to the core

I only realize I miss pottery class after watching numerous wheel throwing videos in youtube. Writing requirements deprived me the leisure of attending sessions so I ended up watching vids at home, in true loser fashion.

My current ceramics fixation centers on the bowl and I told Joey I will not attempt doing other things until I've perfected making bowls, which elicited an oh-kay look from my pottery teacher. Zoni, my Friday classmate, was surprised I'm making so many bowls and wondered where I'll use all of them. Honestly, I don't know why too. I just want to make them.

Two sessions ago, Joey said my bowls are 99% perfect for shaping 0.5 kg of clay. I have no idea where to get the other 1%, though, and figured this must be where talent comes in. Its my best so far. My attempt at making bowls at 0.7 kg were disappointing. Next class, I'll try making bowls from 1kg, before moving to 2kg (a whole bag of clay). Hah, good luck with that. (If my numerics are wrong, forgive me; mathematics is my weakness, regardless of how basic it is.)

My major bowl problem is the shape. My bowl has an uneven concave, which poses a major problem when I do trimming. I'm trying to figure out how to solve this. And thanks to this video, I got a few pointers for my next pottery session:

1. Shape while raising.
2. Use medium speed.
3. Lock hands, try right over left.
4. Don't panic.

I guess that's it for now. - 3/17/2013