All Things Metal Clay
An Expert Guide

Check out Sarah Hood’s easy to navigate site and beautiful jewelry here.

While she has a wide range of work available, it’s organized into clear “lines” so it’s not a problem. I love her acorns with little silver caps in the organic line!

Technorati Tags:
handcrafted jewelry, Sarah Hood, silver jewelry
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by Elaine Luther

Want to read more about writing for blogs? There’s a ton out there. Here are my two absolute favorites:

Copyblogger

Chris Garrett on New Media

And here’s a post I published in December:

To let people know about your blog, you’ll need to “claim your blog” on Technoranti, and do other things to get the word out.

I want to share some really cool tools I’ve found, a code generator and an automatic ping service.

The first is:

Tag Generator

This generates the code for you to place tags within a blog post for your choice of web bookmarklet sites/blog search sites.

The second is:

Ping-o-matic

This allows you to ping multiple sites all at once, saving you a lot of time while you let the blog searching sites that you have updated your blog.

These tools work really well, and will help drive traffic to your blog, helping you get consistent numbers of viewers.

I use both of these tools every day and they do seem to help.

A third tool I’ve added is Stumble Upon, which also has helped a lot of people find this blog.

Need help with the blogging part of it? Check out this excellent, what else, blog, by Tammy Powley, jeweler and writer. It’s called Blog Class Info.

Do you love to read interviews with other creative folks? Here’s a round up of just a few of the many interviews out there on various blogs.

Peggy Li interviewed at Jewelry Making at Bloglander

Katie Hacker interviewed at Art Bead Scene Blog.

Amy Fraser profiled at Jewelry and Beading.

Deborah Kwitney at Jewelry and Beading.

Jessica Neaves at Craft Gossip.

Tara Finlay at Craft Gossip.

For podcast interviews, remember Craftcast with Alison Lee.

I’ve mentioned here and on Metal Clay Gallery that if I wanted a gold ring, instead of using gold metal clay, I would make the ring in PMC + (silver), then have it molded and cast into gold.

(I need a new wedding ring and am thinking of doing this, only with Platinum Sterling (R).)

Ruth wrote to me and asked to explain in more detal how one would go about having a ring cast.

First of all, my hats off to you, those of you who are brave enough to work in gold metal clay, I can’t bring myself to do it.

What is casting?

Let’s start off with a basic understanding of what lost wax casting is. It’s a method commonly used in the jewelry industry to make all kinds of jewelry and jewelry parts.

Here’s how it works: you make a piece of jewelry out of wax. Then you add a stick of wax to it, called a sprue. Attach that to a rubber lid, and put a steel flask on that rubber lid. The open end of the flask is up, the lid is on the table.

This will make a lot more sense if you open your favorite jewelry supply catalog and follow along, so you can visualize the various flasks and sprues.

Now, you would pour investment plaster over the top of your wax model and let the plaster dry in the flask.

Once dry, you flip the flask over and melt out the wax using a kiln or a steam de-waxer. The was melts out and is lost, thus the name, lost wax casting. (Sometimes people think the name means the method was lost.)

The next step is to force molten metal into the plaster, specifically into the space where the wax used to be. This is done with a centrifigal casting machine (at colleges and art centers) or a vacume caster (in the industry). There are also low tech methods, such as sand casting, steam casting and sling casting. (also potentially dangerous.)

But I’m not trying to teach you to cast, just to give you a basic idea of the process.

For more details, here’s a video of the process. Here’s a link to more videos on technorati.

But wait, you say, I don’t work in wax, I work in metal clay!

No problem. A professional caster can make a wax for you from your metal clay original. How? By making a vulcanized rubber mold of it.

The steps to the process are:

1. Choose your caster.

2. Make your perfect model ring, polished, fits and completely done.

3. Call up your caster to discuss your order and let him/her know that it’s coming.

4. Mail or hand deliver your model ring to the caster, with clear written instructions.

5. He or she will then — make a rubber mold of your ring and shoot a wax from this, then cast the ring in the metal of your choice.

6. Then the caster will finish the ring to the degree you specify and pay for. The range goes from just roughly cutting off the sprue and sending it to you, to cutting off the sprue and sanding it down, all the way to a complete finish and polish.

Make sense? Please post questions in the comments so I can clarify things.

I know one question will be how do I find a caster? The best ways are to ask people you know, ask on your email lists, and contact the casters who advertise in your favorite jewelry-making magazines.

Some casters work only with the trade. Those who are advertising in the magazines available at your local bookstore are open to working with regular folks, hobbyists and small businesses.

Click here to learn more about Platinum Sterling (R).

(c) 2008 Elaine Luther All Rights Reserved

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What’s that in the picture? That’s a vulcanized rubber mold. Please note that it’s not a very good one, but it’s one I happen to have lying around. My good molds are all on file with my caster.

Technorati Tags:
jewelry making, lost wax casting, casting, metal clay, precious metal clay, art clay silver
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No time to write a blog on your own? Why not share the fun with fellow artists? Here are some links to group blogs, written by teams with a common media or theme.

Art Bead Scene Blog

This group of art bead makers take turns posting, share their works in progress and have contests and give aways, as well as monthly challenges!

Project 8

A group of 8 artists creating and post work on given themes.

The Wisconsin Street Team

Wisconsin artists who sell on etsy.com.

Do you know of a great group blog? Please post the url in a comment!

Thanks!