I coincidentally looked up glass cutting recently and found videos of people cutting window panes by scoring a line and then smacking the scored section off. Is that what you do for cutting glass curves also? Your work looks too technically precise for the smacking method I saw.
Essentially, yes. I can say that for curves I’ll do more tapping and hoping than smacking lol but there are different pliers (grozer and running pliers) that help the job along. For deep curves, I’ll score a bunch of lines in the space that I’ll be removing, tap, and use the grozer pliers to work away the bits… I actually made a video of the process with this piece, if I ever post it, I’ll tag you!
This is another piece, but you can see pretty clearly here. The brush is applying flux, that helps the solder adhere only to the copper foil. Without flux, nothing happens!
Whoa! That is a legitimately fascinating video, thanks again for sharing. “We Can Do It” is such a great image too.
Youtube shorts might net you a little extra revenue if you have a bunch of these clips, btw, if you aren’t way ahead of me, haha, i just learned about shorts.
How long did it take you to develop such a steady hand for the solder?
Yeah I did not get to add the soldering part to the video… with a soldering iron, I use 60/40 (lead/tin) solder and go over the front, back, sides, then the back again and finish the front as smooth as possible.
On this piece you can see the solder work is black, that’s a patina that’s applied after roughing it up with some steel wool. There’s black and copper patina, or you can leave it silver.
After cleaning it all up, I finish with a microfibre cloth and some car wax to protect the piece and keep the dust off. I’ll see if I have any soldering clips I can upload.
It’s fun! With all art, sometimes projects get bumped for a commission or because I working on something new is more exciting haha… I am down to one glass project on the go right now… I can’t wait to share it!!
So there’s no glue and the metal doesn’t fuse into the glass, but the overhang of the solder once it’s cooled acts as a picture frame for each shard and then a complete frame for the whole piece? That’s amazing.
And you definitely did great work on the smooth part of the soldering, all of those front-facing lines look very even and smooth.
Ha, easy to bump projects, i got all excited about these t-shirt designs but after four designs i started up a podcast and got super distracted throwing myself into the episodes. It’s great to feel that inspiration though when you like a project so much you can be reasonably assured it’ll develop into something you’re proud of.
Well, I’m excited to see the new piece, thanks for sharing all this information with me, I would have no idea how something like this worked otherwise.
Are there special glass paints to use for the colors?
You’re welcome! It’s definitely stressful and the reason it took me so long to quit smoking… but totally worth it when the sun shines through that glass.
wow, that’s very cool. so you have to cut each piece of glass for each finger bone like that?
Thank you!
Yes, cut and grind it smooth. Then copper foil tape around the edges and solder… voila!
Very cool, it came out great.
I coincidentally looked up glass cutting recently and found videos of people cutting window panes by scoring a line and then smacking the scored section off. Is that what you do for cutting glass curves also? Your work looks too technically precise for the smacking method I saw.
Essentially, yes. I can say that for curves I’ll do more tapping and hoping than smacking lol but there are different pliers (grozer and running pliers) that help the job along. For deep curves, I’ll score a bunch of lines in the space that I’ll be removing, tap, and use the grozer pliers to work away the bits… I actually made a video of the process with this piece, if I ever post it, I’ll tag you!
Ha, that’s awesome, thanks for explaining. Yea, I’ll definitely check out the video when it goes up, sounds like a nail-biting, rewarding process.
Here it is!
It’s fast and tiny and you can’t see too much of the cutting… but it’s my first time attempting to share the process. Enjoy!
oh wow and it’s a time-lapse, you legend!
that definitely gives me a better idea of how the process goes, thanks a lot for sharing, that was very cool to see.
so that’s the copper foil at the end and then do you use a blow torch or something to melt all the pieces together?
that must be so much fun for you also, do you have a lot of projects going on at the same time or do you tend to focus on one at a time?
Soldering
This is another piece, but you can see pretty clearly here. The brush is applying flux, that helps the solder adhere only to the copper foil. Without flux, nothing happens!
Whoa! That is a legitimately fascinating video, thanks again for sharing. “We Can Do It” is such a great image too.
Youtube shorts might net you a little extra revenue if you have a bunch of these clips, btw, if you aren’t way ahead of me, haha, i just learned about shorts.
How long did it take you to develop such a steady hand for the solder?
Yeah I did not get to add the soldering part to the video… with a soldering iron, I use 60/40 (lead/tin) solder and go over the front, back, sides, then the back again and finish the front as smooth as possible.
On this piece you can see the solder work is black, that’s a patina that’s applied after roughing it up with some steel wool. There’s black and copper patina, or you can leave it silver.
After cleaning it all up, I finish with a microfibre cloth and some car wax to protect the piece and keep the dust off. I’ll see if I have any soldering clips I can upload.
It’s fun! With all art, sometimes projects get bumped for a commission or because I working on something new is more exciting haha… I am down to one glass project on the go right now… I can’t wait to share it!!
So there’s no glue and the metal doesn’t fuse into the glass, but the overhang of the solder once it’s cooled acts as a picture frame for each shard and then a complete frame for the whole piece? That’s amazing.
And you definitely did great work on the smooth part of the soldering, all of those front-facing lines look very even and smooth.
Ha, easy to bump projects, i got all excited about these t-shirt designs but after four designs i started up a podcast and got super distracted throwing myself into the episodes. It’s great to feel that inspiration though when you like a project so much you can be reasonably assured it’ll develop into something you’re proud of.
Well, I’m excited to see the new piece, thanks for sharing all this information with me, I would have no idea how something like this worked otherwise.
Are there special glass paints to use for the colors?
You’re welcome! It’s definitely stressful and the reason it took me so long to quit smoking… but totally worth it when the sun shines through that glass.