Fish Dish

This is a fish dish I made in Visual Arts class! It is made out of pottery and yes, I did make it from scratch. I made it from plain squishy clay from under the ground! Here are the steps of making a fish dish!

1. Make a sketch on a piece of paper and the size of your sketch will be the size of your dish so think that way, if you want a small or big plate. In my class we all had to do a certain size to get a good grade.
2. After you have made your sketch the way you want your plate to look (we had to make it a fish because the project was to create a fish dish), you color your sketch all of the colors you want it to be. We had to have 3-6 colors in my Class. Then you cut it out.
3. After you have created your final colored sketch you get some clay! You roll out that clay to a centimeter and make sure your cut out sketch fits one your clay.
4. Lay out your sketch on your clay and cut it out with a clay knife. keep your sketch on top of your clay and use a clay tool to lightly trace all of the lines in your sketch.
5. Take the sketch off and now it is time to sponge the clay to get it wet and ready to add texture.
6. Once you have sponged the clay fish dish you can add textures with tools such as paint brushes, tooth brushes, and for scales certain clay tools. You can use circle cut outs for the eye.
7. Once you have all of the texture that you want and this is the way your fish is going to look forever so you want to smooth out the edges and make it look the best it can be!
8. When you are officially done you let it dry on a foam plate that fits your clay.
9. It will take 2-3 days for it to fully dry and when it is it will be white and now you can glaze it!
10. Before you glaze you have to sponge your dry fish then start glazing, you want to pick colors that match your sketch so when you compare to your sketch they will look like each other.
11. You need to apply three coats of glaze one each day. Let the colors dry each day before you paint the next coat. Once you have applied three coats you can fire it in the kiln.
12. It has to stay in the kiln for about 3 days. When it comes out, that will be your fish!!!!!
YAY!!! GOOD JOB!!!
Another post by: Caitlin Snow