ChaseDesigns
2005-09-01, 1:01pm
Basically the way I use cane:
1) I cut twice the number of murrini I think I'm gonna need (I'm constantly dropping the little buggers, cracking them, smearing, etc. always have extra). I cut 'em about 1/8 inch thick. Smaller and they tend to distort when I heat them and larger and they're just a waste.
2) Put them on the torch marver to keep them warm. If they're shocky I'll keep them in the kiln to warm them up.
3) Find the right tweesers. Ok what ya want: you want tweesers big enough to hold the chip without it moving around, but small enough so you can heat the butt of the chip without heating the tweesers too much.
4) Heat the murrini up in the back flame. You just want it hot on it's bottom. Just kinda glowing. NOT so hot that it sticks to the tweesers.
5) Heat the spot on the bead where you want the chip.
6) Gently place the murrini on the bead. Press it ever so slightly so it's in good contact with the bead. It'll kinda mushroom down ever so slightly. If you push too much it'll smear. If not enough it'll pop off when you go to reheat everything.
There are three different ways I use to set the murrini:
A) You can use a stringer of you're bead color to encase around the murrini. You want to get rid of the "L" between the murrini and the bead. Heat up a stringer of your bead color and encase around or up to the murrini. You want to build up the bead to the level of the murrini. If you get too much color around the chip it will close in on the chip and make it smaller. If you don't get enough around the chip the chip will settle down and look a little smeary. If you're gonna heat everything up now heat very slowly. Heating it all up now will make for a very nice effect as the chip will be level with your bead. See Deanna's witches for a really nice use of this effect.
2421
B)OK, so you're not quite to the level of heating it up as in A. While you've got the surrounding area built up you're just really not sure it's to the correct level. Now put a blob of clear right on top of your murrini. This will help it combat the surrounding bead and not get over taken. It will also make a nice window effect. You end up looking into the clear to see the murrini. This can also make for a really nice dimentional effect. "Look deep into my bead...."
2135
C)OK, so you're thinking: That's all really nice Greg, but jeeze! Don't ya have anything a little, you know, easier? OK, use anything for your base, put the murrini on as above. Now encase around the chip in clear, put clear on top of the chip, build up in clear. This really shows off the murrini and has the least smearing or overtaking as everything around the chip is clear.
2009
The biggest trick to using murrini is to not over heat it. If the bead (and hense the murrini) moves, you know, sags, droops, etc, the detail in the murrini's a gonner.
It really just takes a little guts and practice (wow Deanna really hates it when I tell her stuff like that!).
The above is only how I use murrini. There are other methods as well, but this has always worked best for me. I do use moderatly sized murrini. So the plunge and snap method doesn't work so well for me (murrini too big). If Fay feels like chiming in here her method maybe very interesting as a counter point to mine, as her murrini are really quite large compared to mine.
Hope this is clear and helps. If not please ask and I'll try to clarify.
Greg
1) I cut twice the number of murrini I think I'm gonna need (I'm constantly dropping the little buggers, cracking them, smearing, etc. always have extra). I cut 'em about 1/8 inch thick. Smaller and they tend to distort when I heat them and larger and they're just a waste.
2) Put them on the torch marver to keep them warm. If they're shocky I'll keep them in the kiln to warm them up.
3) Find the right tweesers. Ok what ya want: you want tweesers big enough to hold the chip without it moving around, but small enough so you can heat the butt of the chip without heating the tweesers too much.
4) Heat the murrini up in the back flame. You just want it hot on it's bottom. Just kinda glowing. NOT so hot that it sticks to the tweesers.
5) Heat the spot on the bead where you want the chip.
6) Gently place the murrini on the bead. Press it ever so slightly so it's in good contact with the bead. It'll kinda mushroom down ever so slightly. If you push too much it'll smear. If not enough it'll pop off when you go to reheat everything.
There are three different ways I use to set the murrini:
A) You can use a stringer of you're bead color to encase around the murrini. You want to get rid of the "L" between the murrini and the bead. Heat up a stringer of your bead color and encase around or up to the murrini. You want to build up the bead to the level of the murrini. If you get too much color around the chip it will close in on the chip and make it smaller. If you don't get enough around the chip the chip will settle down and look a little smeary. If you're gonna heat everything up now heat very slowly. Heating it all up now will make for a very nice effect as the chip will be level with your bead. See Deanna's witches for a really nice use of this effect.
2421
B)OK, so you're not quite to the level of heating it up as in A. While you've got the surrounding area built up you're just really not sure it's to the correct level. Now put a blob of clear right on top of your murrini. This will help it combat the surrounding bead and not get over taken. It will also make a nice window effect. You end up looking into the clear to see the murrini. This can also make for a really nice dimentional effect. "Look deep into my bead...."
2135
C)OK, so you're thinking: That's all really nice Greg, but jeeze! Don't ya have anything a little, you know, easier? OK, use anything for your base, put the murrini on as above. Now encase around the chip in clear, put clear on top of the chip, build up in clear. This really shows off the murrini and has the least smearing or overtaking as everything around the chip is clear.
2009
The biggest trick to using murrini is to not over heat it. If the bead (and hense the murrini) moves, you know, sags, droops, etc, the detail in the murrini's a gonner.
It really just takes a little guts and practice (wow Deanna really hates it when I tell her stuff like that!).
The above is only how I use murrini. There are other methods as well, but this has always worked best for me. I do use moderatly sized murrini. So the plunge and snap method doesn't work so well for me (murrini too big). If Fay feels like chiming in here her method maybe very interesting as a counter point to mine, as her murrini are really quite large compared to mine.
Hope this is clear and helps. If not please ask and I'll try to clarify.
Greg