help with encasing florals

[Vicki B.]

OK every couple of weeks I try an encased floral hoping that my skills have improved enough that the beads will look like what I am imagining.
Here's the procedure as I understand it:

1. sm core bead decorated and encased. (I'm not sure about the encasing at this point, but if you have silver or dichro or want deep pokes in the flower centers, it seems like you need the encasement here.

2 decorate with flower, poke, seal the air bubble in the poke with clear.

3. encase entire bead.

Now I think I'm am putting too much encasement on here because I get this big wonky, unmanageable bead with distortion on the flowers.

Do I need that first encasement before I apply the flowers or is there another way to protect dichro or silver at this point?
Do I need to seal the air bubble in the flower centers before I do the last bead encasement or will the bubble seal as I do an "around the world" stringer encasement?

I think I have the world's biggest encased floral in the kiln right now, and it will probably crack from sheer ugliness.

Thanks for listening!

[Cosmo]

That's how I do it. Make sure the base bead is very cool, and the encasing rod is very warm, so you can wrap the whole bead at one time. Here's one I did not too long ago (I don't do many flowers - must be a guy thing).

http://www.soleiletlune.com/lampwork/IMG_0021.jpg

I did a base of purple, then a thin layer of clear. Put the "vines" on, then the flowers, poked, and trapped the bubble. Let it cool way down while heating the clear rod. Then using a pretty good amount of pressure, but making sure the flame didn't hit the base bead, encased it. I think I did one wrap, melted it, and then did another wrap.

[ChristyPhelps]

Send me your email - I don't know how to put an attachment with a pm. I put together a compilation of all the floral info I could find to date, at that point, when I waas trying to master this. I'll be happy to send it to you.

I'm not going to say I've matered it , by any means, but I can tell you that you can let a bead get a LOT cooler than you would imagine. That was the key for me.

[Angela Schoonen]

Hi Vicki;
It took me a long time to get good encased florals. First of all, if you're distorting your flowers, then your base bead is too hot while you're applying the encasing. Remember to keep the bead OUT of the flame while you're encasing - only the clear rod should be held in the flame. If it's too big, you need to start smaller - start with a really small core for example. It's just practice, practice, practice. You'll get it :) Good luck.
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