Casting is coming along unbelievably well!
Helen ( “Arlla” is her user name on the Windstone forum: http://www.windstoneeditions.com/forums/viewforum.php?f=4&sid=b246ac3725c09585269a67df7ed9972b ) is training two new casters, Wendy and Chris. They are turning out lots of good pieces! We have a drying tunnel set up now, to dry the castings quickly, and soon there will be enough pieces to start painting production runs again. They are casting all the pieces we are out of, and have molds for, such as: Male dragons, Circle of cats, Leaf Cat sconces, and Wolf councils, but Helen also found treasure: some usable Oriental Dragon molds! They have been casting those too! Because the Oriental Dragon mold has a parting line on the belly it isn’t difficult to de-mold (unlike the Sun Dragon which was a tube-shaped glove mold, and a real pain). However, this parting line on the Oriental’s belly leaves a seam line on the finished casting that is very time consuming to clean up, so this isn’t without a downside.
Helen hopes to cast enough Orientals for us to do a run of them in Ruby, since we have never done them or the Young Orientals* in that color. Jennifer Miller ( “Jennifer” on the forum) and Helen are also probably going to try their hands at hand painting a few of these guys. Scales that are as smooth as the Oriental’s will be a challenge for hand brushing, but I can’t wait to see what they come up with!
To read more details about whats going on in the casting dept, read Helen’s topic on the Windstone forum: http://www.windstoneeditions.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=9870
(*I take this back, we DID do the young Orientals in ruby!)
This is a link to one of the Phoenix sculptures in my gallery on the windstone forum:
http://www.windstoneeditions.com/galleries/displayimage.php?album=16&pos=45
Let’s see if this link works this time.
How many do you have to cast to have enough to start a production run in Ruby? What’s your daily average? o.o
What is that cat back there with no back? o.o; Is that your memorial cat? He’s pretty big! o_O
If we’re lucky, we can turn out about 4 orientals a day. They are difficult to pour and difficult to scrape, so even if we get good ones poured they may not be finished the same day. And then they have to dry completely before they will all be painted. It will take a little time! 😉
That is the sitting cat candlelamp. The space in the back is where the votive goes!
We did do young orientals in ruby, but there are many backorders and you never retired that one officially. We need to make more! *poke* …..assuming we find the molds…
😀
excitement! I almost wish I could help.
Wow, I haven’t got any candlelamps. I didn’t realize they were so big. :0
I’ll squeak for some more baby orientals in ruby! Or any other color, haha.