Elijah Singleton's Progression

[elijahsingglass]

I have been thinking about posting up one of these threads for a while now. I am finally bringing myself to do it.
Anyways, Introductions, my name, obviously; Elijah Singleton. I am 21, been torchin' for almost two years now, on and off.

I first started when I went to a local pawn shop and saw a Nortel Red Max, Bought it off the guy for $400 after learning it was for blowing glass! LOL, I had never even seen anybody blowing glass before, but the thought of being one of these crazy lava-fire-playing artists was exciting to me and something I really wanted to learn!! So I found a guy who blew glass, paid him for a lesson, I spent two hours welding punty rod together, He told me it would be at least a year or two of lessons before I would even be able to attempt to make a functional piece. I got really discouraged and decided to no longer proceed with the lessons, he wouldn't give me my torch back, I counted it as a loss and moved on with my life.

About a year later after my wife and I had gotten back from traveling up and down the west coast in our van I met another glassblower who really needed help around his shop. So in trade for my craftsmanship and hard labor he let me use his equip and material to learn the art!

I spend almost a year at his shop, learned so much, then I broke off and started up a different shop with a buddy of mine and did production work for him for several months on and off. (this was in the midst of my wife and I living in our van, being homeless, and traveling).

Over the last 10 months after moving to California, my life has been taken over by glass, I sleep, dream, eat, think about nothing but it 24/7. I found myself dreaming through the entire process of creating a piece from prep work all the way to putting the finished product in the kiln. I spent hours and hours online looking at pictures, reading through forums, trying to learn.
It became so intense that I felt like I needed to put aside life and start my own shop and explore my creative side, follow my passion. I worked for my wife's uncle for the last several months doing roof work and saving my money to A) get us a house and B) buy my own glass equipment and start my own shop.

Last tuesday I got the last of the equipment I needed and setup shop!
So, I welcome all artists along in my journey as a new glass artist. I love everybody and I want to learn everything.
Please feel free to comment and give me tips and advise.

Enough of my story, Let us melt some glass and spread love!

So my next post will be pics, lol

[elijahsingglass]

These are some of the things I have made, the rigs are the most recent

[Billyben]

cool stuff man I like the black and white spoon look forward to seeing moar

[poncho]

nice work so far and cool story!

[gambitglass]

Cant go wrong when your following your heart/dreams. I hope you wont have to be homeless though and find success and fulfillment from your endeavors. Glass looks good too! keep meltin it up.

[elijahsingglass]

Thanks for the encouraging words ^

[Trevor]

ha ha i always have glass dreams too. love the story and attitude! i like the bub, unique shape. cool rigs as well

[rvp117]

if you [dream] it they will come! Paraphrased from Wayne's world. Can't wait to see some more glass. I'm digging your styles!

[B-Rye-oNeR]

Do you mean Jim.... Morrison?, .... Was there a weird naked indian with him?......................................Didn't you think it was a little bit unnecessary to see the crack in the indian's bottom?...... I had the same dream.

(best movie ever)



lol @ dreaming about glass. ,,,,,, I see wags when I close my eyes at night. If I work too much and no saftey breaks when I fall asleep I literally feel like I am working glass the whole time. I wake up felling like I haven't slept at all then go straight into the shop and work some more. It can get really annoying. I haven't had that problem in a few months though.

GOod start!, keep em coming.

[elijahsingglass]

sorry for the break in posting, I was outa O2 for a few days, you all knew at one point what that was like lol.. anyway here are my latest two creations!

[elijahsingglass]

my welds arent as pretty as they should be cause i don't have punty rod right now so I can't do any bridging, man, melting in those seals and fighting gravity isn't fun

[BK]

overlaping thirds man. heat up a third of the way around and puff to even consistency, let regain surface tension, go to next third, repeat.

[elijahsingglass]

overlaping thirds man. heat up a third of the way around and puff to even consistency, let regain surface tension, go to next third, repeat.

good stuff, i'll give that a try

[hashmasta-kut]

lets see how this goes this time(little hope i have for positivity )

you should make your curves narrower for better flavor especially near the bell end, they are a bit airy looking, the flavor gets lost some when its airy.

[elijahsingglass]

I made this bub last night, I still can't do bridges yet cause i don't have rod right now, but I tried just getting the rings as white as possible without condensing too much and stuck them then pulled out a little bit and gave it a little puff, they look a little cleaner, but i think they could def. get better, i'll keep practicing. As you can see I have been playing around with wine glass bottoms. What technique do you guys use to flare em out? I have tried it two different ways, just heating the section and ream it out until its wide enough, by hand, which was difficult. and then there's condense into a thick bubble, blow it out, kinda keeping it thin on the bottom, then punty up to the other side after you pop the hole and tear out extra glass, then heat it up and swing it out in the flame by centrifugal force, which was also difficult.

[BK]

no reaming. correct heat base plus centrifugal force. that mouthpeice seal looks better. you really dont need to bridge that dude, just work it out

[elijahsingglass]

This is my latest creation!

[istandalone24/7]

love that sherlock!

[Captain Glass]

Yea dude that Sherlock is sick

[elijahsingglass]

I had enough O2 to do one piece tonight, so this is what I got, the mouthpiece didn't turn out how I wanted.. I was condensing and twisting so it would look all twisted on the inside like a tornado or something, and it actually looked pretty cool, until I did the bends.