Sondra, my experience has been that flux is not good under opaques (or transparents for that matter) I had the same experience as you! For black, I usually start over white opaque (or copper base) and then as I move up the layers of enamel I might change to dark blue transparent. It doesn't show as blue but adds a depth to the black. Just my opiniion --good luck! Diana
i'm confused as to why you would start with a black opaque over the copper surface. this means you need to cover the inside of the face with a level opaque layer of white, with no black coming through, and then do your shading, and then your opalescent enamels. To me it makes more sense to start with a white background, which then gives you a white base for your face, and therefore more room to paint/fire your shading layers, with no concern as to whether the black will come through the white. And it's then much easier to paint and fire opaque black on the background. you don't need to worry if it crawls up the wire or is an uneven layer as it's not as critical an application as the white in the face will be. this is how i would approach it if i was working on copper. and you DO need to be careful firing your fine silver wires with a copper base. anyone who has not had problems is simply either firing at a lower end of the firing spectrum or is being extra careful. wires will melt if the piece is overfired, and the piece is almost always ruined, as many of you have found out.
So I thought I was doing the right thing by using a very hard fusing black. Now that I have heard more, I am thinking I might cover that with foil and proceed like you have mentioned here. Thanks for the input! I do wonder though, I recently did a white base coat to experiment with opaque and transp. colors to see the result. My concern is that it might be difficult to achieve the opalecence on the last layers that I am looking for. What are your thoughts?
I understand what you are saying. At least for this piece I already put the high fire black on the entire piece. Wires are done. i put them on last night but didn't fire. Started to think that I have 2 choices here. One I fire them on and then put white on the face, or take the wires off and put down some foil. I am asking for your opinion. If I want the face to be "otherworldly" with a slight blue cast (suddenly thinking of Avatar) and want the opalecense to finish the layers, which is better-the white or the foil? Sooo grateful for your input!
i like to use white as a base coat, and then add some foils over parts of the white. this way i am shading the face with "light" and color. it doesn't have to be all white or all foil. and the foil elements can be different shapes, sizes, patterned, etc to give even more elements of design and interest to the face (if you want). my experience with opalescent white ( either ng302 or thompson 835 leaded) is it turns yellow from reacting to the silver and i need a flux layer to prevent the chemical reaction. fire the foil, then the flux, then the opals. hope this makes sense.
