Ed Schmid on You Tube: The 7 min. beer bottle

[Ed Schmid]

Hi,
I just got back from Chicago and while there, Michael Menconi shot a quick
video of me doing the ->7 minute handblown beer bottle (one of my usual "end-of-the day" pieces).
It was shot at the "Contemporary Studio of Glass Art" in Westmount, Il.
It's kinda fun and I'm sure some of you'll enjoy it.

I hope this link works:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ATh-IQfcF0A#GU5U2spHI_4

Hey, Hope to see some of you guys and gals at GAS.
Since my class at Red Deer was cancelled, I got the green light to GO!
I'm stoked!
I'll be the guy with the sandwich board walking around that has my books on it, saying "Book Signing Today"
(hint...so bring your old rag-tag copies and get it signed by the Man himself,)...or
(better yet, buy a FRESH new copy!)

Aloha,
Ed

[Rick Sherbert]

Ed, nice job. I'd drink out of that!

Jerry Douglas on Dobro?

[Lawrence Ruskin]

Good work, that glass has great hang time as well.

Where ever did you get the idea of making cappuccino on the dog house door?

I did that at Pilchuck in the 80s 'cause you couldn't get good coffee in the cafeteria.

Did that become some sort of tradition?

[Randy Kaltenbach]

Appropriate music, too!

[Bruce Harris]

Not to diss Ed, but why are we watching him when Lino is on Live at the Museum?

[R. Scott Johnson]

cool! i've never seen anyone use a blowpipe as a punty like that. awesome. but if the glass was cool enough to crack off, how then did it stick up?

[David Patchen]

Ed, you've got quite the cute little lefty/righty dance going coming out of the furnace :) Nice fast bottle. I kind of miss blowhoses now and then when doing small stuff.

R. Scott--if you put on the bottom quickly and then crack it off it can attach to the blowpipe as a punty. It's a slick move that I first saw in Italy. It takes a little practice to judge the heat correctly so it's hot enough to stick but not so hot you deform the crap out of the bottom. Try it--it's fun.

[Ed Schmid]

Ok the quick reply as I'm working crazy 18+ hour days lately trying to play catch up.

Yes, Rick, I believe it was Jerry Douglas on Dobro (who else plays THAT instrument like the way Lino plays zanfirico?).

I asked Michael to maybe put the video to some Bela Fleck music and he did a superb job in the selection (altho the clapping at the end, albeit cute, was a bit over the top for my own ego...as was the title...'cause; hey- I'm a normal guy like the rest of "yous"...we all share in the passion of glass...but I just happened to strike a nerve with the books...[and soon, hopefully, with all of this crazy hard work- my sculpture as well!]:).

"Why are you watching Ed when you could be watching Lino live? "That's a good question! If you ask me- Hell, I'd rather you go and watch Lino live,
(I would too if I had the time!), plus he's live, and my bit is just a recording.
"You-Tube" will always be there for you and your loved ones, 24-7.
Go watch Lino...or better yet, make you own artwork instead!

Lawrence: the hang time was actually achieved with Spectrum nuggets (my favorite glass for many reasons), but also with a keen understanding of how it behaves through years of mucking up many other "end-of the day" pieces.
Honestly, I've generated more floor models than most intermediate students have ever gathered. [The school of hard knocks-...or...is that 'knuckleheads'?].

Yeah, Scott, the flip around technique; aka "blowpipe as a punty" is as old as the hills, (esp. if you live in Santa Cruz or Half Moon Bay where they have a tendency to slide into the ocean on a seemingly regular basis!).

As David Patchen says, the key to that technique is to keep the bottom warm and the neck cold and clean (i.e. a well-defined transfer line).

Check out "Advanced Glassworking Techniques" (a cool book I hear!),
pages 92-93, and it tells you a bit more about the history and technique as I understand it. It is always a "showstopper/jaw-dropper" trick that easily impresses people the first time they see it.

And, Yes David, that "cute" lefty-righty trick coming out of the furnace is not by choice, but by habit/happenstance. I am a lefty who blows glass right-handed and it is the only way I feel comfortable gathering. Being ambidextrous certainly has it's advantages in the hot shop, esp. when it comes to doing reheats and getting back into the bench with Godspeed.

Time is money, or so "THEY" say...
'course, like Ford, I like to think of it as "economy of motion" (or in other words...the most economical way to manufacture anything is to analyze the process and frigger out the quickest path from point A to point B-
and eliminate the waste in between...something sadly most American glassblowers have yet to understand...but that's another topic of discussion for later).
cheers,
Ed

[Ben David]

Two newbie questions for Ed or anyone else:

Did you/he actually blow out the bell of the bottle while it was in the glory? That's what it looked like - came to the glory with the blowhose.

Later, while heating the neck, you/he reaches into the glory with what looks like a tweezer. Was this to straighten the piece on the punty - or to preheat the mouth-shaping tool?

[Ben Solwitz]

He attached the hose while he was at the hole so it was ready when he sat down. Inflating while you are in the hole isn't recommended as you can't see what you're doing and it's easy to get out of control. He was preheating the capping tool at the end, it creates the right size and shape so that you can apply a bottle cap and seal the bottle.

[Garner Britt]

the hang time was actually achieved with Spectrum nuggets (my favorite glass for many reasons), but also with a keen understanding of how it behaves through years of mucking up many other "end-of the day" pieces.


Spectrum Nuggets!?!? How hot are you working it? Is this end of the day precharging temp or....

Very cool video, maybe the first in a series?

garner

[Ed Schmid]

Ben's got it right (the other Ben-Slowitz), and that's the best place to hook up in the process, at the glory hole.

No, all of the blowing takes place at the bench and in-between.
I love my blowhose! far better than any assistant in many cases...it just takes about a week of trial and error to get used to it, so you don't get tangled up (and blue----from it wrapping around your neck!).

Garner, the furnace temp is 2150* F.
The key is to not let that mass of glass ever get cold by overmarvering or chilling it. Every move in that video is crucial to using the original heat out of the furnace. It's a fluid dance, that plus an understanding of heat, gravity and thermal dynamics...the main elelments of all glassblowing.
ok, not too mention losing a boatload of them to floor models! (trial and error! the other key to successful glassblowing!).

I think the person who I witnessed practice this methodology (after Lino and Dick Marquis...I mean it just seemed like the glass would just grow and flow off their pipes), was Bill Gudenrath back in 1988 or '89.
He was doing demos at the Columbus College of Art and Design (I was going to OSU for grad. school at that time).
He demo-ed one of his old-world vases/pitchers...where he blows the whole thing out in no reheats..by tilting the pipe just so...catching the mass of glass on the floor (YES! actually letting it roll on the floor as the neck stretches, then SUCKING in to create a cool constriction in the neck and then puffing the ball section out), and again doing the flip-around technique,
before doing the finishing action on the lip.

Bill is as easy to watch, and as fascinating, as Lino everyday, or anyday.
He's probably the most brilliant, informed glassmaker on the planet as well.
Worth the trip to the Studio in Corning...if you ever get the chance, do it!

[Ben Solwitz]

Slowitz? That hurts Ed. I'm going to go toss my copy of Beginning Glassblowing in the glory hole, maybe it will last long enough to get some reduction out of it. :(

[Travis Frink]

Ed, nice job. Jerry Douglas on Dobro?

The music reminds me of some cool stuff David Grier (guitar) and and Matt Flinner (mad mandolin) do. Some smokin hot licks in their music.

Ed,

Thanks for the vid. Watching you (and Lino) work is a great reminder about efficiency of motion and not losing too much heat from the piece.

And thanks for the books. They were my first English language instruction in glass. You have no idea how much sense they made after months of trying to to figure what soft-spoken instructors were saying as their voices got drowned out by noisy studio equipment. without saying anything about the fact that I had no idea what most of the glass jargon was in English- much less Japanese- at the time.

You tube and this website have been other great resources for me recently. Thanks to all of you have contributed.

Travis

[Franklin Sankar]

And Utibe says this video is no longer available.
I wonder if it my Boss who is catching up on me.
Franklin

[Ed Schmid]

Oh terribly sorry Ben....um I mean Neb.
guess my fingers were not quite warmed up this morning when I posted that last reply.
my apologies...sorry to hear you'll reduce the book to ashes *(esp. if it's one of those RARE "Ed's Big Handbook of Glassblowing" Books, now out of print. I have seen them for sale on the web for $1900. and $2000 respectively!...).

and Travis, glad to hear that my books have helped you out as much as they have...there was once talk about getting it translated into Japanese,
altho the translater I was discussing it with wasn't sure about some of the idiomatic expressions...they would be difficult to transpose into your language...
perhaps someday, if there were enough demand for it and I wasn't so damn broke like I am at the moment. It costs a fortune to create a book in the first place, and then even more to get it translated...something which I think the audience cannot afford to do at the moment...but perhaps I am wrong.


Franklin: I think your boss is on to you. The link still works, I just checked it out. Better "duck and cover", that or go to an internet cafe and check it out.
Cheers!

*Honestly...you guys really harp on the spelling issue. What's up with that?
Pete is about hte wurst! Lite-n up! I say...
(ok, I know it's all in good pun!) Ciao!

[Ben Solwitz]

Haha no problem I'm just kidding, your book is way too valuable to burn up in the glory hole, and I don't even have the original. It amazes me that books can sell for that much money. I was just recently looking to get a copy of Interaction of Color but a lot of people say the original is better because it has 150 color plates instead of the more recent copies with only 10. I looked around the web a bit and found out an original copy with all the color plates goes for $2500-$7500. Sounds like you should have kept a few boxes of the original book around for yourself.

[Mick Owen]

Ed, where can that capping tool be purchased?

[Ed Schmid]

Mick: no where.
it was custom made for me back in Millville, and I'm not even sure the old timer is still in business.
I might have to dig around in some old boxes to find where I might have the receipt.
It cost over $300...and that was 14 years ago.
sorry.

[Rick Sherbert]

You are kidding about the $1900-$2000 right? But I did find this: http://www.alibris.com/booksearch?S=R&qisbn=9780963872807&qsort=p&siteID=uTKYNncJNRY-qwtYbfMYH6M0ow6p0yWDtA

[Mark Halva]

Ed,
You used to send out update flyers, before the computer age, telling your loyal followers of what you were making, where you had been, what was going on in your life. Now we are getting ready to move, I discovered all those that you had sent out, so if I tuck those into my origional hand signed copy, I think that could easily drive the price up another $1500.00.
Mark

[Scott Young]

...there was once talk about getting it translated into Japanese,
altho the translater I was discussing it with wasn't sure about some of the idiomatic expressions...they would be difficult to transpose into your language...
perhaps someday, if there were enough demand for it and I wasn't so damn broke like I am at the moment. It costs a fortune to create a book in the first place, and then even more to get it translated...something which I think the audience cannot afford to do at the moment...but perhaps I am wrong...

If you decide to look into translation, let me know. My son can translate (he was raised in Japan and is fluent in both languages) and he would be less expensive than "corporate" translators. Add to the fact that his father (me) is a glassblower and can assist with the "expression definitions". Besides, he is "sponging" off me while he is in college (where can I get someone to pay for my food, board, tuition, and buy me a car with insurance???) and he "owes" me... :)

[Franklin Sankar]

Yes its back. the IT guys were fooling around again.
Franklin