Test Results :: Clockwork

CiM Clockwork (229) is a vibrant, happy orange transparent.  It is not as easy to strike as Effetre Striking Orange (072), but it is not difficult either, once you get the hang of it.  It's easier for me to strike this colour in larger beads than smaller ones.

The colour of Clockwork is richer and more vibrant than Striking Orange, and is possibly the most vivid orange in our 104 COE palette, but it is also denser and cloudier, so there is a comfortable place for both colours in my glass stash.  One of the big advantages that Clockwork has over Effetre Striking Orange is that you can tell what colour it is by looking at the unmelted rod.  In the rod, Striking Orange looks like a pale yellow, so it is easy to get it mixed up with other pale yellow rods of glass (including Striking Red, Yellow, and Electric Yellow) if you aren't careful. Clockwork screams 'ORANGE' at you without any ambiguity whatsoever.  

1 - Plain, 2 - Plain (reduced), 3 - Over Clear, 4 - w/ Silver Leaf, 5 - w/ Silver Leaf (reduced & encased), 6 - w/ Silver Glass Frit (reduced), 7 - w/ TerraNova2 Frit, 8 & 9 - w/ Tuxedo, Copper Green, Opal Yellow, Ivory, Peace

What I am waiting for these glass companies to make is a light orange. I would really like to have a light orange transparent glass that is lighter in colour and less dense than either Clockwork or Striking Orange but darker than CiM Peachy Keen or Lauscha Peach.  Not instead of these colours, but in addition to them. Please? I'll put it on my wish list underneath 'Transparent Coral'.

You can see the richness of this colour in the left-most spacer bead.  Clockwork is a JUICY colour, oranger (this is a word, right?) than anything I've ever seen in nature.

Ignore the weird mark that looks like a crack in the right-most bead.  That is a stupid kiln bead-sticking accident, and not something you need to worry about, unless you want to spend time worrying about how competent I am.

On top of Clockwork, silver leaf turns brown and more or less stays the way you melt it in.  When the silver is reduced and encased, some blue fuming can be seen on the Clockwork under the clear. This is most visible above in the far right-hand side of the right-most bead.  You can also see from this picture that I was able to successfully encase Clockwork without any issues.

Reducing silver glass is really beautiful on top of Clockwork. I like the light edging the fritty bits get around them, and the contrast of the blue over orange. My striking silver glass got ok colour in the bead on the right, but it is nowhere near as appealing because it is dark and the contrast is not as vivid.

I didn't notice any particular reactions between Tuxedo and Clockwork.

You can't really get the full effect from it in the picture, but Copper Green over Clockwork is really interesting. It gets a dark line around it, which is interesting enough on its own, but the Copper Green also gets a faint mirror shine to it, which really sets it off. I often talk about how Copper Green darkens or 'shmutzes up' on top of some other colours, and this is different from that because the Copper Green doesn't really discolour or darken in this combination, it just gets shiny.

I would have expected to see the same reaction only in reverse when I used Clockwork on top of Copper Green, but glass likes to surprise me. There is a faint darkness around the edges of the Clockwork stringer and dots, but not a pronounced black line the way there is when the Copper Green is on top. Also surprisingly, there is a definite pale line around the Clockwork stringer lines and dots in the bead on the left, which I was in no way expecting.

Opal Yellow, Ivory, and Peace all separate over top of Clockwork.  The effect with Opal Yellow is very subtle, the dots and lines developing a faint inner halo and looking vaguely three-dimensional.  The effect is a little more pronounced but a little less structured with ivory, the dots and lines taking on a creamy, creased appearance. And then the Peace dots and lines, depending on how much they are heated, separate so dramatically that a very dark 'chasmy' line can be seen in the middle of the stringer lines I put on the right-most bead, above.  At first, I thought this was Peace misbehaving and turning black on me, because I have had that happen in the past when my propane tank level is getting low, but that is not what happened here at all.

Nothing much interesting happened when Striking Orange was used over Opal Yellow, Ivory, or Peace, apart from a little trouble getting it to strike to Orange on top of Ivory or Peace.  I'm not sure if this was a colour thing or a stupid user error, though, so before you take that to the bank you might want to do a little playing around.

I will add some additional beads with Clockwork as I make them. It gets an interesting cloudiness to it when it is used in sculptural pieces, and I love it for making striped ribbon cane for flower petals.