Last weekend could be called a Cindy Drozda weekend. It all started early on Saturday morning at the monthly meeting of the Chesapeake Woodurners in Annapolis. Cindy was our featured speaker/demonstrator for the day.

For the morning demonstration Cindy turned and colored a 6-sided covered bowl. It was originally thought of as a natural edge bowl, but to make things easy it was cut on a bandsaw with 6 points - not quite a star. After, or more correctly during, the turning she applied stains. Then after they dried a bit, some times she would hasten the drying of the alcohol base by setting the alcohol on fire. “Since the alcohol burns with a blue flame, and wood burns yellow it is easy to know when the alcohol is done and the wood is beginning to burn.”

For Cindy’s Saturday afternoon demonstration she made a small box topped by a finial. Then on Sunday she led a workshop of about 8 turners, one of which had only turned two other pieces. But she is no stranger to turning - she does wonderful pyrography work on her dad’s turnings.

Here are a few tips on turning Finials.

• First of all you need dried Straight Grain wood. Burls probably would not hold together. And the pith should not run up the middle of the finial.
• The tailstock does not support the work, Get rid of it as early as you can.
• Use a light touch, sharp tool, and careful aim.
• Oppose the cutting force, use your fingers. If they get too hot then you are putting too much force on them. Just balance the light cutting force.

A few other things Cindy stressed: Supporting with your fingers gives you feedback, both the irregularities as well as the tool force. Sandpaper is one of the most important tools, take advantage of it.

Comparing three different art media, “Wood is subtractive, the shape of Pottery can be changed, Glass in Additive.”

“In any hollowform, the inside and outside curves should have some relationship, but not necessarily the same.”

About 4 years ago I had a week long workshop with Cindy making small lidded boxes, so this was a great review. As usual Cindy’s class was enjoyable, entertaining and most importantly I feel I came away with some new skills and insight on turning.

I’d misplaced one of my notebooks I was using in Portland, but found it this morning. In it were some more tips I picked up at the Symposium.

• What is your goal for this piece?
• Put pieces away to review later.
• Keep trying to improve.
• Make 20 “Identical” bowls.
• Good lighting is necessary.
• If an object is supposed to have a flat make it aparent

I don’t think I have any more notes lying around, but keep watching, I may find more, or pick up some from demonstrators at various club meetings.

It’s out of the bag, but still wet, so as soon as I finish posting this it will go back into the bag for a few months, or more properly I’ll be changing bags every week or so for a few months while it dries slowly.

I’ve finished “roughing out” the piece, and you can get an idea of what I am trying to do. The ends are cracking near the pith, but I plan on carving them to individual feet, and the chucking foot will be removed to leave the bowl suspended. Here’s hoping it all works and doesn’t split any further. The bark edge will come off the feet, but along the sides of the ‘platter’ I’m not sure yet, I’m open to suggestions.

There’s not much to show today, but since I mentioned it in the last posting I thought it might be fun to post the picture.

That’s it bagged in a grocery bag.

Even dedicated woodturners take time away from the lathe to sit back, and breathe fresh air. Yesterday (by the time you read this it could be weeks ago) the Chesapeake Woodturners held their annual Turn-Out at Kinder Park in Millersville, MD. We’ve held our Turn-Out there for the past couple years, a great facility so we keep coming back. This year we had the use of a BBQ trailer. John Abt was our honored chef and did a fantastic job of grilling Brats, Burgers, and Chicken.

But while the food was cooking a couple dozen of the turners and guests took a wagon ride, sans hay, to the Antique Saw Mill that is one of the attractions of the farm. Here are only 3 of the pictures I took, the rest can be found by clicking HERE will bring you to the rest of the pictures. If you want a larger copy of any of them just yell, call or email me.

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Here are the pictures I promised yesterday. They don’t show much, yet but give you something to think about. If you have any suggestions, leave me comments, If I haven’t gone too far I’ll consider them. Or I’ll try to consider them on the next couple of wood.

We all know what a log looks like, but just to be complete here’s a starter.

Now take a look at the beginning of the roughout.

and another view.

More later as I progress. Right now it is sitting in a plastic bag to slow down drying overnight. From now on I will bag it in paper grocery bags.

Over the next few days I should (notice I didn’t say I will) be posting some pictures. This past weekend a friend’s neighbor took down a Beech Tree and was going to have the wood go to the dump. What a waste! I’m full of wood I will never use, but I did grab two logs.

Today I cut one into half logs, and started working on one piece with an idea that has been rolling around for a while. I’ll be posting some pictures as progress develops.The wood is still green, so after a rough-out it will be some time before it dries to the point I have a finished work.

I entered a piece in the Howard County (MD) Fair this year, as I have done in the past 4 or 5 years. This year I, again, earned a ribbon, Third Place, but a ribbon none the less. I didn’t count the number of entries in the “Small Woodturnings” class, which means the largest dimension was 12″. Medium is from 12 to 24″ and over 24″ is considered Large.

First and Second place were won by a husband and wife ‘team’. Lisa Munzer won a first with a Segmented Bowl made from Maple and Walnut, and Rick Munzer also entered and won with a Segmented Bowl of Maple and Purpleheart. Rick and Lisa are also a member of the Howard County Woodworkers Guild.

Cherry Burl w/African Blackwood - Mike Vore, Maple/Walnut - Lisa Munzer, Maple/Purpleheart - Rick Munzer

This would have been a hard class to judge. I think I would have ranked them in the same order. As you can see Lisa’s work also won a special judges award.Rick also won a couple ribbons for some of his Intarsia work (sorry, no pictures of that.)

Take a look at your local county and state fairs, they too may have a woodworking category in a “Home Arts”, or similar, section - and have as good a set of judges as we have in our county.

I’ve entered the Maryland State Fair, but as wasn’t impressed with the judging there as I am at our county fair.

In the past couple years I’ve been lucky to attend classes at two of the renowned Arts and Crafts Schools in the US. In 2005 I attended class with David Ellsworth at the Anderson Ranch Art Center in Snowmass, CO. Then in 2006 I was able to attend class with Ray Key, from Evesham, Cotswolds, England at Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts in Gatlinburg, TN. Then this summer I had a chance for a brief stop over at John C. Campell Folk School in Brasstown, NC. There are others, but I don’t have enough knowledge to mention them - comments please!

In August of 2005 I spent a week at The Anderson Ranch.
This is the patio outside the woodturning studio.

And here we are working

Then in the spring of 2007 I spent a week at Arrowmont

This isn’t the class I was in, but a picture I was able to get on another trip to the school. Somehow in all the times I’ve been here I don’t have a picture of the outside of the Woodworking building.

On my recent trip to Atlanta I stopped by J.C. Campbell and took these two shots.

This is the outside of the new Turning Studio

This is the inside of the new Turning Studio

My impressions of the schools:
Sizes:
Both Arrowmont and The Anderson Ranch are compact, cozy if you prefer. All the buildings are within a 2 or 3 minute walk of each other. Some of the buildings are old, lending a bit of charm, while others are new modern ones. J.C.Campbell has a huge campus, stretching about half a mile. I didn’t have time to see where the living quarters were, but most of the buildings I saw, except for the new Turning Studio, were set in old forests.

Locations:
The Anderson Ranch is is located in Snowmass Village, CO, during the winter it is a good ski vacation retreat/resort. Arrowmont is in Gatlinburg, TN, a year round tourist resort. The city Gatlinburg is about one mile from end to end, but when you are on the Arrowmont campus there is nothing to tell you that you are in the “big city”. Brasstown NC, J>C>Campbell is in Brasstown NC - more on this later.

Other features:
There is lots to do and see in Colorado, so that your family will have plenty to keep busy, from visiting Aspen to old mining towns like Leadville, Cripple Creek and Victor. The Anderson ranch does have WiFi in some areas so students can check their email.

Gatlinburg is about 5 miles from Pigeon Forge - the home of Dollywood, another tourist trap. So while you are in class at Arrowmont your family can enjoy all there is to offer not far away. Arrowmont has WiFi access over most of the campus and is planning to expand the coverage to all the residence buildings.

Brasstown, NC - the home of J.C.Campbell is a small rural town in north west North Carolina. When I drove to the school I really didn’t know where the town was, it is small. I don’t know what would keep the rest of the family busy, but I’m sure there is something. (comments please).

But wait! There’s more!

All these schools have a wide selection of classes in other arts besides woodturning. On my last trip to Arrowmont I was in time to see a demonstration of wood firing some pottery, the technique for this workshop that lasted about 2 weeks, the firing technique is known as Anagama. It involved ‘baking’ the pottery in a kiln fired with wood, raising the temperature to about 2300F in a kiln that is half buried in the side of a hill. If you’ve been to Arrowmont you might recognize some of the pictures that follow.

Waiting for the next time to load more wood. It won’t be long, the kiln needs to be fed about every 10 minutres. This thing burns lots of wood.

There are 5 ports to load wood through, one in front and two on each side, one of the side ports is open and you can see one of the potters fueling the fire with wood and flames coming out.

This chimney is above the kiln, and at night watching the flames out the top is dramatic. The lit windows in the lower left are in the pottery studio, the library windows in main building can be seen in the more distant building.

I’m waiting for a chance to take a class at J.C.Campbell.

Here are a few more tips from some of the good artists at the AAW Symposium in Portland, Or. These come from Ben Pho, David Ellsworth, Jacques Vesery, Art Leistman, Tom Crabb and others.

• How the components (texture, neck, foot, etc) fit the form is very important.
• Vertical Lines - excite, diagonal lines - contemplate, horizontal lines - dull.
• It is more important than to come up with the right question than the right answer.
• Be a risk taker.
• Look for Strong Statements, not Good Statements.
• Learn when to stop.
• Wood is the most perfectly imperfect material.
• I go to the Lathe and ‘Watch it happen’.
• Never predict what what you will do, it will come out.
• I always have a definite plan before I go to the lathe.
• Don’t put too many elements into one piece.
• Be curious, Be creative, Watch.

Yes a couple of these statements contradict each other, they are views from different artists.