Test Results :: Light Gray

Effetre Light Gray (EFF248) is an elephantine opaque colour. It is somewhat reactive with Ivory, fairly inert with other colours, and makes an interesting base colour for silver and silver glass.

When you reduce it, Light Grey 'browns up' a little.

Silver on top of Light Grey turns yellowish and pinkish. When the silver is reduced and encased, it loses this interesting colour.

Reducing silver glass spreads and develops a nice sheen on top of Light Gray. I got a decent starting strike from my TerraNova2 on top of this colour, and like the pale halos that I can see around the TerraNova2 fritty bits.

Light Gray separates a little on top of Tuxedo.

Ivory and Light Gray develop a reciprocal dark line reaction. In the case where the Ivory is on top, the result is a dark line that almost looks like a shadow. When the Light Gray is on top, the reaction is crackly and intermittent, giving the stringer lines and dots a translucent, jagged appearance.

Here are some other beads that include Light Gray:

Test Results :: Skyberry

Effetre Skyberry (EFF768) is a light blue opaque colour that blushes turquoise. It's like what you'd expect to get if Light Sky Blue and Copper Green got together and had a love child.

Like Copper Green, Skyberry develops a greyish sheen on its surface while it's being worked, although Skyberry's sheen tends more to the pinkish side, which is I guess where the whole 'berry' thing comes from. This sheen goes away when it is distracted by other surface reactions, like what you see in my colour tests with Tuxedo and Ivory.

I went to check my findings for Light Sky Blue to see how this colour and that one are similar, only to realize in a surprised and slightly horrified way that I haven't tested that colour yet.

In the bead on the left, you can see what Skyberry will do in a typical, same-coloured spacer. It's darker at the edges, and lighter in the middle, covered across the shoulders with a pale pinkish greyish sheen.

When I reduced Skyberry in the bead on the right, it turned a dark brick red.

Silver makes an interesting greyish-greenish patina on the surface of this colour, which mostly disappears when it is reduced and encased.

Like most blues, this colour is a pretty boring base colour for silver glass.  The reactions in both beads are interesting - you can see the Skyberry doing odd things around the edges of the frit in both cases - but it fails to make the colours pop, and I didn't find it a good base to strike my striking silver glass frit on.

Tuxedo separates Skyberry both when it is used on top of and underneath it, and Skyberry develops a dark line with Ivory in exactly the way you'd expect it to, as a close cousin of Copper Green.  Skyberry also separates on top of Copper Green which I thought was interesting.

In the bead on the left, if you look closely, you may notice that I accidentally used Opal Yellow twice instead of testing with Peace the way I meant to.  Oops.

Anyway, here are some fun beads with Skyberry. I still have about a half pound of this left, and plan to use it all before I move on to another palette. I am glad that Frantz still has more of this, as I'll want to put some aside for the next time I feel like working with a light blue.

Test Results :: Anole

Today is my 10th anniversary!  10 years ago, I posted my first glass review and then look what happened.  I hope you enjoy this one and the ones that will inevitably follow.  I don't know whether or not I have 10 more years of this in me, but I guess it's possible! :D

 

CiM Anole (CiM480) is a pretty, light green semi-opaque colour that stays translucent as you work it. It's the same hue as Elixir, only with less translucency.

I was not expecting it to be, but Anole is a bit sensitive to overreduction. Reducing it here made it darker and yellower than the other Anole beads.

Silver disperses over the surface of Anole in little veins, and then springs forth with a largely uninteresting white blankety effect when it is encased, without any blue blushing, translucency, or iridescence to make it interesting.

I got pretty colour from my reducing silver glass frit against this colour, even if my TerraNova2 frit was slow to strike on top of it. These reactions were a bit of a let-down though after my results with Elixir. I think I'm noticing that the misty opals have some silver glass-influencing power in them that colours like Anole lack.

Ivory and Copper Green both separate on top of Anole, but apart from that I didn't notice much in terms of reactions in these beads.

Here are some beads made with Anole.

Test Results :: Smurfy

Smurfy (CiM569) is a medium to dark turquoise opaque colour. I found it really creamy and nice to work with, and vastly prefer it to the other dark turquoise opaques (Dark Turquoise, Dark Sky Blue) from Effetre because it doesn't easily develop that greyish dirty patina that other turquoises get, although you can make that happen if you really try.

You can see in the bead on the left that when I reduced Smurfy it got a greyish haze on its surface. I reduced this bead a few times trying to get it to change colour. I was hoping for that solid red brick coating you can sometimes get on turquoises, but that doesn't seem to happen with this one.

Smurfy is darker than both Light Turquoise and Fremen, more of a shade with Dark Sky Blue. Unlike Dark Sky Blue, it doesn't easily develop that grey sheen, although you can make it happen if you hold it in a reducing flame.

On top of Smurfy, silver leaf looks a greyish green colour. When you reduce and encase it, it turns yellow.

Smurfy seems like it is probably a decent base for silver glass.

Like other turquoises, Smurfy gets a dark line with Ivory. Smurfy separates on top of Tuxedo and Copper Green. Apart from that, there weren't very many reactions in these beads.

Here are some other beads made with Smurfy.

Test Results :: Caramel

Reichenbach Caramel (RL7205) is a medium, pinkish brown opaque colour. It's a reactive colour, and is translucent when used in thin layers on top of other colours. This means that it goes a bit blotchy and see-through when you use it on top of very dark colours, and it fades out and looks yellower than itself when it's used on top of very pale colours.

It's browner than Flamingo, but it has many of the same kinds of reactions with other colours.

Here you can see the colour variation of Caramel. It can't decide if it's brown or pink. And then, when you reduce it, it can't decide whether it's purple or blue.

Silver leaf turns Caramel a yellowish colour. Reducing and encasing the silver just makes for a yellowish grey layer under your clear, which it seems wise to avoid.

I got pretty colour and reaction outlines from my reducing silver glass frit on top of this colour. I also got a very nice, almost-magical starting strike from my TerraNova2 frit. So, this colour seems to make a very pretty base colour for silver glass.

So, that whiteish outline that developed around the Copper Green in the leftmost bead is new for me. Or at least I thought it was until I looked back at my Flamingo test results and saw that Copper Green did this with that colour as well.

On top of Caramel, Opal Yellow separates.  

Ivory and Caramel develop a reciprocal (and quite intense) black line reaction which, because of Caramel's translucence in thin layers, means that the Caramel develops a strange, brown blotchiness on top of Ivory.

Here are some pictures of beads that contain Caramel.

Test Results :: Iris Dense Blue

Reichenbach Iris Dense Blue (RL3206) is a lovely colour, and much more fun to use than you could guess just by looking at an unmelted rod of it. It's soft as butter, very reactive with other colours, and lovely reduced. Let's look at some details.

Iris Dense Blue in solid-coloured beads is a mottled blue with a greenish cast, with dark veiny streaks running through it. I expected it to be brighter and sort of lividly blue, and this was a very pleasant surprise. When this colour is reduced, it develops a metallic sheen on it. You can see this sheen on both the middle and right-most beads, although for some reason it looks redder in the middle bead. I think that the amount of reduction alters the colour of it somewhat.

As I found in the rightmost bead, you can encase the reduction on Iris Dense Blue and achieve a mother-of-pearl effect. It does burn off easily, though, so you have to work cool if you want it to stick around. I managed to keep rather more of the reduction in this bead than I did in the pair of gobstoppers at the end of this post.

Silver spreads out and beads up on top of Iris Dense Blue. When the silver is reduced and encased, it forms a silvery blanket under the clear layer.

In the leftmost bead, my little fritty bits of silver glass developed an organic light border, and the surface of the Iris Dense Blue reduced to a gunmetal-ish colour.

In the rightmost bead, I got an interesting light border around all of my TerraNova2 frit and a starting  strike to burgundy, but no unusually great striking results.

Iris Dense Blue separates on top of Tuxedo, and if you compare the way it looks on top of Tuxedo to how it looks on top of all of the other colours here, I think you'll have to agree that it looks both brighter and bluer on top of that colour than with any of the others.

Copper Green, Opal Yellow, and Peace all separate on top of Iris Dense Blue, and Iris Dense Blue separates on top of them as well, a faint dark line running through the centre of its dots and stringer lines. It fumes Peace a weird greenish colour, both when Peace is above and when it is below it.

The big star of this series of tests is the behaviour with Ivory. On top of Ivory, Iris Dense Blue separates into light and dark, and throws a brown reaction line. The resulting effect is of a 3-dimensional set of stringer lines and dots that looks raised off of the Ivory base glass which is very appealing. When Ivory is used on top of Iris Dense Blue, the result is still interesting. You still get the dark line and the light outline, but because the reaction 'shadow' encroaches on the Ivory and not the blue, the stringer dots and lines take on a messier, uneven appearance.


Here are some beads that include Iris Dense Blue.

Test Results :: Bone

CiM Bone (CiM826) is a lovely, pale neutral colour. It's reactive, but much less volatile than other Ivories that we currently have available. Bone is paler and cooler than Effetre Ivory, and I think you'll like its reaction profile.

Do you miss Vetrofond Ivory and Yellow Ice? Bone isn't the same, but it is Ivory in colour, is not reactive in a muddy, negative way, and is beautiful with silver, which are the three things I miss most about those colours.

Reducing Bone seems to warm its colour to a light tan.

Here is CiM Bone with Vetrofond Biscotti, Vetrofond Cream, Reichenbach Porcelain, Effetre Wood, and Effetre Ivory. As you can see, it's very similar in colour to Vetrofond Cream. I haven't done a lot with Cream yet, so I am not certain how similar it and Bone are in other respects.

Silver Leaf on Bone behaves pretty much the way you'd expect if you know what it does with Effetre Ivory. The base colour fumes a deep brown and the silver gets a goldish cast to it. When the silver is reduced and encased, it turns blue in patches.

 

Since Effetre ivories are fun with silver, I thought I'd try silvered stringer with Bone.  Here's what silvered Bone is like - not as veiny as Effetre Ivory but a very interesting, mottled organic effect.

Reducing silver glass on Bone fumes the surface a richer Ivory colour and brownish around the edges of the frit. Striking silver glass on top of Bone was a slow starter. I looked back at my tests for Vetrofond Ivory and Effetre Light Ivory and it seems like this colour's less dramatic reactions mean that it will be less exciting with silver glass, but I would love it if someone would prove me wrong.

Like other Ivories, Bone develops a reciprocal dark line reaction with Opal Yellow. Unlike other Ivories, Bone does not react negatively with Copper Green, forming no dark line reaction at all. I have no idea why, but I can be grateful for this without understanding it.

Bone separates on top of Copper Green and Tuxedo.When Tuxedo is used on top of it, the Bone rises up in halos around the Tuxedo stringer lines and dots. When Copper Green is used on top of it, the Copper Green separates but the colour of it remains so dark and gunmetalish that it's not all that easy to see the reaction.

Has anyone else noticed that Tuxedo has gotten bluer and more transparent in recent years? I don't know what the current batch is like, but this stuff from last year seems much less opaque than I am used to.

Here are some other beads that include Bone.