For
quite some time now I have discovered that ink can be my friend when setting up
various designs to carve, in this case a Fishin' design orchestrated around a
molded square plate form. Using three parts water to one part ink to stretch it
out, I can work out a design and figure out where various elements should go as
you can see in this photo. It is not exactly the "measure twice, cut
once" method but I can tell you once you have started to incise or carve a
design, you are locked in to how and where the design goes. Quite a few of
these designs are worked out in advance on scrap pieces of paper, many recycled
from my wife's home office which allows me to fine tune the decoration as much
as possible until it is time to render it on a
three dimensional form. Granted despite these efforts, not every design
translates from paper to pot and some designs just don't work because they are
not very good or interesting but I can tell you that far fewer pieces end up in
the clay recycle than they used to before I decided that "if you take your
time, you get a more harmonious outcome".
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