Another journey into color

[Kathy Marshall]

Still playing around with the Chris Pytlik method of dyeing.
I realize the results are not for everyone, but it's kind of fun to see what I can come up with and something different for the those bland pieces of wood.
The ornament body is yellow birch and the top and finial are maple. It's 6" overall and the body is 2 1/2" wide x 1 /2". The colors are red, yellow and blue. Where the yellow and blue mixed it's green and on the bottom (not shown) where the red and blue mixed it's purple.
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The bowl is from a piece of ash. It's 4 3/4" x 6" and colors used were red and yellow.
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This little bowl is also from ash. It's about 4 3/4" x 1 1/2" and I used 2 different shades of blue.
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All pieces were finished with spray lacquer (the bowls still need some wet sanding and another coat or 2 of lacquer).

Thanks for looking!
Comments and critiques are welcome.

[Joe Watson]

The first (red) ash bowl is sharp, i dig it.

The icicle in the second image looks pretty cool, like a thermal image.

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[Dan Forman]

I love the ornaments, like the red bowl, not as fond of the blue bowl, but 3 out of 4 is pretty good. :D

Dan

[John Keeton]

Kathy, the ornament is a winner! Very neat effect. I am good on the red bowl, and the blue isn't bad. On the ash, unless the grain is filled, seems like the gloss makes the open grain distract from the coloration. Just my thoughts.

You did a nice job with the turning on all of them, though - particularly with the NE bowl - a challenging form!

[Steve Schlumpf]

Nice work on everything but I really like the ornaments! The effect reminds me of blown glass! Pretty cool!

[Roger Chandler]

Irradescence! I have tried spelling this word about 8 different ways, but the spell checker on this forum still objects! Anyway.......that is the effect I see on your pieces, Kathy........something like what they used to call Carnival glass......as JK said "neat effect."

[Jon McElwain]

The second natural edge bowl with the yellow coloration on the side reminds me of the open mouth of one of the red rock fish we catch in southeast Alaska! Carve some eyes and gills on that one and you could sell it for a bundle at one of our tourist shops!

How was the ash to turn? I recently tried to core some mountain ash that had been sitting in my shop for about 4 years. I broke the tenon twice before giving up and jsut turning a single bowl out of it. Hard as a rock. I know coring is best left for wet wood, but I had done it successfully on other species before.

[Bernie Weishapl]

Really nice on all Kathy. I do love the ornaments though.

[steven carter]

I like the coloring on the ornament globes, but think they might look better with solid color finials to enhance the globe part IMO. Really like the NE bowl.

[Eric Holmquist]

I really like the ornament and red bowl. I am looking forward to Totally Turning 2012, Chris Pytlik will be a demonstrator.

[Cathy Schaewe]

Well, they're certainly not boring! I agree that the ornament looks like blown glass - very pretty.

[Bob Bergstrom]

Sprinkle a little glitter on those ornaments and they will really sparkle in the Christmas spirit. I sure like what you did and way to expand you creativity.

[David E Keller]

Neat stuff, Kathy! The ornament seems like the perfect form to go crazy with colors, and that's just what you've done!

[Peter Blair]

Hey Kathy.
Can you shed any light on exactly what is "the Chris Pytlik method of dyeing".
I like all the pieces, wood to me is always new and exciting but it never hurts to 'up the anti" once in a while.

Pete

[Roland Martin]

Very interesting effects on the ornament, Kathy, I really like it. The NE bowl is also very nice, but the blue one, not so much.

[Kathy Marshall]

Thanks for the comments!
Like I said, I'm just playing with this color thing, I have lots of ash and it seems to take the color well so it makes good practice wood. It's fun to play with different combinations and sometimes they work and sometimes they don't, but I think this process will help me do a better job with traditional dye jobs.

The second natural edge bowl with the yellow coloration on the side reminds me of the open mouth of one of the red rock fish we catch in southeast Alaska! Carve some eyes and gills on that one and you could sell it for a bundle at one of our tourist shops!

How was the ash to turn? I recently tried to core some mountain ash that had been sitting in my shop for about 4 years. I broke the tenon twice before giving up and jsut turning a single bowl out of it. Hard as a rock. I know coring is best left for wet wood, but I had done it successfully on other species before.
Jon, the ash turned fine. What I have is green and it turns pretty nice, haven't had any long enough for it to dry out to see how it turns dry.


Hey Kathy.
Can you shed any light on exactly what is "the Chris Pytlik method of dyeing".
I like all the pieces, wood to me is always new and exciting but it never hurts to 'up the anti" once in a while.

Pete
Pete, in a nutshell, he dyes his pieces from the inside out. He turns his pieces pretty thin and then he bleaches most of them (I'm skipping the bleaching step). When he's ready to apply the dye, he dribbles it into the inside (he uses a plastic pipette, I've been using an eye dropper). The dye is then wicked from the inside to the outside, most heavily on the endgrain and very little on the face grain. He usually does a darker color on the inside, then on the outside he might dribble more of the darker color along the edge and let some flow down the sides, then he takes the lighter color and dribbles it on the spots that didn't get any of the darker color. Then he might dribble some of the lighter color over the darker, or the darker over the lighter, or drop little spots of varying sizes. Because of the dribbling and dropping, the dye will leave lines around the edges of the dribbles and drops. The he sprays on a couple of coats of sanding sealer to set the dye, and then starts applying lacquer.

Neat stuff, Kathy! The ornament seems like the perfect form to go crazy with colors, and that's just what you've done!
I've got some other color combos to try, it's a good thing I've got family to give my experiments too!

[Noah Barfield]

I love both the color and the shape of your red ash bowl! I'd love to learn how to turn a shape like that.

Noah

[Peter Blair]

Thanks Kathy. Very nice. I am reluctant to try too much on a piece I spent hours and hours to create, just in case. But I would like to do a little experimenting.
So you turn and dye the wood wet, what type of dye do you use? Some of the colours are very vivid so I would assume a particular type of dye.
I sometimes get some birch and agree that it often is rather plain so I just might get a chance to experiment a little.

Pete

[Baxter Smith]

Interesting pieces Kathy. I find the responses/peoples likes and dislikes just as interesting. Lots of likes on the red NE bowl for example. Its probably the one I care for the least. Not sure why. Maybe it reminds me of a gallon of red barn paint used by someone who is a pretty sloppy painter.:) The ornaments are neat but I really like the icicles!