Stained glass red panda

Here he is, all finished. The photo doesn't do him justice and its not helped by the colour of the lime wash or the light bulb. He is being delivered in the morning, but will try a daylight photo before he goes. He does look really good though and I  very pleased with him. I hope you like him. Next project is a Welsh dragon, they are very popular and my design is really good (so I've been told). Watch this space. 

All Copper Foiled

Two full days to get all the pieces copper foiled. A strip of very fine copper is wrapped around each piece, then burnished and finally trimmed. Technically you don't need to trim them, but with such small and intricately shaped glass pieces you can loose a lot of the shape and delicacy with bold lines. So I painstakingly under a large magnifying glass trim each piece with a razor blade to restore fine lines. The time spent was well worth it, he looks great having lost none of his character. When we finish him the copper will be lovely black lines and will stand out a treat. Next job soldering it all together. 

Glass all cut

After a bit of effort all the glass is now cut and shaped and he looks good. It's surprising how difficult it is to get the expression right, just a couple of degrees out with the eyes and he has a prominent squint; eyebrows or cheeks just a bit off and he looks like a badly drawn Disney character. Get it just right though and he comes to life. The really difficult part though is repeating it with the solder. After a final check each piece has been carefully ground smooth on the edges, a thorough wash in piping hot water to degrease it then onto the copper foiling table. I'll cover that inure detail next time. 

Cute Red Panda

Nearly all cut now, just a few more pieces of his face. It's incredibly time consuming shaping the very small pieces and making them all fit neatly without loosing the shape, after a full day on it we still only managed half his face. There is a small hole in each eye which will hopefully give a nice glint when the sun shines through and really bring him to life.  Hope you like him. 

Nice log

Was on a roll today then was called out. Money is useful and is good for getting cider, but it doesn't advance the art. I had some lovely dark brown semi opaque glass which was perfect for the log, but when cut and viewed at a distance, it wasn't quite right; it needed more contrast with the dark red legs. So we re-cut the log using a lighter shade, but kept the bottom strip to make a shadow and add a bit of depth. Happy with it now, it almost looks like a real log. At a distance both his tail and the log look textured and three dimensional. I'm out on the job Thursday and Friday so won't finish his face till the weekend. 

Stained glass Red Panda

Spent most of the morning re-shaping his full back leg. It was really beginning to grate on me, looking more Long John Silver than cute little tree panda. Unfortunately the very dark red (almost black) glass, whilst being the perfect colour, is expensive and difficult to cut. It really only wants to go in straight lines and I only had enough left to make one more piece, so took my time over it and used the grinder more than usual. I think you will agree though that the time was well worth the effort and the colours just about perfect. 

Red Panda

First cuts made and he is looking quite good. The colours are just about right, the glass is very characterful with lots is seeds (bubbles) and a gentle texture which whilst not mimicking fur, breaks up the light well enough to "fuzz" it a bit. We are using large bold shapes for the body which should help to focus attention on the detail in his face. The trick will be to get his expression right.  Glass pieces with multiple compound curves are very time consuming to complete, requiring many small individual cuts to complete just one facet. It then needs careful grinding to remove sharp edges and leave a good surface for the copper foil to bond to. Should have most of the glass cut tomorrow.