This is the research I have found as well as my notes!! :)
This weekend I got the chance to meet Deanna Hood and interview her face to face.I was taking notes while she was making a glass bead. She said that when she sculpts her beads that she uses an oxygen propane mix tank. The glass that she uses are italian glass rods that she melts under a heat lamp and manipulates it onto a metal pole. After she is done with the bead she puts it in between two ceramic blankets until it is cool enough to remove. From that point she can string the beads and do whatever she feels like with the beads. Interestingly enough since she doesn't blow/pull the glass herself what she does is called lamp working. You can look at all of the materials that it takes to do lamp working as well as the different colors of glass rods that Deanna uses at: http://www.glasscraftinc.com/index.cfm. But before you dive off into an exciting world of glass blowing in your garage I would advise you to take a course or too, take all of the necessary safety precautions, and always... wear googles.
Did you know that glass is not actually a solid. Well its true because glass is never really "hardened". Glass is composed of silica which is a liquid so that is why glass is called a super-cooled liquid because of the fact that it is neither solid or liquid.
This weekend I got the chance to meet Deanna Hood and interview her face to face.I was taking notes while she was making a glass bead. She said that when she sculpts her beads that she uses an oxygen propane mix tank. The glass that she uses are italian glass rods that she melts under a heat lamp and manipulates it onto a metal pole. After she is done with the bead she puts it in between two ceramic blankets until it is cool enough to remove. From that point she can string the beads and do whatever she feels like with the beads. Interestingly enough since she doesn't blow/pull the glass herself what she does is called lamp working. You can look at all of the materials that it takes to do lamp working as well as the different colors of glass rods that Deanna uses at: http://www.glasscraftinc.com/index.cfm. But before you dive off into an exciting world of glass blowing in your garage I would advise you to take a course or too, take all of the necessary safety precautions, and always... wear googles.
Did you know that glass is not actually a solid. Well its true because glass is never really "hardened". Glass is composed of silica which is a liquid so that is why glass is called a super-cooled liquid because of the fact that it is neither solid or liquid.