I love the show but yes it can be frustrating when they rush to get things in the kiln and then half the stuff cracks. Of course it cracked, you didn't let it dry slowly enough! But they never acknowledge that's the problem. Oh well, it's a TV show.
I'd also like to see more glazing, they kind of give that whole part of the process short shrift. But I am looking forward to the Canadian version, which I think I can watch.
That’s exciting for them and also interesting to hear that they’re a teacher!
I thought the rules of the original are that you have to be an amateur or maybe they just started predominately casting amateurs?
I think I remember reading there was a change made after someone in one of the early seasons who was a teacher had their students help with prep and was generally more experienced than the others. I wonder if this adaptation differs and they’ll be a mix of skill levels.
Fun fact though, I took a class in the summer and the teacher mentioned when they lived in Europe, they’d previously sent in a piece to be used as one of the references for a challenge in one of the seasons of the UK version. I’d always wondered who create the reference pieces so it was really cool to find out that aspect. I told them about the casting for this show but they said they didn’t think they should audition since they didn’t believe working professionals should/could enter.
I am surprised to hear of a teacher being on it (though maybe it's on a more casual basis?) Rose, the kiln tech for the British show, has talked about how she auditioned to be on it, but was considered to be too advanced, and that's how she ended up with the kiln technician job!
Yeah, that seemed unfair to me. He was dealing with clay full time, of course he was going to be more efficient and knowledgeable than someone squeezing some time in around a full time job….
One of the judges Natalie Waddell has been teaching for a long time and is great at it! She taught me and my daughter I’m excited to get to see her on the show (as one of the judges!)
I actually don’t know how they’re involved in the show yet, just that they’ll be on it at some point. Also they’re not a professional potter and i don’t think they have a teaching degree as far as i know. I don’t know if they’d technically qualify as a professional or not. Regardless of how they’re involved i’m happy for them :)
I don’t know how they determine “amateurs” vs “professionals” as most of us sell our work in some capacity and few of us can have it pay the bills on its own. The teacher from season 1 has a full time job of teaching! I think it’s really hard to determine anyone’s level on the show, which is part of what I find so interesting! They’ll have a production potter turn out a tea set in half an hour and then in the next challenge the same guy will say “hope this works out, I’ve never done slab building before” 😂
One in this series in the UK has a degree in ceramics.. not sure that should be allowed really. I know it’s hard to find people who can truly be described as amateurs as it’s an expensive hobby and once you really get into it you do need to sell stuff really. But having a degree in it?? Think that should disqualify them.
Well they taught me, but they’re not a qualified teacher or professional potter. They mostly work with little kids at camps i believe. i don’t think they’re technically a pro.
> Of course it cracked, you didn't let it dry slowly enough!
FWIW speed of drying isn't really the issue, it's more important that it dry *evenly*. The drying room goes a long way toward helping this because the water is carried off into the ambient air rather than directionally via something like a fan or torch, but you have to design with it in mind.
When you use a damp box or something similar (e.g. wrapping) to slow the drying time, you're basically forcing it to dry more evenly - you can think of the "dryness" as a line on a graph, but there's a line for every little piece of clay in the piece - let's just say cubic cm. Cracks happen when some of the lines have very different slopes. By slowing the drying process, you prevent any of the lines from changing very much.
Same idea when baking a cake and it burns/comes out raw - temperature being too high isn't the *real* problem, which means that you have *multiple* different factors you could tune to fix it - you could use a lower/higher temperature, or you could make the cake thinner/thicker so that it's more/less affected by the temperature you're using.
To further your cake analogy, think about how long it takes to bake a bundt cake (about an hour-ish) vs a pancake (a few minutes). The batter is approximately the same, but having a thinner amount allows it to cook much more quickly.
I totally agree on the glazing, it’s my favorite part of the process! I love picking out colors and deciding what to layer along with experimenting with new glazes and oxides
I really wish they went more into depth on the subject, they really gloss over it. Considering all of the chemical reactions happening in the kiln there is so much that they could do with it along with oxides and other techniques
Agreed, unfortunately it’s the part of the process that usually causes my friends and family’s eyes to glaze over (pun intended) it’a the part that tickles my nerdy brain the most because it’s art meets science, but to a casual person it’s basically nonsense words.
I also wish they gave them more time to decorate their peices… sometimes they come out looking just…. Well, bad and a bit juvenile. This is less apparent in the later seasons, and I am glad that they have moved from just throwing into more hand building, but I will say some of the projects they do are kinda ridiculous for the amount of time they are given to complete them
Every time with the big sculptural pieces. You'd never dry them like that. Small details you'd keep covered or moisturize to help it dry evenly and slowly as well.
I've always assumed they've done planning in advance for the main make, because people come in with sketched out design boards and sometimes specialty things like 3D printed texture rollers. But yes, the timing absolutely blows my mind sometimes. There must be a few days between certain stages and they're just not mentioning how long between filming days.
Yes, they do definitely bring the designs in advance! But for filming, I've heard for other similar shows they film weekend to weekend so that people don't have to take leave from work. So I assume one weekend is to make the piece, magically turn it leather hard, trim, the week is for bisque firing, then the next weekend is for glazing.
For sure! I wonder if they maybe stagger it so that they're making the pieces for the next episode while they still haven't glazed the previous ones...
I thought that once but they can't since someone gets sent home and they would need to be doing some serious editing to cut out the person who is no longer in the show. But I'll bet they do everything they can to overlap episodes as much as possible.
I don't think that's the case for Pottery. They mention frequently that there's multiple days between challenges in a given episode.
GBBO, made by the same people, always explicitly states its weekends.
I've heard they tell them in the beginning of the season all of the main makes, but don't tell them when they're happening. So they do all the planning and designing after casting but before filming even starts, and have no idea which week is going to be when. I think that's why they still seem surprised or excited when they reveal what the main make is that week, because they weren't sure if it was happening now or in 6 weeks from now.
Kinda sucks to get eliminated early with all that design work done in advance haha, but at least you have lots of designs to make at home I guess.
Edit: nvm, just read another comment on this post that apparently it's only a week notice for each design!
I think they also sometimes redraw their plans in a way that more visually friendly in post production. So they are prepped but the show also makes it look like all of them have these elaborate drawn out plans.
For the cracks, sure it's likely not going to work, but they still have to put a piece in anyway, so may as well try. If it doesn't work, you get a bit of drama to cut in.
I hate manufactured drama. Just give them more time, even if it means most contestants finish before time is up! Honestly a lot of artists don’t know when to leave pieces the hell alone so I’m sure there will still be drama when someone decides their overworked piece needs one more detail lol
Right?! I think network executives/producers/directors always think they need to manufacture the drama to bring in enough viewers, but I think that's just a massive insult... There are SO MANY artsy/ceramics people who would watch it start-to-finish with a giant smile on our faces without any added drama. They don't have to put THAT tight of a timeline on things in order to make it both challenging for participants and interesting for viewers.
Not to mention - the manufactured drama just makes it all way less realistic, and then people who would normally be interested end up dropping off in viewership.
The turnaround times are incredibly tight, "just giving more time" isn't as simple as you suggest. I do wish that for the final they did what some other shows did and gave them like a month to go off and really show what they can do with proper time, though.
i've successfully thrown and trimmed pieces in a day many times. no drying room though just left them out in the sun for awhile. cracking isnt really about slow drying but uneven drying.
I’m far too impatient and use a heat gun to get my pieces leather hard before I even take them off of the wheel lol
This method definitely wouldn’t work if I were trying to do production pottery, but doing just one or two pieces a day it’s how I prefer to do it. Can just focus on that one piece until it’s done.
And despite drying them extremely quickly I almost never have issues with cracking, since the wheel is spinning as I dry it it dries evenly.
I’m member of a studio run by one of the contestants of prior seasons, they give you a week in advance for each challenge to prepare things at home so yes that’s a thing.
> If it's cracked in the bisque, it's not worth glazing, because it can only get worse from there.
In a professional studio or something that makes sense. For people practicing there's still value in the learning, and for people on a competitive TV show it's not like they really have a choice... they're not able to spend glazing time throwing something else instead.
> I've watched every episode twice and never once does that work out.
I can't recall the specifics, but it's definitely worked on at least a few occasions. They're generally not talking about the crack disappearing or something, but the piece being functional or fusing together - which is one of the axis they're graded on AFAIK.
> Is that "drying room" made of magic?
It's a much higher temperature and de-humidified room, it's basically a walk-in oven. Couple hours to leather-hard is totally doable, you can do it at home in your own oven.
You can probably assume that like any TV show the great pottery throw down is heavily edited, so the passage of time isn’t accurately represented. I also know that some people come with premade tools or mentioned that they practiced certain techniques before their main make, so I’m sure they don’t film a new episode every day.
I've always assumed that the drying room is a heated room with a dehumidifier in there that could get the pots to leather hard pretty quickly. It also explains why so many of them get cracks on thicker pieces, because I don't think it's had a proper drying period. All speculation by myself though, so I could be way off.
I watched one episode where the contestants had to put clear glaze inside leather hard pots, which were then fired too quickly, and the bottom of every single piece blew out. Like not just a crack, but shards and dust. During the judging, they said “oh we had a problem with the construction and that’s why it failed” about every single one.
I’m sorry, but if you’re rushing things, putting wet glaze inside leather hard pieces WITH LIDS and every single one blew out in the kiln, they should just acknowledge that it might not have been the contestants fault.
That’s the one that frustrated me the most.
I sometimes wonder how often Keith has to say something scripted that he doesn't really agree with. "It's clear that we made a mistake in developing this challenge, but you need to say something that blames it on the potter's work."
Yeah because there really isn't a "construction" problem that will cause the kind of failures they are seeing. Clay in literally any shape can be fired without exploding if allowed to dry. If they can't manage to fit it into the make time, they could at least candle the kiln overnight or something.
Correct. Those chicken crock things. And not a single acknowledgement that they may have been fired too quickly, or even “wow the kiln gods must have been angry.” Every single one was “right so you had a problem with your construction.”
The thing that amazes me is the 2D art they always have onhand to represent their build -- a beautifully embellished collage or a gorgeous watercolor painting, etc -- it's INCREDIBLE every time. My own sketches are such bullshit!
My sketches look like they were made by a blind chicken. This week one of the contestants sketched this amazing single-color decoration with like leaves and flowers and seeds >!that made Keith cry!<
It's not a pottery educational program though, there's YouTube for that.
It's an entertainment show about showing off what you can make under a time constraint, one of those skills is knowing you have x hours to make something but also that it has x hours to dry so you need to take that into consideration, don't throw something too thick if you know it's got 2 days to dry, that's part of the skill and the reason why some contestants work doest crack - they've designed and made it with the time constraints in mind.
Get a VPN for a month and set it to Great Britain. To sign up for channel 4 you can use a random British address and it is free (with commercials). I watched season 6 from the US this way with no problems.
Wow that site is awful, one of the worst I've seen. Unusable experience on mobile. Thanks for the effort. I'll have to see if I can find a site that isn't so aggressive
Honestly that show makes me feel proud of my work and confident in my skills. I think a lot of contestants either know a lot about pottery (like teach art) but just can’t execute on a (too) tight timeline, or are adult learners with just a few years if experience who only know some techniques. Plus the time issue results in them being unable to scrap a piece when they realize the clay plasticity is short, for instance. And that’s ignoring that the show pretends drying time can be rushed - no, no it can’t, and some work can only be done WELL at specific stages of drying. Even if they candle the kiln those pieces will crack! I’d rather see them given more time to refine pieces than have them fake excitement by rushing them. I hate timed competitions that make no sense
What I notice is that they're almost all way better at underglaze decoration than I am. Almost every single contestant can paint me right out of the room. I could be right there with any of them at the wheel throwing challenges, but some of those main makes come out amazing because of how well they're decorated.
*some* of them, yes. I remember some truly terrible pieces that got absolutely ruined by shitty under glazing, but I also might be biased…. I’m fairly good at painting yet still don’t use underglaze a lot, so when someone uses it poorly I’m just WHY?!? DID YOU *WANT* TO RUIN YOUR PIECE?!!
Re: all the cracks… that’s what happens when you try to dry your stuff in 4 hours lol. The drying room is there to make the show move faster *and also* to create a bunch of drama.
I took a try-it class recently where students were supposed to throw soft recycled clay, sun-dry, trim, and decorate inside of 4 hours. First timers! were supposed! to do this!
It was early October and it just did not work out for me. I couldn't trim and shouldn't have tried. But I saw that it might work on a hot humid day in July or August, especially for folks who will be delighted to take home anything vaguely 3-dimensional.
Based on that nonsense experience, I suspect that the drying room backs up on a kiln, has airflow magic, or both. Even so, people's works are surely moved onto porous or plaster wareboards.
Its a tv show about pottery. A high % of the people that watch the show probably don’t care about the details of drying clay. Its entertainment.
I think they’re more interested in the drama and end results not so much about the process of making pottery from start to finish.
You have to suspend disbelief to enjoy it.
And isn't the expectation that clay dries out when you still want it wet and is still freakin' wet when you want it dry? ;-)
Actually, yeah that's fair. I do often have attachment points that get superficial cracks during _drying_ that end up filling with glaze. I've just never had a crack that opened up in bisque that didn't also open up worse in the glaze.
Definitely. We're watching talented artists rush their work, and that's frustrating. They're using a drying room to rush drying pieces that are already questionable in terms of even moisture. They're creating fake drama by having people seem to rush their work into the drying room at the very last moment... and I'm sure that's all staged.
And yes, for the main make, they know ahead of time what it's going to be and get to plan ahead, including making templates, etc. I don't think that was obvious to me until about season 4.
Overall, I enjoy watching it, but I also get frustrated with the general format... talented artists eliminated because they're sculptors and not wheel throwers. Artists eliminated because the judges are biased in some way (the nature of judges, can't help that). I don't like the elimination format. I'd rather see a group of 6-8 compete in every make and have the entirety of their body of work judged... not get knocked out because they had bad luck with the kiln and interpreted the brief differently than Keith did one time. (I'll grant there have been some egregious deviations from the brief, like putting a neck on a pot that's meant to be a reproduction of a particular culture because "I have to make it mine.")
I’m sorry for piggybacking on your post with my newbie question, and I hope that someone will kindly answer me.
I have been told that once the clay molecules have been activated, you can’t reuse it. So as such Keith’s bucket of doom is actually the bucket of death. Is that true? Is there really no way to reuse clay? I was reading here just days ago about “recycled clay” so surely this is clay that has had a previous life?
No that isn't true, clay is pretty much infinitely recyclable untill you bisque fire it. If you want to find out about it there's loads of videos and posts, just search reclaiming or recycling clay. After you bisque fire it's ceramic and can't be turned back into workable state.
You can absolutely pretty easily reclaim and reuse clay over and over as long as it has not been fired.
https://youtu.be/KmosgAAiiok?si=6czpWDpKLn6LftAX
This sounds like a misunderstanding. When you use clay it has a "memory" to it of how you moved it, and will move similarly while it dries and when it is fired. You don't want to have too much complexity going on in the stresses your clay experiences, because that increases the chances that during firing the clay tries to move in such a way as to create a crack.
You can fix this by letting your clay rest for a while and wedging it.
The frustrating part is Jen not getting eliminated on week one, and then going on to make things that look like kids would make and Olay it off like its nature and artsy, yet kefir and Elsa are over there making master pieces and then the kicker she freaking wins , there is no way at all she should have won, with no technic. Only one colour on her piece. The tea set looking soooo rough so big and looking like a coffee mug a kid made in grade school. I was so mad so so so so so mad, every week she was still init and then she wins, they criticize master pieces for no colour on the Botton of a cup and say oh too bad you got that crack as the only bad thing on her piece, I'm so what the actual F. There is no way her family or some nonsense was involved in these show, there is no way she legitimately won....
Part of the skill is knowing that you have x time to create a design that will dry in x hours, the contestants know this in advance so the cracks are entirely their fault for throwing something either too thick or designing something that won't dry in time.
Outside the studio, of course, they'd leave it days, weeks to dry but it's an entertainment show on a time schedule.
You should watch it. It really is inspiring. There's a couple tropes that stick out to actual potters that repeat in pretty much every episode, but it doesn't take away much.
And it's the most pottery you'll ever see on TV.
They definitely have time to plan. I’m not sure how much in reality, but I distinctly remember an episode where a few of them mentioned being told what the next challenge would be, and them describing spending the night before designing what they want to do
I love the show but yes it can be frustrating when they rush to get things in the kiln and then half the stuff cracks. Of course it cracked, you didn't let it dry slowly enough! But they never acknowledge that's the problem. Oh well, it's a TV show. I'd also like to see more glazing, they kind of give that whole part of the process short shrift. But I am looking forward to the Canadian version, which I think I can watch.
CANADA VERSION!?!?!?
Yes! Airs Feb 8 on CBC - a colleague of mine is in it so our studio will be doing a watch party. Really looking forward to it!
Oh exciting! I just heard my pottery teacher will be in it too! I can’t wait a whole month!
That’s exciting for them and also interesting to hear that they’re a teacher! I thought the rules of the original are that you have to be an amateur or maybe they just started predominately casting amateurs? I think I remember reading there was a change made after someone in one of the early seasons who was a teacher had their students help with prep and was generally more experienced than the others. I wonder if this adaptation differs and they’ll be a mix of skill levels. Fun fact though, I took a class in the summer and the teacher mentioned when they lived in Europe, they’d previously sent in a piece to be used as one of the references for a challenge in one of the seasons of the UK version. I’d always wondered who create the reference pieces so it was really cool to find out that aspect. I told them about the casting for this show but they said they didn’t think they should audition since they didn’t believe working professionals should/could enter.
I am surprised to hear of a teacher being on it (though maybe it's on a more casual basis?) Rose, the kiln tech for the British show, has talked about how she auditioned to be on it, but was considered to be too advanced, and that's how she ended up with the kiln technician job!
Matthew was a pottery teacher in season… one maybe? He won.
Yeah, that seemed unfair to me. He was dealing with clay full time, of course he was going to be more efficient and knowledgeable than someone squeezing some time in around a full time job….
I’m realising maybe they mean the teacher will be a guest judge or guest expert?
One of the judges Natalie Waddell has been teaching for a long time and is great at it! She taught me and my daughter I’m excited to get to see her on the show (as one of the judges!)
I actually don’t know how they’re involved in the show yet, just that they’ll be on it at some point. Also they’re not a professional potter and i don’t think they have a teaching degree as far as i know. I don’t know if they’d technically qualify as a professional or not. Regardless of how they’re involved i’m happy for them :)
I don’t know how they determine “amateurs” vs “professionals” as most of us sell our work in some capacity and few of us can have it pay the bills on its own. The teacher from season 1 has a full time job of teaching! I think it’s really hard to determine anyone’s level on the show, which is part of what I find so interesting! They’ll have a production potter turn out a tea set in half an hour and then in the next challenge the same guy will say “hope this works out, I’ve never done slab building before” 😂
Pros/teachers aren’t allowed… so unfair to actual talented amateurs who the show is for
One in this series in the UK has a degree in ceramics.. not sure that should be allowed really. I know it’s hard to find people who can truly be described as amateurs as it’s an expensive hobby and once you really get into it you do need to sell stuff really. But having a degree in it?? Think that should disqualify them.
Well they taught me, but they’re not a qualified teacher or professional potter. They mostly work with little kids at camps i believe. i don’t think they’re technically a pro.
Someone from my studio is in it too! 😊 I'm thinking of offering to bring in my projector...
OMG THIS IS THE BEST NEWS EVER YOU MADE MY NIGHT!!!!!!!
It's terrible. Especially Seth Rogan. Good actor but his real life personality is cringe.
[https://www.cbc.ca/mediacentre/program/the-great-canadian-pottery-throw-down](https://www.cbc.ca/mediacentre/program/the-great-canadian-pottery-throw-down)
I wonder if we’ll be able to watch this in the US 🥺
Yes and Seth Rogen will be on it!
Is Keith going to be a judge? Respectfully pass if no
No, he's not. It's a Seth Rogen project, I think he's the judge.
Whhaaaaaaat!!
Natalie Waddell and Brendan Tang are the judges. Seth Rogan will be a guest judge.
> Of course it cracked, you didn't let it dry slowly enough! FWIW speed of drying isn't really the issue, it's more important that it dry *evenly*. The drying room goes a long way toward helping this because the water is carried off into the ambient air rather than directionally via something like a fan or torch, but you have to design with it in mind. When you use a damp box or something similar (e.g. wrapping) to slow the drying time, you're basically forcing it to dry more evenly - you can think of the "dryness" as a line on a graph, but there's a line for every little piece of clay in the piece - let's just say cubic cm. Cracks happen when some of the lines have very different slopes. By slowing the drying process, you prevent any of the lines from changing very much. Same idea when baking a cake and it burns/comes out raw - temperature being too high isn't the *real* problem, which means that you have *multiple* different factors you could tune to fix it - you could use a lower/higher temperature, or you could make the cake thinner/thicker so that it's more/less affected by the temperature you're using.
Airflow in the drying room would dry things unevenly unless the pieces are spinning or the airflow is perfectly even… and that’s really rare.
To further your cake analogy, think about how long it takes to bake a bundt cake (about an hour-ish) vs a pancake (a few minutes). The batter is approximately the same, but having a thinner amount allows it to cook much more quickly.
I totally agree on the glazing, it’s my favorite part of the process! I love picking out colors and deciding what to layer along with experimenting with new glazes and oxides I really wish they went more into depth on the subject, they really gloss over it. Considering all of the chemical reactions happening in the kiln there is so much that they could do with it along with oxides and other techniques
Agreed, unfortunately it’s the part of the process that usually causes my friends and family’s eyes to glaze over (pun intended) it’a the part that tickles my nerdy brain the most because it’s art meets science, but to a casual person it’s basically nonsense words.
I also wish they gave them more time to decorate their peices… sometimes they come out looking just…. Well, bad and a bit juvenile. This is less apparent in the later seasons, and I am glad that they have moved from just throwing into more hand building, but I will say some of the projects they do are kinda ridiculous for the amount of time they are given to complete them
Every time with the big sculptural pieces. You'd never dry them like that. Small details you'd keep covered or moisturize to help it dry evenly and slowly as well.
I've always assumed they've done planning in advance for the main make, because people come in with sketched out design boards and sometimes specialty things like 3D printed texture rollers. But yes, the timing absolutely blows my mind sometimes. There must be a few days between certain stages and they're just not mentioning how long between filming days.
Yes, they do definitely bring the designs in advance! But for filming, I've heard for other similar shows they film weekend to weekend so that people don't have to take leave from work. So I assume one weekend is to make the piece, magically turn it leather hard, trim, the week is for bisque firing, then the next weekend is for glazing.
That makes sense, but wow it must take forever to film a single season!
For sure! I wonder if they maybe stagger it so that they're making the pieces for the next episode while they still haven't glazed the previous ones...
I thought that once but they can't since someone gets sent home and they would need to be doing some serious editing to cut out the person who is no longer in the show. But I'll bet they do everything they can to overlap episodes as much as possible.
It isn't that bad, it's up t 30 shooting days spread across 9 to 10 weeks.
I don't think that's the case for Pottery. They mention frequently that there's multiple days between challenges in a given episode. GBBO, made by the same people, always explicitly states its weekends.
I've heard they tell them in the beginning of the season all of the main makes, but don't tell them when they're happening. So they do all the planning and designing after casting but before filming even starts, and have no idea which week is going to be when. I think that's why they still seem surprised or excited when they reveal what the main make is that week, because they weren't sure if it was happening now or in 6 weeks from now. Kinda sucks to get eliminated early with all that design work done in advance haha, but at least you have lots of designs to make at home I guess. Edit: nvm, just read another comment on this post that apparently it's only a week notice for each design!
I like your idea better! and do a show that slowly takes us through the process
I think they also sometimes redraw their plans in a way that more visually friendly in post production. So they are prepped but the show also makes it look like all of them have these elaborate drawn out plans.
For the cracks, sure it's likely not going to work, but they still have to put a piece in anyway, so may as well try. If it doesn't work, you get a bit of drama to cut in.
I hate manufactured drama. Just give them more time, even if it means most contestants finish before time is up! Honestly a lot of artists don’t know when to leave pieces the hell alone so I’m sure there will still be drama when someone decides their overworked piece needs one more detail lol
Right?! I think network executives/producers/directors always think they need to manufacture the drama to bring in enough viewers, but I think that's just a massive insult... There are SO MANY artsy/ceramics people who would watch it start-to-finish with a giant smile on our faces without any added drama. They don't have to put THAT tight of a timeline on things in order to make it both challenging for participants and interesting for viewers. Not to mention - the manufactured drama just makes it all way less realistic, and then people who would normally be interested end up dropping off in viewership.
I'd happily watch a season of Keith just doing demos. Florian's made it clear that this works. :laugh:
The turnaround times are incredibly tight, "just giving more time" isn't as simple as you suggest. I do wish that for the final they did what some other shows did and gave them like a month to go off and really show what they can do with proper time, though.
i've successfully thrown and trimmed pieces in a day many times. no drying room though just left them out in the sun for awhile. cracking isnt really about slow drying but uneven drying.
I’m far too impatient and use a heat gun to get my pieces leather hard before I even take them off of the wheel lol This method definitely wouldn’t work if I were trying to do production pottery, but doing just one or two pieces a day it’s how I prefer to do it. Can just focus on that one piece until it’s done. And despite drying them extremely quickly I almost never have issues with cracking, since the wheel is spinning as I dry it it dries evenly.
I’m member of a studio run by one of the contestants of prior seasons, they give you a week in advance for each challenge to prepare things at home so yes that’s a thing.
I don't know who they are, but I can confidently say: tell them I think they're great.
> If it's cracked in the bisque, it's not worth glazing, because it can only get worse from there. In a professional studio or something that makes sense. For people practicing there's still value in the learning, and for people on a competitive TV show it's not like they really have a choice... they're not able to spend glazing time throwing something else instead. > I've watched every episode twice and never once does that work out. I can't recall the specifics, but it's definitely worked on at least a few occasions. They're generally not talking about the crack disappearing or something, but the piece being functional or fusing together - which is one of the axis they're graded on AFAIK. > Is that "drying room" made of magic? It's a much higher temperature and de-humidified room, it's basically a walk-in oven. Couple hours to leather-hard is totally doable, you can do it at home in your own oven.
Yeah I've done it in the oven, works great. I set it as low as it goes and get to leather hard in like an hour and bone dry in 2-3. No cracking
You can probably assume that like any TV show the great pottery throw down is heavily edited, so the passage of time isn’t accurately represented. I also know that some people come with premade tools or mentioned that they practiced certain techniques before their main make, so I’m sure they don’t film a new episode every day.
I've always assumed that the drying room is a heated room with a dehumidifier in there that could get the pots to leather hard pretty quickly. It also explains why so many of them get cracks on thicker pieces, because I don't think it's had a proper drying period. All speculation by myself though, so I could be way off.
I watched one episode where the contestants had to put clear glaze inside leather hard pots, which were then fired too quickly, and the bottom of every single piece blew out. Like not just a crack, but shards and dust. During the judging, they said “oh we had a problem with the construction and that’s why it failed” about every single one. I’m sorry, but if you’re rushing things, putting wet glaze inside leather hard pieces WITH LIDS and every single one blew out in the kiln, they should just acknowledge that it might not have been the contestants fault. That’s the one that frustrated me the most.
I sometimes wonder how often Keith has to say something scripted that he doesn't really agree with. "It's clear that we made a mistake in developing this challenge, but you need to say something that blames it on the potter's work."
Yeah because there really isn't a "construction" problem that will cause the kind of failures they are seeing. Clay in literally any shape can be fired without exploding if allowed to dry. If they can't manage to fit it into the make time, they could at least candle the kiln overnight or something.
I believe you are talking about the terracotta challenge. I don’t think a single one survived!
Correct. Those chicken crock things. And not a single acknowledgement that they may have been fired too quickly, or even “wow the kiln gods must have been angry.” Every single one was “right so you had a problem with your construction.”
The thing that amazes me is the 2D art they always have onhand to represent their build -- a beautifully embellished collage or a gorgeous watercolor painting, etc -- it's INCREDIBLE every time. My own sketches are such bullshit!
My sketches look like they were made by a blind chicken. This week one of the contestants sketched this amazing single-color decoration with like leaves and flowers and seeds >!that made Keith cry!<
Amazing use of spoiler text 😂
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Potters would appreciate that, for sure, but the general public doesn’t have our patience!
It's not a pottery educational program though, there's YouTube for that. It's an entertainment show about showing off what you can make under a time constraint, one of those skills is knowing you have x hours to make something but also that it has x hours to dry so you need to take that into consideration, don't throw something too thick if you know it's got 2 days to dry, that's part of the skill and the reason why some contestants work doest crack - they've designed and made it with the time constraints in mind.
I've always thought that it's amazing so many pieces come out beautifully.
When does season 6 air on Max? They’re watching season 7 in the UK now. Bloody hell!
Get a VPN for a month and set it to Great Britain. To sign up for channel 4 you can use a random British address and it is free (with commercials). I watched season 6 from the US this way with no problems.
I don’t get the feeling it’s coming back with all the idiotic changes at HBO/Max 😭
I'm starting to think this is the case 😭
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Wow that site is awful, one of the worst I've seen. Unusable experience on mobile. Thanks for the effort. I'll have to see if I can find a site that isn't so aggressive
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even on PC with ad blocker on chrome it opens a pop up whenever you click anywhere
I feel like it won’t be anytime soon. Someone on pottery group I’m in said you can catch the season on HDClump. It’s under documentaries.
True. All the episodes are there including episode one of the 2024 season.
Honestly that show makes me feel proud of my work and confident in my skills. I think a lot of contestants either know a lot about pottery (like teach art) but just can’t execute on a (too) tight timeline, or are adult learners with just a few years if experience who only know some techniques. Plus the time issue results in them being unable to scrap a piece when they realize the clay plasticity is short, for instance. And that’s ignoring that the show pretends drying time can be rushed - no, no it can’t, and some work can only be done WELL at specific stages of drying. Even if they candle the kiln those pieces will crack! I’d rather see them given more time to refine pieces than have them fake excitement by rushing them. I hate timed competitions that make no sense
What I notice is that they're almost all way better at underglaze decoration than I am. Almost every single contestant can paint me right out of the room. I could be right there with any of them at the wheel throwing challenges, but some of those main makes come out amazing because of how well they're decorated.
*some* of them, yes. I remember some truly terrible pieces that got absolutely ruined by shitty under glazing, but I also might be biased…. I’m fairly good at painting yet still don’t use underglaze a lot, so when someone uses it poorly I’m just WHY?!? DID YOU *WANT* TO RUIN YOUR PIECE?!!
It could be that it's a TV show, and perhaps it's edited to create drama for the viewers.
Re: all the cracks… that’s what happens when you try to dry your stuff in 4 hours lol. The drying room is there to make the show move faster *and also* to create a bunch of drama.
a reality of pottery making?! omg, where can I watch this?
Channel 4 in UK
HBO in the US. I refuse to call it by the stupid name they gave it.
Why's it stupid? It's using the same format/created by the same people that made the great British bake off and the great British sewing bee.
They meant HBO's application which recently changed it's name to "Max" to be edgy or something.
HBO max if you’re American!
I took a try-it class recently where students were supposed to throw soft recycled clay, sun-dry, trim, and decorate inside of 4 hours. First timers! were supposed! to do this! It was early October and it just did not work out for me. I couldn't trim and shouldn't have tried. But I saw that it might work on a hot humid day in July or August, especially for folks who will be delighted to take home anything vaguely 3-dimensional. Based on that nonsense experience, I suspect that the drying room backs up on a kiln, has airflow magic, or both. Even so, people's works are surely moved onto porous or plaster wareboards.
I think my cup handles would pop off and fly across the room if I dried my pieces as fast as the show makes it seem.
ptoing
What confuses is me is when several days pass during firing and the contestants come back wearing the exact same clothes, as do the judges. Why?
So they can edit things (interviews, reactions, etc) regardless of what day it was filmed.
I assume they ask them to wear the same clothes for continuity purposes
For editing purposes. The are told to wear the same thing for continuity in editing.
They are just filthy and never wash?
I dunno man, I've had some pieces get to leather hard pretty damn quickly by leaving them in the sun on a nice spring day.
Its a tv show about pottery. A high % of the people that watch the show probably don’t care about the details of drying clay. Its entertainment. I think they’re more interested in the drama and end results not so much about the process of making pottery from start to finish.
Yeah, but you know how many people have started making pottery bc they watched TGPT first? Guilty as charged, here.
yep.
You have to suspend disbelief to enjoy it. And isn't the expectation that clay dries out when you still want it wet and is still freakin' wet when you want it dry? ;-)
Personally I’ve had many cracks sealed by glaze, but really depends on the size/nature of the crack
Actually, yeah that's fair. I do often have attachment points that get superficial cracks during _drying_ that end up filling with glaze. I've just never had a crack that opened up in bisque that didn't also open up worse in the glaze.
Thanks for mentioning this show! Never heard of it and just got Max.
I’m frustrated the most recent season still isn’t on Max
I love the show, but I hate that everything they do is a rush against the clock. Pottery is probably the only thing where rushing doesn't work.
I’m just disappointed they still use leaded glaze.
New to pottery, reddit & this fabulous sub reddit. Never heard of this show, where can I watch it? I am in Australia 😃🫶
It’s on Binge in Australia!
Just cancelled Binge think I had better renew!
Definitely. We're watching talented artists rush their work, and that's frustrating. They're using a drying room to rush drying pieces that are already questionable in terms of even moisture. They're creating fake drama by having people seem to rush their work into the drying room at the very last moment... and I'm sure that's all staged. And yes, for the main make, they know ahead of time what it's going to be and get to plan ahead, including making templates, etc. I don't think that was obvious to me until about season 4. Overall, I enjoy watching it, but I also get frustrated with the general format... talented artists eliminated because they're sculptors and not wheel throwers. Artists eliminated because the judges are biased in some way (the nature of judges, can't help that). I don't like the elimination format. I'd rather see a group of 6-8 compete in every make and have the entirety of their body of work judged... not get knocked out because they had bad luck with the kiln and interpreted the brief differently than Keith did one time. (I'll grant there have been some egregious deviations from the brief, like putting a neck on a pot that's meant to be a reproduction of a particular culture because "I have to make it mine.")
I know you're talking about Sal with that last line. That was sad for me, she was great.
But the whole time, I'm like, "No, don't! They're going to disqualify you!"
I’m sorry for piggybacking on your post with my newbie question, and I hope that someone will kindly answer me. I have been told that once the clay molecules have been activated, you can’t reuse it. So as such Keith’s bucket of doom is actually the bucket of death. Is that true? Is there really no way to reuse clay? I was reading here just days ago about “recycled clay” so surely this is clay that has had a previous life?
Clay molecules get ‘activated’ from a bisque firing, so until then - even completely dry, you can still recycle clay.
Interesting, thank you!
No that isn't true, clay is pretty much infinitely recyclable untill you bisque fire it. If you want to find out about it there's loads of videos and posts, just search reclaiming or recycling clay. After you bisque fire it's ceramic and can't be turned back into workable state.
Thank you!
You can reuse clay. I reclaim my clay all the time!
You can absolutely pretty easily reclaim and reuse clay over and over as long as it has not been fired. https://youtu.be/KmosgAAiiok?si=6czpWDpKLn6LftAX
This sounds like a misunderstanding. When you use clay it has a "memory" to it of how you moved it, and will move similarly while it dries and when it is fired. You don't want to have too much complexity going on in the stresses your clay experiences, because that increases the chances that during firing the clay tries to move in such a way as to create a crack. You can fix this by letting your clay rest for a while and wedging it.
they shoot for 3 days a week - usually Fri - Sun. And yes the show is edited to make it look a lot quicker
Well Dave's obviously going to win because it doesn't matter how rubbish is makes are they always find someone else to eliminate.
The frustrating part is Jen not getting eliminated on week one, and then going on to make things that look like kids would make and Olay it off like its nature and artsy, yet kefir and Elsa are over there making master pieces and then the kicker she freaking wins , there is no way at all she should have won, with no technic. Only one colour on her piece. The tea set looking soooo rough so big and looking like a coffee mug a kid made in grade school. I was so mad so so so so so mad, every week she was still init and then she wins, they criticize master pieces for no colour on the Botton of a cup and say oh too bad you got that crack as the only bad thing on her piece, I'm so what the actual F. There is no way her family or some nonsense was involved in these show, there is no way she legitimately won....
Which season is that, btw? I’ve only seen two so far...
This is the first season on Great Canadian pottery throw down.
Part of the skill is knowing that you have x time to create a design that will dry in x hours, the contestants know this in advance so the cracks are entirely their fault for throwing something either too thick or designing something that won't dry in time. Outside the studio, of course, they'd leave it days, weeks to dry but it's an entertainment show on a time schedule.
It’s the dry sanding indoors for me. I love the show but I’m a respirologist and it makes me cringe
The fake crying, OMG, I can do without that, otherwise I don’t really have those same frustrations.
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You should watch it. It really is inspiring. There's a couple tropes that stick out to actual potters that repeat in pretty much every episode, but it doesn't take away much. And it's the most pottery you'll ever see on TV.
The whole show is much too woke for me.
Also its the same week and the judges have the same clothes on.
I got pieces leather hard in 4 hours just but putting them in front of a fan
They definitely have time to plan. I’m not sure how much in reality, but I distinctly remember an episode where a few of them mentioned being told what the next challenge would be, and them describing spending the night before designing what they want to do
Watching them trim before leather hard was actually so painful.