Electric Pottery Kiln Bisque Firing

Video Transcript

"The first firing that you're going to do for your pottery is called the bisque firing. This is greenware. This is clay that I've thrown and trimmed. It's completely ready to go in the kiln, but it's drying. You don't want to load this into your bisque kiln until it's one hundred percent dry. You don't want any dampness left, because water; at a little over two hundred degrees; boils, and any water that you have in here will explosively turn into steam, crack your pieces, cause your pieces to explode, and ruin all the hard work that you've done. So make sure your pieces are completely dry. You can make sure of that by looking at them. They're going to look much lighter than the original version of your clay. If you're using white clay, they're going to look pretty much white. You can also put the backside of your hand against the piece. If it feels cool to the touch, it's still evaporating water out of the piece, and it's not ready to go in the kiln yet. Now, I am not loading a bisque kiln right now, I'm loading a glaze kiln, but this is what the pieces look like after they come out of the first firing, which is called the bisque firing. They are hard, they ring, and they're ready to glaze, which we're going to talk about in a little while. But right now, I'm going to load a glaze kiln."