A little while ago I bought an inexpensive usb microscope on amazon.com and it has been really fun to play with. I’ve been taking pictures of the crystals in my pottery and it’s been really interesting in seeing the different ways the crystals form within the glaze. It’s almost enough to make me want to go back to school and study chemistry.

 

The secondary crystals in this one are so interesting, but I don’t often get them, even when firing the same glaze with the same firing schedule

 

Many of the crystals here rise up through the glaze and you can feel the ridges in the surface. Most of the time  when you can feel the crystal, it seems it’s mostly just in the centers from where they’re radiating

 

I find it interesting that the crazing (cracks) in the glass mostly don’t travel through the crystals, but occur mainly where the crystals don’t grow. I’m not sure if it is because the crystal is strong enough to withstand the unequal pressures of the glaze to the body, or if it just doesn’t show in the pictures.

 

I think this is my favorite picture so far because of the incredible depth of the glaze it seems to show. It’s almost like waves breaking, or satellite photographs of mountains.

 

And finally, a picture of my dirty jeans back in from grinding glaze off the bottoms of the pots. I could kill some serious time with this little toy, there are just too many things within arms reach that are interesting close up.