For the third paperweight, this one, I decided to use the optic mold. This is a star-shaped mold that tapers to a narrow point. I believe it’s made of aluminum. After rolling my first gather of glass in the frit and melting the frit into it, I put the jack glass-side down and push, incising lines into the glass. If I had done this before I gathered the frit (the broken glass that makes the color) it would have made vertical stripes.
After pulling the gather out of the optic mold, I grabbed the end of the glass with some diamon shears and twisted. Then I gathered a second batch of clear glass, and rounded it smooth with some wooden blocks before jacking it off into the annealer. Of the three, this is the most complex creation process, and it’s the one I like the least.
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Hmm. Of course I’m only going by the picture, but it looked like the most elegant one. But they’re all interesting.