...the company has more or less gone out of business; at any rate, last I checked the website, they weren't taking orders.

Here is the sample strand for the pi glass sample pack I got at Gathering last year. The transparent orange bead is missing—got mixed in with the uroboros samples. (Oops.)

This photo isn't just lame because it's missing a bead—the beads shown are full of release: in fact, that's why I took the picture, cuz I'm outta the cheap tigertail, and I was afraid the sharp holes in the metal tags might slice the monofiliment while they were whirling around in the magnetic polisher. Then my number to bead concordance would be lost, oh no! But I figured if I had a photo of the specific beads with their numbers, I could recreate the strand. —Though in the case of those two translucent yellows, I'm not certain it matters.

It should be noted the pi people marked their rods with metallic markers, which I thought very clever; unfortunately, the marker was showing some fatigue by the time s/he got to my rods, so some of the numbers are very difficult to read. Thus, I can't guarantee the numbers are correct, but I expect they're close enough.

And here is a summary of my so specific notes (specific because they easily fit onto the back of a business card)

• black—many bubbles
• trans red—prone to scum (bubbles) from marver
• seafoam—very nice creamy glass
• tan—striking; nice color (workable, transluc.)
• 29—easy to strike
• 87—acid [yellow]–> crayola [orangey-yellow]
• 90 flesh—spits (shocky)
• 59 opq blue—spits (shocky)
• 79 opq yellow—spits (shocky)

This is also the first time I've made both solid samples—I figured to take the scum that inevitably forms on the end of a cut rod and make a little solid disk so's the hollow would be all “good” glass—then decided little solid samples are nice too. If nothing else, I can sandwich the number tag between the beads, making it just a bit easier to associate with the correct bead.

I'll try to have the uroboros sample strand up shortly. Gee, I suppose at some point I can put up all the old samples too—pig, czech, effetre (after I finish adding the new colors, a never-ending job as long as they keep selling odd color...)

I admit, I am happy with image, cuz today—ta-da!—I finally started using the histogram display, and lo and behold, even with a bright white background, it works like a charm. Granted I took over 10,000 pictures with the camera before I worked up the nerve to use this feature (and yes, I was flummoxed when the card had two directories on it—why has it created a Nikon101? Oh, because it ran outta numbers. I get it...) but never let it be said I'm swift on the uptake. Oooh, maybe I can finally quit already on the bracketing...so that was rather nice:)

file created 04may06

Unless otherwise noted, text, image and objects depicted therein copyright 1996--present sylvus tarn.