Customer Reviews

Fusing for Technical Excellence by Alan Toy

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is an excellent instructional DVD for those beginning as well as intermediate. Techniques are explained in detail for cutting glass, cutting circles, drilling glass, firing glass and much more. An overview of the way glass acts when heated helps elimate mistakes in firing. The explanation of using kilns, especially programing, is most helpful. Making jewelry cabochons and finishing the fused jewelry is also covered.
Although I have been fusing glass for over a year, I learned a lot.

This dvd is one of several others I have purchased about glass fusing. It is by far the best of all with so many great tips, instructions, and helpful hints. I look forward to the authors future dvds as I am sure they will be full of more great information.

This dvd gives step-by-step instructions on beginner fusing. It is also a great reference tool to come back to when starting a project or when trouble shooting.

I'm the type of learner that has to see and do. I don't learn very well from reading or listening to lecture. I purchased this DVD thinking it would "demonstrate" the topics it advertised. Unfortunately, most of the DVD is a shot of the author standing behind a work table and talking. I kept waiting to see demonstrations of how things are done, but these were few and very far between. At the end, there were a few demonstrations, but it didn't make up for the rest of the DVD. In the "wrap up" the author mentioned his next DVD would be a "projects" DVD, suggesting that this is where the demonstrations will take place. Also, the audio was terrible. The production is more typical of YouTube rather than a professionally produced DVD.

For anyone interested in actually seeing fused glass demonstrations, I would spend the $39 on a membership to Bullseye's online education videos. I wish I had gone there first.

Mr. Toy is a very good teacher. This two sided DVD (almost three hours) surprised me with the amount of information he presents. The first side of the DVD is "lecture style" which I felt was appropriate since it really covered all the key technical issues in depth. Charts and very clear explanations. The second side gets into real projects and we are shown in some detail how each of the various methods in fusing are used. Flat work, full fuses, use of molds, etc. I didn't understand until now how molds needed to be primed and pre-heated, how metal molds acted differently than ceramic and the difference between draping, slumping and dropping. All of this is demonstrated. Last comments I have are about the appendix material. Mr. Toy covers the basics of cutting glass correctly, how to best to prevent bubbles (there are over a dozen tips just in this area - which I found really useful since bubbles are just a part of the fusing process and I needed lots of the tips so that I could minimize or accentuate them. He even shows how to do some beautiful jewelry work - explaining how to actually use "acid" to etch designs into dichroic glass and then how to create a groove on the perimeter of the finished piece and lastly how to wrap precious metal wire to make the piece into a pendant.

All in all, the value of all of this information was well worth the price. Hope this helps some of you out there!!