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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.