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#215- 3 ways to Improve Your Pottery Without Making Pottery
51 Plays2 years ago
On this episode of Shaping Your Pottery I will be talking about how you can improve your pottery without actually making pottery. You can do these things where ever you are you don't need clay or a wheel
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Transcript
Free Pottery Themes Offer
00:00:00
Speaker
Hey, real quick before we get started, if you would like to find your own theme for your pottery, so your voice really stands out and you're not getting bored with making the same thing over and over again, I put together 53 themes for you guys and it's completely free. All you have to do to get it is just go to shapingyourpottery.com forward slash 53 themes. That's shapingyourpottery.com forward slash five three themes.
Can You Improve Pottery Skills Without Making Pottery?
00:00:29
Speaker
If you love pottery and want to take your skills to the next level, you're in the right place. Find your own pottery style right here on Shaping Your Pottery with Nick Torres. Let's get started. Can you improve your pottery without actually making pottery? Listen this episode to find out what is up Shaping Nation. This is Nick Torres here. And on this episode of Shaping Your Pottery, I'm going to be talking about can you improve your pottery without actually making pottery?
00:00:59
Speaker
Is that a possibility? What can you do to actually improve your party without making? So a couple weeks ago, I was sitting outside waiting for my dog to take a pee. And while I was sitting on my bench outside, my brother texted me. He says, is there a way
00:01:19
Speaker
to improve your pottery without actually making. And he gave the example, he said, remember when we used to play baseball, how we would do certain things like throughout the day, even if we weren't actually practicing baseball. And doing those certain things would actually help us improve our baseball skills.
Leveraging Visual Inspirations
00:01:41
Speaker
and he gave the example like we would go outside take the bat and we just swing the bat and doing that simple action would actually improve our skills as baseball players and immediately once he texted me that three things kind of came to mind so the first thing that came to mind was drawing or getting photos of either of pots that you like or just ideas that you want to maybe put into your pottery so the reason why
00:02:11
Speaker
This works out so well to help you with your potteries because if you know what you're trying to make, then it becomes that much easier to actually make it come to life, right? If you, let's just say you go into making pottery and you go into the studio, but you don't really know what you want to make. So you just kind of start making and half the process right there is probably you just thinking what to actually make. But beforehand, if you went into it, knowing what you wanted to make already,
00:02:40
Speaker
then it's gonna be a lot easier for you to make that vision come to life. It's the same thing, you don't have to actually be making pottery to improve your pottery to do this. So you can literally, five minutes a day, five minutes a week really, you could just spend time and just gather things that you want to add to your pottery or maybe shapes or sizes that you want to maybe emulate into your own pottery. Gather that and just put it into maybe like a file
00:03:09
Speaker
like or maybe a Pinterest board, whatever it is, and just gather all that stuff because now you can look at that stuff as resources. The second thing that you can do and I have also done as well is simply watching YouTube videos or other people making pottery.
The Power of Pottery Videos
00:03:28
Speaker
So when I was a junior in high school or going into my senior year of high school, I couldn't do anything all summer because I had injured my knee
00:03:37
Speaker
And because I was kind of bored, I only did two things really. I only watched a lot of videos about pottery than I also read. But because I was watching so many videos about pottery, what began to happen was that when I went back into my senior year that year, I was kind of, I was more ready.
00:03:57
Speaker
compared to last year because one I had already had the experience of making pottery from the previous year but two I was literally watching pottery all the fucking time so that simple action I'm just repeating that watching and watching and watching and I wouldn't just watch YouTube videos or videos about pottery if I saw something that they were doing like on the wheel I would Practice it without actually practicing it. What do I mean with it?
00:04:25
Speaker
So like the example I gave earlier with like baseball, where you just swing a bat, I did the same thing with my pottery. So if I was trying to learn how to center, but I didn't have my wheel at the time, what I would do is I would match
00:04:41
Speaker
the hand positions of the potter I was watching. I would match the hand positions, I would literally almost like visualize it in my mind, and I would just kind of practice the hand position. And this simple thing of practicing the hand position and watching other people do the pottery, it gets you into that mindset of when you are ready to and able to start making pottery,
00:05:06
Speaker
You can kind of almost model what they're doing, because now you have it in the back of your mind, say, oh, they did this, so I'm going to try this as well. And that's going to help you significantly to improve your pottery. And you're not even going to have to actually make pottery. It's just a simple act of practicing the movements that you're watching, because that's going to get into your mind. It's going to get into your mind, and it's going to stay there just by simply practicing the movements.
Finding Inspiration in Community
00:05:30
Speaker
Finally, the last thing that you can do to improve your pottery
00:05:34
Speaker
is getting around other potters, other artists. I didn't realize it until maybe a few months after starting this podcast. But after those few months, I realized that my own pottery was growing because I was simply being around other artists, other potters. And half the time, I wasn't even really making pottery. I was making pottery like every other week because I just didn't want to recycle my clay. Who the hell likes pottery?
00:06:04
Speaker
recycling clay. But anyways, I simply by interviewing the potters, I was getting new ideas on how to actually improve my pottery. And same thing can be for you. If you could get around other potters, other artists, you're going to start getting new ideas on how you can actually imply that to your own pottery. You may see somebody do something like, oh, that's a really good idea. I'm going to try putting that into my own pottery and then you try it and then boom.
00:06:32
Speaker
Now, now you have something that is either it's going to work for you or it's not going to work for you. But that probably wouldn't have happened if you didn't get around other potters. But a lot of you're probably asking yourself, how can I get around other potters? So here is something that I have been doing recently. So very recently, me and someone I know, some that I've interviewed before, Sarah Connor, every week we kind of meet and we just kind of have like a little mastermind session together. You know, we talk about pottery.
00:07:02
Speaker
We talk about our growth and what we want to achieve with our pottery. And we help each other, give each other ideas. And all I did was just I asked her say, hey, do you want to do like a mastermind once a week where we just talk? And because we just talk and we just help us keep each other accountable. And I can't tell you how much this has helped me so much. It is wonderful that I do this every week.
00:07:28
Speaker
And I'm pretty sure it's helping her as well. It helps us keep each other accountable. And we also get to pick each other's brains when we're trying to make a new design for a pottery or try something new for our pottery. And simply just by being around each other, it just helps so much. So you can literally ask somebody, maybe somebody you're close with on Instagram, say, Hey, do you want to talk about pottery once a week, once a month? I think that will really help us grow as potters, you know, and then
00:07:56
Speaker
Just don't be afraid to ask people that, because if you can ask people that, then who knows? Maybe they might say yes, they might say no. But if they say yes, then it's a win-win for everybody.
Recap of Pottery Improvement Tips
00:08:07
Speaker
So to recap, the first thing that you can be doing is drawing or taking photos and just gathering that information of things that you like. The second thing that you can do is
00:08:19
Speaker
is watching YouTube videos and then practicing the movements in the air. And she's like, when you're around the house or just maybe sitting, drinking coffee, just practice those movements without actually being on the wheel or hand building, whatever. Finally, the last thing is just to get around other potters so that, and that's probably where your growth is really gonna start 10Xing. I hope you guys enjoyed this episode and I'll see you guys next time.