fandomhigh | Arts & Metal Crafts; Thursday, Fifth Period [06/13].

Maybe she was feeling a little inspired by yesterday's conversation; maybe she'd already started to work on Irene's request a bit in her head and was just itching to do this kind of work, but when the students came into the shop class that afternoon, they'd find their teacher wielding a large blowtorch in front of a mounted piece of sheet metal, goggles on, big grin on her face....so hopefully that meant they knew they were in for a real one today!

"You really don't need to work with metal for as long as I have," she started, "to know that it's a fascinating medium with a lot of unexpected properties. You see that especially in blacksmithing, where the whole point is to figure out how to mold and shape the metal into doing what you want it to do. But also, with a bit of heat and alchemy, you can not only change the shape of the metal, but also....the color. So, with a little bit of a nod to Pride Month," and Amaya might have denied any sort of nod and grin Irene's way at that, but even she would have known that'd be impossible to deny, "that's what we're going to learn about today, how to pull out different colors from metals in fun and exciting ways."

To demonstrate, then, she turned toward the sheet of metal, turned on the blow torch, and, with a little bit of work, it started to turn blue.

"Simple as, right?" she said with a laugh, gesturing toward the colored steel proudly. "We're definitely going to want to gear up for this one, so let's do that, and we'll get right into the hows and whys and then get to work!"

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Colorfully!

Stewart

Irene Adler

Senshi

Stark

After a quick overview on safety with the torches and the importance of proper protections, Amaya's ready to get right into it, explaining how heat treating steel for color works, with an emphasis on how it's all about how much heat you're applying, and that different metals will yield different results, too, so be sure to play around with that a little, as well! You can also use chemicals to create the effect, or even electricity! That last one, in particular, is a good way to get brighter colors.

Which meant you were also getting a lecture on handling chemicals, especially if you wanted to go that route rather than the fire route!

Senshi had never been a dwarf who'd spent much time in mines or metalworking at all, so all of this was fascinating to him.

Spend the rest of class playing around with coloring metal using the different methods, and, if you're feeling confident, even try to make something out of it!

Playing with fire, metal, and chemicals? Oh, yes, Stewart was very eager to get started on this one. He started with a little bit of the torching method, and there was something fantastically ethereal in watching the colors slowly change under the light of the flame, but he had to admit, the electrical method was far more his style. He did like the vibrancy of the colors, and, honestly, anything that could sort of scratch that itch he got from making drugs that wasn't actually making drugs was probably a good thing.

Maybe with a little effort, he could change enough rings and loops to string together a nice Pride bracelet for Roald or something...

Irene, if nothing else, had always been good at maintaining the lightest touch and building upon it.

Ahem.

Which was to say, she took to the heat treating quite well, gently working the heat across metal over and over again until she was able to pull a few different shades of blue out of it -- and while she wasn't making anything, per se, it was still....relaxing? Was that the right word for an activity involving a blow torch?

(She was also, of course, riding a little high of feeling like she might have helped inspire class a little, particularly with the receipt of actual whole-class acknowledgement.)

This was very interesting to Stark. Fascinating, even, and he had been playing close attention to Amaya. Not that he didn't always but this seemed like it deserved a bit of extra attention.

It was too bad none of the methods seemed to yield a very pink sort of pink. He was just going to play with colors for a bit. It was fun.

In a somewhat unexpected reversal of earlier in the week, it was now Stewart giving Stark a bit of a squinting, uncertain, calculating, perhaps even accusatory side-eye, every so often, as engaging and interesting as the metalwork may have been.

Stark was used to odd looks but that didn't mean he didn't notice them.

At some point he turned his head enough to catch Stewart's eye with a slightly confused expression.

And when Stark looked over with that somewhat dumbfounded expression on his face, Stewart just had to scoff and shake his head. Abysmal, really. Aggravating. Abhorrent! That this man would not even know of the wondrous indulgences he was obstructing just by his mere existence! Pathetic.

And not something Stewart needed to dignify with his attention, so, scowling, with a snarl pulling at the corner of his lip, he was just going to turn his attention right back into his work.

Well, that was enlightening. Or not.

"Did I do something to upset you?" Stark asked finally after deliberating over whether or not to say anything at all for more time than he should have. "Or am I doing this wrong?"

Maybe Stewart had really strong opinions about coloring metal?

Stewart scoffed. There was a pause, and he scoffed again. And by the third scoff, it may have seemed a bit like he had been expecting those scoffs go have scoffs in response in between.

And then he spared a look toward Stark again, one that would be pitying if it hadn't been so envious at its core.

"If you have to ask," he said, oh-so-helpfully, "then you'll clearly never know."

"Not if you don't tell me," Stark agreed, rolling his eye.

"I don't remember doing anything to you. Why would I have?"

Poor confused alien.

Who really didn't need more reasons for loving being in a world where electricity was a thing, and yet there's color treating metal with it to really seal the deal, huh?

It was surprisingly hard to find gifs of color tempered metal, so just have another chart, because I think it's so freaking fascinating:

Arts & Metal Crafts; Thursday, Fifth Period [06/13].

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Class Activity: Color your Metal! - Arts & Metal Crafts, 06/13.

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Re: Class Activity: Color your Metal! - Arts & Metal Crafts, 06/13.

Re: Class Activity: Color your Metal! - Arts & Metal Crafts, 06/13.

Re: Class Activity: Color your Metal! - Arts & Metal Crafts, 06/13.

Re: Class Activity: Color your Metal! - Arts & Metal Crafts, 06/13.

Re: Class Activity: Color your Metal! - Arts & Metal Crafts, 06/13.

Re: Class Activity: Color your Metal! - Arts & Metal Crafts, 06/13.

Re: Class Activity: Color your Metal! - Arts & Metal Crafts, 06/13.

Re: Class Activity: Color your Metal! - Arts & Metal Crafts, 06/13.

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