Part of the fun is not knowing

I love the colour of these cups, in their leather-hard state (I must find a new word for that state that isn't referring to animal skins) in a rich reddish clay, as they are freshly made with a contrasting white slip on the bottom textured areas. That is kinda how I would love them to be when glazed and fired. This might prompt me to get this look using working up a clay mix clay that fires to this colour. However here, these are made in a clay called speckled buff, it has a fine quite densely distributed dark speckle, which you cannot even see at the moment and will be a blandish light buff colour.

Yukayo has made some test tiles in this clay, so we can try to test a few things before glazing them all, a good strategy which I always advise my students, I know this is good advice, from the times I have not always done it! A friend noticed these on the workbench and asked how they are going to come out, I am still trying to decide this but I showed him a piece that uses that same clay with a glaze on top, to explain how different they will look.

I grizzled that "Ceramics would be easier if things came out how they looked"—having had some disappointments lately. But, the greater truth is, if we could see how things are going to end up, it would be losing half the fun. What non-potters are probably not aware of, is just how much time that potters spend visualising their work into being, and reflecting on the finished pieces. Something I enjoy seeing is how over time an artist/s reflection on their work feeds into the next work and becomes more of their own 'style.'