Fusing digital ceramic decals to glass, attempt #1

I was just chastised by my glass shop owner for not keeping better notes when I fuse glass. I've got lots to catch up on but here's a quick post to record the details for a test I just ran before I forget.

I love the look of decals fused to glass and have had a little success selling pendants with this method in my etsy shop - Artful Excursions. I wanted to make custom decals and, from what I can tell,  there are three methods for doing that - printing your own decals on a laser printer (yielding sepia tones that I don't like), having silk-screened decals printed for you (I'm sure they'll look good but they're very expensive), or having digital ceramic decals printed for you. I just finished firing a test run with a set of custom digital ceramic decals from Fotoceramic.com.


The price was pretty awesome ($20 including shipping from UK to the US for all that I could fit on a 10x16" sheet, it turns out that I could fit quite a bit). Their sales staff was very helpful in answering questions and suggested that I order just one sheet in order to see if I liked the results. They said that it was possible to put one of two cover coats on the decals, one that would require firing at a slumping temperature and one that would require firing at a lower temperature, but they suggested that I go for the covercoat that would require slumping.

My results are somewhat mixed. From a distance, especially on a light colored glass, the decals look really good. They're a bit more of a dark grey than the true black I was going for, but the image transferred flawlessly without bubbles and without being burned off. That said, I don't know if I'd order these again. The black is not truly opaque like silk-screened would be and, on medium toned glass, that makes it harder to see. Also, the mass produced enamel decals that I've used in the past are printed on a background that completely burns off during firing, leaving just the enamel image. You have to look closely, at an angle to see it but, when you do so, you can definitely see the edge line from the background paper.

I think the results are good enough to sell, especially on light colored glass, but I'll keep searching for a different method of getting images on glass. (With one caveat - I have an email in to the staff at fotoceramic asking whether the opacity and background paper issues are things that can be solved with a different firing schedule. I suspect they aren't but I'll know more soon.)