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Hello my name is Todd Hansen and we are here at the Art of Fire Contemporary Glass Blowing Studio in Laytonsville, Maryland. We're at www.artoffire.com. I've been a glass blower for about 12 years now. I got several different lines of glasswork that I work on and I'll be talking to you about glass blowing The best way to get started with glass blowing is to find a studio with lots of friendly, helpful people. What you want to find is a place where people can answer questions for you pretty easily, and they got a pretty good instructor program. Something where they got a curriculum and outlining the work, so it makes a lot of sense. So what you're probably going to do when you start blowing glass, is start off getting a couple of solid gathers on a pipe. This just gives you a chance to be accustomed to the furnace, the hand tools, and how you're really going to get yourself around the studio. Once you've mastered those basic techniques, take a blow pipe, take your first couple of gathers and you're going to shape those. You can block them, marvel them, whatever it takes to get them into a parison shape, then do just an easy blowing cap and that's just by blowing a small amount of air and trapping it with your fingertips. You'll have the heat of the glass actually form a bubble. Just go easy with it. Start off with a small couple of gathers. Reheat with the glory hold, try the jacks. Be sure you don't pinch the neck down all the way. You don't want to close that bubble off. Once you get the bubble blowing out, start swinging it a little bit, stretch it, see if you can get a cylinder out of it. Something simple like a tumbler. Flatten the bottom, put a penny on it, turn it around, and start using the jack scoping it off. Nice and easy. If you ever have trouble getting the glass to move, you can always go back and reheat.

1. Introduction to Glassblowing
2. What Tools Do You Need?
3. How to Find a Class
4. How to Find a Job
5. How to Pick a Kit
6. How to Rent a Studio
7. Where Is the Best Glassblowing Museum?
8. How Much Do Glassblowing Artists Make?
9. Is Glassblowing School Necessary?
10. How to Use a Blow Pipe
11. 6 Tips, Tricks & Techniques
12. How to Shape Glass
13. 4 Glory Hole Tips
14. How to Use Puffers & Steam Sticks
15. How to Use Tweezers to Shape Glass
16. How to Use Jacks & Pacioffis
17. How to Use Diamond & Straight Shears
18. How to Get Started
19. History of Glassblowing
20. What is Glass Art?
21. History of Handblown Glass
22. Can Glassblowing Be Done at Home?
23. Glassblowing Safety
24. How Hot Does the Glass Get?
25. How to Pick Supplies
26. How to Dress for Class
27. How to Marver Glass
28. How to Decorate Handblown Glass
29. How to Use Newspaper as Heat Protection
30. How to Handle Hot Handblown Glass
31. How to Handle Fallen Molten Glass
32. How to Color Handblown Glass
33. How to Use Blocks & Paddles
34. How to Blow Glass with Todd Hansen
35. How to Blow Glass with Ed Donovan

Learn about glassblowing from pros Todd Hansen and Ed Donovan in these Howcast videos.