Here is the look I'm after...

These are the first petals I made which I referenced in a post a few days ago. As a matter of fact, I think I said that these ended up in the trash. Well, instead what was left of the bead sat there on my work table and before you know it I was sanding some of the color off and loving the effect. The color of the clay to begin with was an off-white. Since then I've played with different colors of base petals including some skinner blends. I see a lot of potential here, so it's pretty exciting. Here are some close ups of the petals after sanding and how some of the layers of color show up. But since these petals were inked quite heavily before curing, the inks leached into the clay and dried them out...so a couple of them split at the center where I apply them to the base. I also think that they sat around a day so it helps to get the color really soaked in before curing, otherwise the inks tend to fade. Click on these images for a super duper close-up. I uploaded a few of the other prototype beads to Flickr. So, back to the drawing board.