Journal · 4 min read
IGNITE: What Advanced Cosmetic Education Looks Like After Your First Course
Your first course gives you the workflow. The next one should put you closer to the chair, with harder cases and someone watching your decisions.
After Art of Ceramic, dentists ask me the same question. What now?
They have the workflow. They have done a few cases. Some of them went beautifully. Some taught them something. And they want to go further without sitting through another overview.
That is why I built IGNITE.
What changes after the first course
A first course is about the system. Consultation, facial analysis, mock-up, prep, shape, temporaries, photography, lab communication, cementation. You need all of it before anything else makes sense.
Advanced education is different. The system is assumed. Now the questions are about judgment.
- The harder cases. Bite issues, revision dentistry, patients who have had veneers before and hated them.
- The decisions in between. When to bring in orthodontics. When feldspathic is the wrong material. When to say no.
- Seeing it live. Watching a case go from preparation to insertion in real time, with all the little steps that never make it into slides.
The cases that need more than veneers
A case I teach often: a patient with flared canines, crowded lower teeth, and a history of bonding that kept failing. In protrusive, her lower incisor locked into her upper central like a key.
The easy answer would have been to bond again. But dentistry fails a lot of patients because we look at a single problem and try to be heroes. There was a functional problem, and no bonding protocol was going to fix it.
So the conversation became about orthodontics, about occlusion, and about whether the material I wanted could survive in that mouth. That is advanced cosmetic dentistry. Not fancier porcelain. Better decisions.
Revision dentistry
Some of the most important cases are fixing someone else's work, or your own.
The obstacles are different: rebuilding trust with a patient who has had a bad experience, dark or uneven preparations, margins that need to go deeper, complications from the first time around. These cases need more planning and a lot more conversation. They also teach you more than any first-time case.
How IGNITE works
IGNITE is Stribe's advanced live course, and it is only for Art of Ceramic alumni. That prerequisite matters. Everyone in the room already speaks the same language, so we can start where the first course ended.
Dr. Andi teaches every session herself. I wanted it that way. The point is direct feedback from one clinician on your decisions, in a small group.
It includes live clinical sessions, so you see the steps in real time, not as edited footage. IGNITE 2026 was held in Los Angeles. The experience around the teaching is part of it too: in 2026 that included a day at a performance driving center, because the highest level of dentistry has a lot in common with how the best in other fields train.
Clinical sessions carry CE credits.
Is it the right next step for you
IGNITE is a good fit if:
- You have taken Art of Ceramic and are doing veneer cases.
- You want harder cases, not another overview.
- You want feedback on your own judgment, from me, in a small group.
- You want to see it live, from preparation to insertion.
If you are not doing cases yet, go back to the bench first. Practice the mock-up. Prep printed models. Photograph everything. The advanced course will mean more when you have something to bring to it.
What I hope alumni leave with
Confidence that comes from repetition. When I was one to three years out, I was nervous about the questions my patients asked. Nothing feels scary to me now, and that came from doing the work over and over, with mentors around me.
Mentors are everything. Advanced education should give you more of them.
Why live matters
Slides show the result. Live shows the steps.
One of the things alumni say most about IGNITE is the live insertion. You see all the little steps that go into it, in order, at real speed, including the moments where something needs adjusting.
That is the part edited video cannot give you. When a margin needs one more pass, when a contact is tight, when the shade looks different in daylight, you watch the decision being made and hear why.
The room matters too
Advanced education is also about who is next to you. A small group of alumni who already speak the same language moves faster. Cases get discussed at dinner. People keep in touch long after the course ends.
The experience around the teaching is designed to be memorable, because people remember what they learn in places they remember.
Bring your own cases
The best advanced courses use your work, not only the instructor's.
Bring photographs of cases you are proud of and cases that taught you something. The second kind is more useful. In a small room, the conversation about why a case went wrong is often the most valuable hour of the course.
The takeaway
- First course: learn the system.
- Next: learn judgment, on harder cases.
- See it live, in a small group.
- Bring your own cases and your own questions.
Related reading: building your cosmetic education path and feldspathic veneers and the bite.
Questions, answered.
What is IGNITE by Stribe?
IGNITE is Stribe's advanced live cosmetic dentistry course for Art of Ceramic alumni, with live clinical sessions in a small group. Dr. Andi teaches every session herself.
Who can attend IGNITE?
IGNITE is open only to dentists who have completed Art of Ceramic.
Does IGNITE include CE credits?
Yes. IGNITE includes CE credits for its clinical sessions. Stribe is an AGD PACE approved provider.
Where was IGNITE held?
IGNITE 2026 was held in Los Angeles. Future dates are published on the IGNITE site.