80- Nicole’s Picture Frame
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About 4 days before Christmas, I started making a nice little picture frame for a custom piece of art I had made up for Nicole. A gift for a special girl requires some special wood. So I pulled out my best sheets of curly maple veneer and a couple of sheets of home-sawn afzelia wood (thanks for link Logan!) that I received from David Marks. You may find it odd that I decided to use solid maple as the substrate for the frame. I thought this would be a fun experiment, and when the rabbets are cut in the back, there won’t be any unsightly ply to look at (not that it matters that much). Small projects like this are just a great place to experiment with techniques and materials you might not normally use. All the extra effort pays off in the end when the finish hits the wood. KABLAM!!!! The wood just comes to life!
And here are a few still shots of the frame. Its on a yellow wall which isn’t exactly the best background. Some day I will take it down and get some really nice shots.
I didn’t really cover the finishing method in depth, but its the same wiping varnish system I always use. Specifically, its the one outlined in my DVD, A Simple Varnish Finish.
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Nice man……as always.
I’ll bet this is what you have:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afzelia_xylocarpa
YESSSSSS Logan! You are the man. I think you’ve found it.
Very nice. Can you post a picture of the finished frame with picture, you didn’t have one in the video… unless I just missed it? :)
Done and done! :)
Thanks. Now I can really see the details in the wood.
Very nice Marc!!! I really like how you made this picture frame simply beautiful!!! You sure made those miters look easy with that Domino tool. What size were those dominoes for those miters? Thanks for the video. Fun as usual!!!
Thanks SSG. The Domino does make quick work of a task like reinforcing miters. The size I used what the smallest, 5mm tenon.
It takes a big man to admit he’s a gnome. : )
Great works as always. The figured maple is beautiful.
Marc – nice frame, I was telling my wife how great you are in the shop and how I watch all the vids / read all the posts & then you bust out a WOW pic! WHAT, whats next – a 12 sided wooded dice? I didn’t see that one coming. Maybe from Matt, but not you. Later
Ben
I can honestly say that I don’t know if that’s an insult, a compliment or a little of both, lol. Thanks, I guess……
I really like the message of the art. “Hot, medieval blondes dig short, middle-aged balding guys”. ;-)
Say, Marc. Why did you use plexiglass instead of glass? Is plexiglass actually better for this application?
Better? Not necessarily. The plexiglass is lighter and I honestly have a hard time telling the good stuff apart from glass when used in a picture.
But my real reason in this case was the fact that it was three days before Christmas and I can cut my own plexiglass. :) Oh, it is lighter too so that might be a concern in some applications.
Marc Really Nice!
Very Artistic and good craftmanship. I noticed that you did not use a miter jig and yet apparently your joints were right on. Would you attribute the accuracy of your 45 degree cuts to your use of the Festool chop saw? The domino was really slick too. Enjoyed your video very much.
Thanks
Well, the Kapex is one of, if not the most accurate saw on the market. But that doesn’t mean you can’t tune up other saws to give similar results. I know my old Makita would have produced similarly tight joints. Obviously there are some models out there that aren’t as good at holding calibration, but most decent saws can yield nearly perfect cuts with just a little bit of calibration TLC.
Clamping the workpiece goes a long way when cutting miters too.
Just a comment about framing. I like to matt my art. In my case it is photography I do. This may not be as critical for yours because I am not sure what it is printed on, but a photograph and the frame glass tend to really like each other over time. A photograph can stick itself to the glass and will never come off. By using a matt, not only can you emphasize the frame and the art, but it also keeps the art way from the glass and thus prevent it from sticking to the glass. Also I like to use UV resistant glass. This is especially handy if your art will see the passing sunbeam day in and day out for years. Great frame and next time you are at a frame shop, price what that would have cost you. You will may be surprised. Custom nice frames are super expensive!!
Who makes the straight edge you used while cutting the veneer?
Its a Lee Valley product. here is the link:
http://www.leevalley.com/wood/.....,240,45313
Marc, that was a beautiful frame. Thanks for the video, I really enjoyed it. I have one question though. When you clamped the frame diagonally to bring it square, which corners did you clamp? Could you elaborate a little more on this?
Thanks, and keep up the good work :)
Brian
Thanks Brian. The easiest way to understand that process is to draw a parallelogram on a piece of paper. Imagine what would happen to that parallelogram if you squeeze from one corner to the other. If you can’t visualize it, I’ll attempt to explain in words. The corners that I am applying pressure will both open up a bit. So if I have two corners that are at 87 degrees, and the other two corners should then be at 93 degrees. The correction is made by applying clamping pressure on the 87 degree corners. The pressure opens them up and increases their angle (but decreases the angle of the other corners).
Clear as mud? I will definitely cover this in more detail on a show in the future.
Thanks for the info, Marc. As soon as I read “parallelogram” the little light bulb lit up. Could you actually see a gap in the miters, or were they so small that only the tape measurer revealed them?
Actually at that point, there is pretty much no detectable gap in the miters. The only way I spotted the issue was to use my square. And I try to use the biggest square possible in order to exaggerate the error.
Marc,
Thanks for the very timely post…I was planning on framing some photos for Valentines Day for the missus but didn’t think to make my own frame. After seeing your post, I went out and bought some curly maple and leopard wood, unfortunately they didn’t have any Afzelia on hand. I look forward to moving this to the top of the queue, my father-in-law can wait a little longer for his Christmas present to get done!
Another good use for the domino. But it is essential the holes are in exactly the right place. Do you mark it with a pencil as you would do with a biscuit or do you make one hole larger than the other so you can shift for perfection. How do you do that?
btw, nothing says I love you better than using that special piece of wood right?
On this frame, I did the standard pencil line across the joint thing. And I kept the slot size with no slop on both sides. Makes the glueup much easier.
Thanks Marc, once again you make a process that has left me a little daunted much clearer.
Very nice frame by the way.
An other thing I really enjoy is your choices of woods and veneers. The contrasting colors and shades have opened my eyes to more possibilities in my own projects.
Marc,
That was AWESOME! I waws a huge fan when you first came out, then switched gears and was unable to follow for a while. I recently dusted off all my Festool’s and thought I would catch up on your podcast. Then, to find out that you and Nicole play WoW… Well, I was astonished. My wife and I also play and consider it some of the funnest family time that we have together.
Anyway, keep up the good work.
I’m in awe of this frame but extremely confused… it looks as though you only glued up two separate pieces of wood, did those two pieces get cut into 4 or were there two other pieces that didn’t get filmed?
Hey Matt. You are right. Each piece is actually two pieces together. I explain it at 1:40 in the video and at 4:00 you can see me slicing each piece down the middle to get the four frame pieces.
Marc,
As a certified picture framer, I have a few pointers for you.
Placing the artwork directly against the glazing is not a good idea. Either the artwork could stick to the glazing due to moisture, or the pigment of the artwork (particularly pastels) will be drawn off the paper to the plastic due to static electricity. It is generally preferable to space the glazing at least 1/8 inch off the artwork.
Using plywood for a backing board will cause the paper to become acid burned in due time. The acids in the lignins in wood will degrade paper artwork. It is preferable to use an acid free backing board – either mounting board or paper faced foamboard. Also, the acid in the frame itself can migrate to the artwork, so either the rabbet should be lined with a metalized tape, or acid free matting should be used to space the edges of the artwork at least an inch away from the inside edge of the frame.
Apply a dustcover to the back of the frame. The best dustcovering material in my opinion is Tyvek. It is strong and provides a barrier against moisture and airborne pollutants.
You built a beautiful frame, but it isn’t doing justice to the artwork the way everything is assembled.