IntroductionWelcome| 00:11 | Welcome to Matting, Framing,
and Hanging your Photographs.
| | 00:15 | I'm Konrad Eek, and I'm a
Framer and photographer.
| | 00:18 | And over my many years in the business, I
have learned lots of techniques for enhancing
| | 00:23 | and protecting my photographs to
proper matting and framing technique.
| | 00:28 | One of the things that I find particularly
enjoyable about the whole Matting and Framing
| | 00:32 | process is the craftsmanship involved.
| | 00:35 | Too often in this world today everything is
done with a mouse click or a touchpad, and
| | 00:39 | when you get into Matting and Framing you get
your hands back directly on the art you are creating.
| | 00:45 | And really, it becomes a part of you and
your personal expression comes through in
| | 00:50 | the final presentation of the work.
| | 00:53 | A great question is, why do
you frame your photographs?
| | 00:56 | I think part of it is you place a greater
intrinsic value on your work by placing it in a frame.
| | 01:02 | And I also think any viewer that sees a
framed work immediately takes it more seriously.
| | 01:08 | The whole phrase suitable for
framing, I think carries great weight.
| | 01:12 | And that's why I refer to the elevation of the work
through the application of the framers techniques.
| | 01:18 | I can't tell you how good it makes me feel
to see a photograph of mine hanging on the
| | 01:24 | wall, knowing that not only did I create the
photograph, but I cut the mat, I assembled
| | 01:28 | the frame, I put the whole package
together with glazing, used the proper hardware, and
| | 01:34 | hung it in an aesthetically pleasing way.
| | 01:36 | I want to share with you the tools to get
to that delightful moment of recognition
| | 01:42 | when you see your work presented that way.
| | 01:47 |
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| Using this course| 00:00 | What we're going to do in this course is
address both the aesthetic and technical aspects of
| | 00:06 | Matting, Framing, and Hanging your work.
| | 00:08 | This will take us to several different
places from the student workshop and gallery show
| | 00:13 | of the Oklahoma Summer Arts Institute in
the Courts Mountains of Southwestern Oklahoma,
| | 00:18 | to my shop here in Norman, to one of the
wholesalers I work with in Oklahoma City as well.
| | 00:24 | And along the way, we're going to learn a lot
of different techniques from using the simplest
| | 00:29 | handheld mat cutter to cut window mattes
as well as how to use higher end production
| | 00:34 | cutters for higher volume in Matting.
| | 00:37 | We'll talk about techniques for assembling
different types of picture frames, be the
| | 00:40 | metal or wood, and we'll talk about open
back frames and easel back frames as well.
| | 00:46 | We'll talk about glazing, both acrylic and
glass, and how to cut it how to properly mount
| | 00:52 | it and fix it within the frames.
| | 00:54 | We'll talk about the different tools
that you use to assemble the frames.
| | 00:57 | We're also going to talk about the curatorial
process, both on a grand scale as we hang the
| | 01:02 | student exhibition at Courts Mountain, but
also on a smaller scale with an aesthetic more
| | 01:07 | designed to approach what you
might have in your own living room.
| | 01:11 | And then we'll also go through all the tools
that are necessary to hang the work on almost
| | 01:16 | any surface you will run into in a home.
| | 01:21 |
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| Understanding why we frame| 00:00 | So you have taken the time and effort to create
a good quality photographic print. The question
| | 00:06 | then becomes, what do I want to do with it?
| | 00:09 | We have a print here, it's very nicely
done, it's a good black and white print.
| | 00:13 | It's immediately in danger, though,
because if picked up the wrong way, like this, with
| | 00:18 | a one-handed grip, you can immediately put a
small dent in the paper that lowers its intrinsic value.
| | 00:24 | Particularly, if you're dealing with quality
photographs that are being sold in galleries,
| | 00:28 | a mark like that in the paper would
reduce its value by at least half.
| | 00:33 | So one thing it's important to remember is
how to pick up photographs just to start with.
| | 00:37 | Always look for the long dimension and lift
from the sides and let the weight of the paper
| | 00:42 | create a slight fold, and this
protects it from this sort of ding.
| | 00:46 | You should never reach for a work
of art on paper with a single hand.
| | 00:50 | So this brings to mind one
of the concerns is denting.
| | 00:54 | Another concern you have with an un-matted
photograph is soil from people's hands, we
| | 00:59 | all often times have dirty little hands,
we have oils and acids in our sweat that can
| | 01:04 | actually discolor the print as well.
| | 01:07 | So the first step you should probably make
in preserving your photograph is to put it in
| | 01:11 | a mat. This accomplishes two things, one
a viewer can pick up the work and engage
| | 01:16 | it visually without actually touching the work, they
handle the mat rather that the photograph itself.
| | 01:23 | So it's a good thing, it helps protect the
photograph. The mat does not protect the photograph
| | 01:27 | from things hitting the surface of it,
somebody's looking at your work, and has a little
| | 01:31 | bit of a cold, big sneeze, big problem.
| | 01:33 | So the mat has a certain degree of
protection, but not complete protection for your work.
| | 01:40 | The other thing about a mat though, if the
mat becomes soiled as the edge of the print
| | 01:44 | does, you can change out the mat and just put
the print in a new mat thereby cleaning that up.
| | 01:50 | But the next layer of protection for your work
is combining matting with glazing and framing.
| | 01:57 | Glazing adds a layer of either glass or
acrylic to protect the front of the work, while the
| | 02:01 | framing protects the mat
edges and holds it all together.
| | 02:06 | The other thing that framing does is it
provides a display method, you can either get an easel
| | 02:10 | back frame that will stand up on its own, or
you can wire the back of it, so you can hang
| | 02:15 | the work on the wall.
| | 02:16 | There are a dizzying array of choices between
matting and framing that you can use for multiple
| | 02:22 | purposes, you can tie together disparate
works of art with creative framing choices to make
| | 02:27 | them seem to belong together.
| | 02:29 | You can use framing to make a work feel
more comfortable in a specific environment,
| | 02:34 | perhaps matching it to the decor
of a certain room in your house.
| | 02:38 | The thing to remember is each layer you add,
from the mat to the glazing to the frame
| | 02:43 | enhances the work in special ways.
| | 02:45 | And if you work with all these choices that
you have, you can make the work completely
| | 02:50 | unique, and that's what we're
going to explore in this course.
| | 02:55 |
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1. Getting StartedVisiting a professional framing studio| 00:01 | We're here at Wyman frame & supply in Moore
Oklahoma, a division of the Dale Rogers Training
| | 00:06 | Center in Oklahoma City.
| | 00:08 | The reason we're here is I wanted to show
you a typical retail showroom for a framing
| | 00:12 | operation, as well as the nuts and bolts of the
production of framing supplies for consumer use.
| | 00:18 | My other hope is that while we're here
you can become more conversant with the tools
| | 00:23 | and the terminology involved in matting and
framing. So without further ado, let's go
| | 00:28 | take a look at the showroom.
| | 00:32 | As you can see here, we have samples of
matboard, this is a very typical matter board
| | 00:37 | display corners on racks showing the vast
variety of colors and textures that are available.
| | 00:43 | On the wall here, you have a
broad selection of wood frames.
| | 00:47 | This reflects what they keep in inventory here.
| | 00:49 | As you come back here, you can see all
your choices in polystyrene frames and on this
| | 00:54 | wall you can see your choices in metal frames.
| | 00:57 | We're going to spend some more time here in
the showroom, but before we do that I'd like
| | 01:01 | to take you into the back of the house and show
you the shop where things are cut and assembled.
| | 01:08 | The first thing I'd like to show you, back
in the production area of Wyman, is this tool
| | 01:15 | right here. This is a cutter that they use
for cutting cardboard, acrylic, and glass.
| | 01:20 | Wall mounted, very heavy steel
rails that support the cutting device.
| | 01:28 | This rotates three different
blades into proper position for cutting.
| | 01:33 | Each type of material has a blade that's specific to
properly cut it, be it glass, acrylic, or cardboard.
| | 01:40 | You can see here, and here, there are rulers
that you can use to precisely position whatever
| | 01:46 | material you put in, you open up this
little bar here, slide your material in, align it
| | 01:54 | in the proper position, lock it in place,
then bring your cutter up with the appropriate
| | 02:00 | blade in position, and press this lever to
engage that blade, and draw it through the material.
| | 02:05 | Makes very accurate cuts in
a very easy position to use.
| | 02:10 | Another cutting tool they use here is this
saw that's used to cut the either wood or
| | 02:17 | styrene frame parts down to size, you can
see a saw blade there, the entire top of the
| | 02:22 | table pivots when you use this lever, and
you position your wood frame part with the
| | 02:28 | outside towards the back here, align it
according to the guide, and slowly drive it across the
| | 02:34 | blade. This can handle very large moldings and
makes very accurate, very clean mitered cuts.
| | 02:42 | One of the things that happens in framing
is every cut is an inside cut, when you make
| | 02:48 | the miters, if you look at this piece of
framing, this is the outside of the frame, this is
| | 02:53 | the inside where your work would go,
all of the corners have this inside cut.
| | 02:58 | So with that particular cutter every cut
you make you have to go back and make a second
| | 03:02 | cut on the molding separately.
| | 03:05 | This saw makes both cuts at once, you can
see here you have got two motors, two blade
| | 03:10 | housings, and so once you get started on this,
it always makes the second cut at the same
| | 03:15 | time it's cutting your piece the length.
This makes for much faster production.
| | 03:19 | Once again, it's driven by a foot pedal.
| | 03:21 | It's got nice pneumatic tools,
the whole thing is in place.
| | 03:25 | Very much geared for high production, but
it's also as you can imagine quite expensive.
| | 03:29 | This saw is over $10,000, something you might
think about when you think about the cost of framing.
| | 03:35 | Once the wood pieces are cut to size, the
next thing they do is assemble them and for
| | 03:40 | that they use this tool here, this is called
either a V Nailer or an Underpinner and what
| | 03:46 | it does is through this little hole here, it drives a
V-shaped fastener into the underside of the molding.
| | 03:53 | This part and this part are used to position
the legs of your frame accurately, and then
| | 03:59 | this part will come down on top of the
frame to apply pressure to keep it from shifting
| | 04:04 | up as the V nail is driven into the bottom
of it, it's all operated pneumatically by
| | 04:09 | a foot pedal within this little housing
right here, you put multiple nails in the back of
| | 04:14 | each frame depending on its thickness typically
about a half-inch to three quarters of an inch apart.
| | 04:20 | Another thing to keep in mind when you think
of framing is for every sample they have out
| | 04:24 | front they also have lengths of the
appropriate molding in stock in the back, and you can
| | 04:29 | see here there's a tremendous amount of different
moldings just in this area. Keeping that inventory
| | 04:35 | in stock is yet another part of
why framing can become expensive.
| | 04:39 | I want to take you back and
show you some other moldings.
| | 04:43 | This is the section of the shop where they
keep their inventory of the polystyrene moldings,
| | 04:47 | you can see here this is the uncut end of a
brand-new length, this you can see has been
| | 04:54 | already had a section cut-out of it and they have
left it ready to use with that inside miter already cut.
| | 05:00 | Once again, I just want you to get a sense
of the scale of this and the space that's
| | 05:04 | involved in keeping all this material in
inventory, and if you think this takes up some space
| | 05:10 | wait till to see the matboard.
| | 05:13 | We are here in yet another part of the
back of the facility here at Wyman, and if you
| | 05:19 | look here, this is some of the
glass that they have in inventory.
| | 05:21 | These boxes are all metal framing components.
| | 05:25 | If you look over here to my right, you'll
see more molding and boxes, yet more inventory
| | 05:30 | of framing parts. And behind me here, you'll
start to get a sense of the amount of mat
| | 05:35 | board that they keep in stock. As you come
over here and look down this wall it's like,
| | 05:41 | oh my lord, I could mat the world here. It's
really kind of dizzying when you think they
| | 05:46 | have over 500 colors and textures of mat
board available, many more available by special
| | 05:52 | orders, so there is a dizzying array
of choices you can make in matting.
| | 05:57 | So now that you have been back here and kind
of seen what the nuts and bolts are of creating
| | 06:00 | the different components of a frame the
glazing, the frame, and the mat, what I want to do
| | 06:05 | is go back up to the showroom and show you
how those become assembled into a coherent
| | 06:10 | whole and also talk to you about sort of
the vocabulary of all the different component
| | 06:14 | parts that play a role in
assembling a frame for your photograph.
| | 06:19 |
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| Working with a framer's vocabulary| 00:01 | So I would like to take a minute to go over
some of the vocabulary that you should really
| | 00:04 | understand in order to have a good conversation
with your framer, or to make informed decisions
| | 00:09 | about how you want to assemble your own frame.
| | 00:12 | The first step of course is the frame, and we
typically refer to the frame as a molding style.
| | 00:18 | Molding being the generic term, if you look
behind me you see a whole host of wood moldings.
| | 00:23 | There are also some very nice moldings
made out of styrene as well as a whole host of
| | 00:28 | moldings made in metal. Great variety of
choices and color and texture there with the molding.
| | 00:34 | Once you make your decision on the molding,
the next choice is what do you do for glazing?
| | 00:38 | The glazing is a term you may not have
heard before, it's a generic term that refers to
| | 00:43 | either glass or plexiglass, it's the transparent
barrier that protects both the work and the mat.
| | 00:50 | The mat is the cardboard that we use to
surround the work in within that mat we
| | 00:56 | will cut a window to expose the work,
hence you refer to it as a window mat.
| | 01:03 | Many choices and types of mat often you'll
see a double mat where you'll put a mat
| | 01:07 | of a darker tone and quite often a color
underneath a fairly neutral outer mat.
| | 01:13 | Typically, you'll choose the under mat to
bring out some tone or some color that actually
| | 01:19 | occurs within the photograph.
Another way to add depth is a fillet.
| | 01:24 | A fillet is essentially a small molding, if you
use the fillet, it attaches directly underneath
| | 01:30 | the mat, and typically a fillet will echo
some of the contours of the frame, you can
| | 01:35 | see here we're using a black fillet with a
white mat and the black frame and the contour
| | 01:40 | of the molding of the fillet closely matches the
front edge of the frame. Very nice way to add depth.
| | 01:47 | Another choice you can use to
add depth is to use a linen liner.
| | 01:50 | This is once again another
molding, it's covered with fabric.
| | 01:54 | In this case, kind of off white, you can
get many choices in the type of fabric, and it
| | 01:58 | fits directly within the frame to add depth,
you can also use a linen liner and a fillet,
| | 02:05 | you won't often see linen with photographs,
more typically it's used with paintings, but
| | 02:08 | it can be a nice way to add texture and depth.
A simple way to add depth is to use a spacer.
| | 02:16 | This is a spacers attached to the glass and
generate a gap between the glass and the mat.
| | 02:22 | They come in varying depths and some clear
white or black, they mount all the way flush
| | 02:27 | with this inside edge of the frame, so there is
virtually invisible once you have assembled the work.
| | 02:34 | After you have made all these choices, your next
choice is what do you want to use for a backing board?
| | 02:39 | So, often times that decision is dictated
by the nature of the photographs that you're
| | 02:44 | mounting, but you'll need some kind of a
backing surface to use to mount the work, and it also
| | 02:50 | holds the work in place once
you have assembled the frame.
| | 02:53 | The assemble package of mat, spacers,
glazing goes into the frame, it's held in place with
| | 02:58 | framers points, then typically the back of
the frame is sealed with the dust shield to
| | 03:03 | prevent dust from penetrating into the front
of the frame and showing out between the mat,
| | 03:08 | the art, and the glazing.
| | 03:10 | Once it's sealed you'll take
your choice of hardware here.
| | 03:16 | Typically I use D rings, these are designed
to work on metal frames, these will work on
| | 03:21 | wood and styrene frames, you can either hang
the D rings directly on screws, or you can
| | 03:26 | angle them slightly inward and put a loop of
picture wire between the D rings and attach
| | 03:32 | it to the hook. You can see we got several
hooks on top here, you can attach the wire
| | 03:37 | to the hook or the D rings to the
hook securing the work to the wall.
| | 03:43 | So once again, the basic steps are
selecting a frame, then glazing, then a spacer, then
| | 03:52 | a mat, a fillet, your artwork, the backing
board, framers points, a dust shield, mounting
| | 04:03 | hardware, and then it will hang on the wall.
| | 04:07 | So with those components in mind I think
you're now probably ready to start to look at the
| | 04:11 | aesthetics of the creation of
a matted and framed photograph.
| | 04:16 |
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| Conversing with a framer| 00:00 | Konrad Eek: I'm here with my good friend
and colleague Ben Long, and we're here to
| | 00:04 | discuss the aesthetics of
framing photographic prints.
| | 00:07 | Ben, do you want to tell me a
little bit about these prints?
| | 00:09 | Ben Long: Well, I have got two prints that I
brought with me from the Oklahoma Summer Arts Institute.
| | 00:14 | These are student works done by high school
students that we were working with this summer.
| | 00:19 | I worked these prints up as part of my
Inkjet Printing course, so we got a black and white
| | 00:24 | and a color--these as I said are both
inkjet prints on pretty inexpensive mat paper.
| | 00:30 | What's nice about the black and white that
we were able generate because of the printer
| | 00:33 | we were using we have got a good truly neutral
black and white, we have got a nice color image.
| | 00:39 | Both are--because of the nature of the inks
used in that printer extremely archival--these
| | 00:43 | prints are rated at 200 years
easily on this particular paper.
| | 00:48 | So, I want to talk about
some ideas about framing them.
| | 00:51 | Konrad: Okay, one of the things
you mentioned that the prints are archival.
| | 00:54 | That really helps me with the first
decision that I think you want to make when you're
| | 00:57 | dealing with framing a print, which is what
quality of matboard do you want to use.
| | 01:02 | I would never take an archival print and put it
say in a decorative matboard that's not acid-free.
| | 01:07 | So we are really kind of not really limiting
our choices because there's huge color choices
| | 01:11 | available in the higher-quality matboards.
| | 01:15 | Let's start with the black
and white to simplify it.
| | 01:17 | What were you going to say, Ben?
| | 01:19 | Ben: One question, as far as your
mat choice there you're talking about in an
| | 01:23 | attempt to preserve the maximum archive
ability, if I was willing to maybe risk 75 years,
| | 01:29 | I could go with a different matboard if I
couldn't find one that I liked light in the acid-free.
| | 01:33 | Konrad: Probably not, one of the
things about the decorative boards is they
| | 01:36 | tend to do their destructive work rather quickly,
and you will see a discoloration. I typically
| | 01:42 | only use decorative boards for posters,
printed material because they'll tend to discolor
| | 01:48 | within 5 to 10 years.
Ben: Oh, wow.
| | 01:50 | Konrad: So it's something that would affect
the decision within your lifetime, one would hope.
| | 01:54 | Ben: Right, yeah.
| | 01:56 | Konrad: To simplify things, let's
start with just the black and white image.
| | 02:01 | It's rarer that I will introduce color into the
manning and or framing for a black and white image.
| | 02:08 | I think that when you have got this neutrality to
introduce color becomes a really distracting thing.
| | 02:13 | What do you think about that?
| | 02:14 | Ben: I think you're right. Yeah, it
would over-upstage or overpower the actual print.
| | 02:18 | Konrad: And a starting place, too,
I always kind of look, there is a variation
| | 02:22 | in the tonality of many of
the papers you can work with.
| | 02:25 | And so I typically start from my white hue.
I will look for white that really is a close
| | 02:29 | match to the white of the paper.
| | 02:31 | Ben: Will you always mat? Are
there times when you think just a frame works?
| | 02:36 | Konrad: My one concern about putting it
in just a frame is it usually sets you
| | 02:40 | up where the work is in direct contact with the
glass, which is not a good thing, particularly
| | 02:44 | in a part of the country like
Oklahoma where we have humidity issues.
| | 02:49 | The paper will gain and lose moisture and
content, you will tend to get modeling where
| | 02:55 | it touches the glass, even with a spacer,
unless you use an adhesive mounting of some
| | 03:00 | sort--which I don't care for.
I think they are destructive mounting practices.
| | 03:04 | You can run into a flex
problems, warping problems.
| | 03:07 | They don't lay flat.
| | 03:08 | The nice thing about an over mat is it applies
uniform pressure around the work to help keep it flat.
| | 03:13 | Ben: Okay.
| | 03:14 | Konrad: So typically, I'd start off
with a white. This is a fairly close match.
| | 03:19 | Oftentimes, for drama I will add a second
mat, in this case with black and white.
| | 03:23 | What I like to do a lot is do a
black and white mat that overlap.
| | 03:29 | Typically, you leave about a quarter
of an inch of the undermat exposed.
| | 03:34 | And then you--I oftentimes will leave little
bit of the white of the paper exposed as well.
| | 03:39 | What do you think of that as a combination?
| | 03:42 | Ben: Honestly, I am not crazy about it, I
think it's too much having both colors of mattes in there.
| | 03:47 | It looks too busy. I don't know,
it's upstaging the pictures somehow.
| | 03:50 | Konrad: Do you just think
maybe it's the weight of black line?
| | 03:53 | Ben: It is off, I think.
| | 03:54 | Konrad: Another option we have is what's
called a Black Core Board, where you
| | 03:58 | can have the same white surface, but the core
of the board--if you look at the backside--the
| | 04:03 | backside of the board is black, and then you
have a white decorative paper on the front.
| | 04:08 | And you can see it gives that same
black line effect with a much finer line.
| | 04:13 | And one of the reasons I like that black
line if we are going to show the white, and you
| | 04:17 | have a white matboard that's not the absolute perfect
match, it gives you just the slightest bit of separation.
| | 04:22 | Ben: I like that.
Konrad: You like that?
| | 04:23 | Ben: Yeah.
Konrad: Okay.
| | 04:24 | Ben: I do have one question.
| | 04:26 | This paper is artificially brightened, so it
is not going to be this white for very long.
| | 04:32 | It will yellow a little bit.
| | 04:34 | Do I need to try and predict that or
think about my mat color choice in that?
| | 04:39 | Konrad: I think with this little
of the White you are seeing and also with
| | 04:42 | the separation of the black, I think if it
does shift a little bit, I don't think it's
| | 04:46 | going to be a major issue.
| | 04:47 | This white is also slightly
darker than the white of the paper.
| | 04:51 | So I think you're going to be all right there.
Ben: Okay.
| | 04:52 | Konrad: Do you know, is the white
related to exposure to sunlight, the white loss?
| | 04:56 | Ben: Yes.
| | 04:56 | Konrad: Another way to prevent that
if you wanted to hold onto the true white
| | 04:59 | of the paper if you use one of the UV shielding
glazing options. There is glazing, both acrylic
| | 05:05 | and glass, that can shield up to 97% of the UV, which
would greatly slow down that process there. So moving on.
| | 05:14 | We have made a decision we are going to
go with the white board with a black core.
| | 05:18 | And then once again, I tend to stay with
fairly neutral typically black or dark gray frames
| | 05:25 | brought a few choices here.
| | 05:27 | We can look at this as a repetition of line.
Oftentimes I look to visual clues within the
| | 05:34 | work when I'm suggesting a molding.
| | 05:36 | Here I really see the linearity of the
harp string as bring a strong element.
| | 05:41 | This kind of comes to mind there.
| | 05:45 | This has a little bit of that reference
just on the inside of the frame there.
| | 05:51 | This is a little bit more rustic, but once
again, I grabbed it just because of the linearity,
| | 05:57 | and I noticed this little line of grain
along the back of the harp, I thought they might
| | 06:02 | play off each other.
Ben: Okay.
| | 06:03 | Konrad: And then the last choice
is just this very simple black molding of it.
| | 06:08 | On a piece of this scale,
I think a molding this small is all right.
| | 06:11 | Ben: Yeah, I think, although I
really like your idea with the repetition.
| | 06:15 | I like both of those frames.
It is a small print even with the mat.
| | 06:18 | I am wondering if this is a way to go?
| | 06:19 | Konrad: Okay, and I think you know
this is where I often when I am doing an intake
| | 06:24 | in my frame shop with an individual, I will try
to provide them with choices, but essentially
| | 06:29 | my goal is to help the client
find their way to the best decision.
| | 06:32 | So in this case, we are going to go with Ben
and go with the thinner black molding, probably
| | 06:37 | expose I think only about 2 inches of the mat.
| | 06:40 | I think any more mat than that it would
start to overpower the work with the black core.
| | 06:45 | Ben: Is there ever a time on a print
of this size that you would go with more mat?
| | 06:50 | Is that just about size or is it
about the content of the image?
| | 06:52 | Konrad: It's about size, it's about content,
sometimes it's about where it's going to hang.
| | 06:57 | If you get into more complicated textual
information in the board, I know I have done a few pieces
| | 07:02 | where the board itself has been a
part of relating the environment.
| | 07:07 | So we haven't really discussed where this
would end up hanging because that's not a
| | 07:12 | part of this particular aesthetic, but that's
often good information to take into consideration.
| | 07:16 | Ben: Okay.
| | 07:17 | Konrad: And scale, you can take very
small works--I have seen some very successful
| | 07:22 | 4x4-inch prints that are done in 4- to
6-inch mattes with very ornate frames.
| | 07:29 | First, you are captivated by the frame, but
then you go, well, wow, what's in that little
| | 07:34 | square that is so deserving of all this.
| | 07:36 | And it really cons the viewer into
looking at that lousy little 4-inch print.
| | 07:40 | Ben: So the busy frame is an eye-grabbing thing.
It's not necessarily a bad thing.
| | 07:44 | Konrad: Nothing, you go back a lot
of the fancy ornate framing just came out
| | 07:49 | of a renaissance when these patrons would
buy these expensive paintings, and they would
| | 07:53 | be hanging on the walls in their homes, so they
didn't feel like they were getting enough attention.
| | 07:56 | So I might add these gaudy-gaudy frames and
then they go, hey, look at the art I bought.
| | 08:01 | Ben: Right, right.
Konrad: Let's go on and look at the color piece.
| | 08:09 | What are your first thoughts when you see this?
Ben: It's very blue, we get a lot of blue.
| | 08:15 | Konrad: Yes it is blue.
| | 08:16 | I think one of the things I see in this is
there's a lot of graphic strength right here
| | 08:21 | where you have the sunlight reflecting off
the water, this action in the clouds where
| | 08:26 | it really seems to be the only area in the image
where you have any color other than blue introduced.
| | 08:31 | But the one thing I thought in a thing as a
framer approaching this, I think this rock
| | 08:37 | is extremely important in
balancing out what's going on up here.
| | 08:41 | And so I started looking at the rock and
thinking, what can we do in the matting and framing
| | 08:46 | process to really start to emphasize that rock
and deemphasized the 90% of this frame that's blue?
| | 08:52 | Ben: Okay.
| | 08:53 | Konrad: And knowing it was shot
out at Quartz Mountain, red Oklahoma granite
| | 08:59 | is the rock of choice out there.
| | 09:01 | So I picked this particular mat that really kind
of reflects the color of that granite when it's wet.
| | 09:08 | And what do you see
happening as soon as I put that in?
| | 09:10 | Ben: Suddenly I notice
all the red in here a lot more.
| | 09:12 | Konrad: Yeah, if you take
it out, you don't see it so much.
| | 09:15 | As you put it in, all of a
sudden those colors start to pop.
| | 09:18 | The other thing I have
selected is a black core mat.
| | 09:21 | We are playing some games here with the way
the human eye functions, and this is something
| | 09:26 | Ben's helped me learn in understanding
the way we perceive dynamic range.
| | 09:31 | By eliminating the white, we overall
reduce the contrast of what we see in the image,
| | 09:37 | and what happens then, Ben?
| | 09:38 | Ben: Well, without all that white skewing
our eye in one direction, we read the shadows more.
| | 09:43 | We see the color that's in there.
It really changes things.
| | 09:47 | Konrad: Yeah, it's really pretty
dramatic, and as a framer as I started to
| | 09:52 | understand more than nature of seeing, it really
helped to put together packages that work well.
| | 09:57 | So we have got, not only am I going to
cover the white completely, but I am going to use
| | 10:00 | the black core mat, so even when we cut a
bevel in it, we don't see any white at all,
| | 10:05 | we bring it over the edge of the frame.
| | 10:07 | But along with the fact that I want to darken
it overall, I think if we just go with a single
| | 10:11 | mat in this color, it's going too dark,
it's going to be all of a sudden I think if you
| | 10:16 | put a frame with this, your eye would tend
to be drawn in the intensity of that color.
| | 10:20 | So I am going to put something else in
combination with it.
| | 10:22 | Ben: Okay.
| | 10:23 | Konrad: I think if we go back to a
stark white like we used in the previous
| | 10:27 | one, we'll be right back to
those dynamic range issues.
| | 10:30 | So I have picked a few
choices here to kind of show you.
| | 10:36 | First, another black core, and this I kind of looked
at a little tone and texture coming from the water.
| | 10:45 | And thought about just kind of
the hue of the stone plus the blue.
| | 10:51 | I see you a little mixed emotion there.
| | 10:53 | Ben: I like what it's doing to my
eyes, it's just not a color I am crazy about.
| | 10:57 | Yep, once again, a different
variation, not quite so much texture there.
| | 11:02 | Once again, riffing on the blue of the
water, that's a little closer in there.
| | 11:06 | Ben: Yeah.
| | 11:06 | Konrad: But one of the things I
felt with both of those blues is perhaps it
| | 11:09 | was just a little bit too much color where
the color here was kind of being deemphasized.
| | 11:15 | And so then I found this one which is more
about texture. It still has those blues coming
| | 11:23 | in, but it also has a lot of neutral tones.
| | 11:25 | And if you look at it really closely, there
are some really tiny bits of the same brown
| | 11:30 | that happened in the texture.
| | 11:31 | Ben: Yeah, tonally it's also about the
same as these bright areas in here.
| | 11:36 | Konrad: Exactly.
Ben: I like that one a lot.
| | 11:37 | Konrad: Yeah, so I think this
is the combination that really works.
| | 11:40 | We have played off the tonality in the image,
we have played games with the viewer's mental
| | 11:45 | function so that they'll see everything
more clearly than they normally would.
| | 11:50 | And what remains is just to choose a
molding that really works well with it.
| | 11:55 | On a very simple level, this is a quarter
sawn oak molding. The quarter sawing they take
| | 12:01 | the slices out like the spokes of a wheel
to the center of the tree so you get a very
| | 12:05 | linear appearance for oak.
| | 12:07 | In my thinking here is the linearity
kind of plays off the ripples in the water.
| | 12:11 | The tone of the stain kind of works with
the red there, that's one choice for us.
| | 12:17 | Another, if you want to go in a more
traditional, this is a cherry stained and weathered what
| | 12:24 | they call a lamb's tongue pattern.
| | 12:25 | It's a little more ornate than you might
think up for a photograph, very traditional.
| | 12:30 | This could possibly tie this into--you might
think about where eventually we're going to hang
| | 12:35 | if this type of molding we are going to work.
Ben: Okay.
| | 12:39 | Konrad: These last two I thought were
interesting, once again I am playing off the
| | 12:44 | striation and the rhythm in the water.
This is a dark wood with a blue wash, and to me,
| | 12:51 | this starts to really work
better with the elements here.
| | 12:54 | It's a little rustic, but then
our scene is a little rustic.
| | 12:57 | And then the last one I came to was this.
| | 13:01 | A richer wood tone, much closer to what we see in
the mat here, a slight blue wash on the texture here.
| | 13:09 | Ben: I think I like this one the most.
It's definitely done to these two.
| | 13:16 | The blue feels a little too much blue to me.
Actually, it seems to frame it better somehow.
| | 13:23 | Konrad: Yeah, and it's funny I think
that's what we are really after, and I have got to
| | 13:27 | agree with you, I think this was my choice.
| | 13:28 | I really like it texturally, but I like how
you end up with this repeating series of kind
| | 13:34 | of rust almost rectangles that I think would
really hold the work together first completed.
| | 13:39 | Ben: I agree, I like that a lot.
| | 13:41 | Konrad: One of the things we try to do
here for you is share a little bit of the
| | 13:46 | aesthetic conversation you
might have with your framer.
| | 13:50 | If you're working with a custom framer, but
also I think a dialogue that you can internalize
| | 13:55 | if you're trying to make
these decisions on your own.
| | 13:58 | Are you seeing things a little bit
different with a framer's eye now?
| | 14:01 | Ben: Absolutely, I had no idea you
could so change your perception of the color
| | 14:05 | within the print by blocking out the white
or bringing out different colors with matting.
| | 14:09 | Konrad: And I think that plays back to
some of your discussion in the print about
| | 14:13 | the proper viewing
environment for getting the print right.
| | 14:16 | And what we're doing here is we are taking
that viewing environment and skewing it to
| | 14:20 | kind of accentuate what the viewing system is in
the way you do the final interpretation of the work.
| | 14:27 | So my hope is that from this you gain some
tools to use as you address the world of framing.
| | 14:33 | And so we have kind of discussed the
aesthetics and the options that are available to you.
| | 14:37 | What we are going to do now is start to
look at the actual practical methods of cutting
| | 14:43 | mats, cutting the glazing, cutting and
assembling the frames, and putting the entire package
| | 14:48 | together to create a matted framed
photograph that is ready for hanging.
| | 14:53 |
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|
|
2. Working with MatsSelecting a mat| 00:01 | The first step in the presentation and
protection of your photograph is to mat the photograph.
| | 00:06 | And when you decide to mat the photograph,
the first choice you need to make is whether
| | 00:10 | to use archival or
non-archival matting materials.
| | 00:14 | This choice can be informed first, of
course, by the nature of the photograph itself.
| | 00:19 | It does not make sense to put a
non-archival photograph in an archival mat.
| | 00:25 | Here at Quartz Mountain the student work we
are preparing is archival, we are using an
| | 00:29 | Epson inkjet printer with UltraChrome inks
and printing on a media that is acid free.
| | 00:35 | So this work will last for a long, long time.
| | 00:38 | As a result, we have made the decision to use
archival materials in order to mount the work.
| | 00:44 | When you go down that road towards archival,
RagMat is really the top of the line as far
| | 00:48 | as archival materials.
It's made from 100% cotton rag.
| | 00:52 | It contains no acids, no lignins, nothing that
will attack the work in anyway or discolor it.
| | 00:59 | There is a huge selection available in RagMat.
| | 01:02 | This is just one brand, Crescent, and you
can see here we start out, we have got a lot
| | 01:07 | of whites, yellows, soft tones,
we go into greens and grays.
| | 01:11 | They have different textured
surfaces in several colors.
| | 01:16 | You can even go farther, you know, if you need something
in purple, you have got lots to choose from.
| | 01:22 | Really, the whole spectrum is covered. And in
addition to that, you also have many different
| | 01:29 | textured surface, patterned surfaces, many
options to work from, and this is just in the RagMat.
| | 01:34 | They are top of the line.
| | 01:36 | In addition to RagMat, you can get Alpha-Cellulose
Matboards that are also lignin free, they
| | 01:43 | are processed and buffered to be a pH
neutral, the pH falling between 8.5 and 9.0.
| | 01:50 | Once again, these materials will
not attack your artwork at all.
| | 01:54 | The step down from that when you move away
from the archival matboard is a decorative
| | 01:59 | matboard. And the decorative matboards are
wonderful, you get a full color selection in them,
| | 02:05 | you just don't want to rely on them
for archival preservation of the work.
| | 02:09 | They will eventually attack what's
matted in them, cause some discoloration.
| | 02:14 | Your work is not going to burst into flames
or anything horrible like that, but it might
| | 02:17 | be slightly degraded over time by coming
into contact with the acids in the board.
| | 02:22 | They are perfect choice if you're matting a
poster, most printed pieces are non-archival,
| | 02:27 | they contain acids and they in
their own way will yellow over time.
| | 02:33 | So we have made the decision to use RagMat. When
choosing a matboard for a museum type exhibition,
| | 02:39 | typically, museum exhibitions are mounted
with whiteboard, and especially photographs,
| | 02:45 | it's rarely you go into the
museum and see anything else.
| | 02:48 | Another factor in the selection of a
whiteboard is with about 80 works being in the show,
| | 02:55 | all from different artists, not all from different
artists, but from a group of 18 different artists.
| | 02:59 | We would really like to use a board with a
color that kind of unifies the show, that
| | 03:03 | helps pull the images together
and have the show make more sense.
| | 03:08 | So starting with white that may seem simple, but
there are really a huge number of choices in white.
| | 03:16 | You can look at these, there are all subtle
differences in tones, some lean towards the
| | 03:20 | pink, the blue, the yellow.
| | 03:22 | What I would typically do when I'm trying
to select a whiteboard is look at the paper
| | 03:26 | base of the photograph or the artwork I'm
trying to work with, and pick a white that
| | 03:31 | works well with that.
| | 03:33 | In this case, I am going to pick a
white that matches it pretty closely.
| | 03:36 | Sometimes what works on papers that are printed
on ivory or a beige paper, I will pick a slight
| | 03:42 | contrast from the paper itself.
| | 03:44 | But in this case, I want to
really match the paper closely.
| | 03:48 | So we selected our white, you might consider,
every once in a while you think about double
| | 03:52 | matting, a double mat is a nice thing, it
adds depth, it adds a little more visual interest
| | 03:59 | in the case of black and white photography.
| | 04:01 | A white mat over a black mat can make
a really dramatic border for the print.
| | 04:07 | In this case, for this exhibition, because of
budgetary constraints and time constraints,
| | 04:11 | we are going to go with a
single mat, and go with a white mat.
| | 04:15 | The next decision you have to make is
what kind of backing board you want to use.
| | 04:19 | A mat is a two-part construction.
| | 04:21 | There is a backing board where the
photograph is mounted, and then there's the matboard
| | 04:25 | which goes over the backing board, which
has the window cut in it to expose the work.
| | 04:30 | You can just cut a second sheet of your mat
board to use as a backing board or there is a material
| | 04:35 | out there called the Foamcore.
| | 04:37 | It's two layers of paper with foam in the
center. You can get this in acid free, in
| | 04:43 | a couple different thicknesses.
| | 04:45 | An advantage to Foamcore is it's less
expensive than matboard, it's still archival, and it's
| | 04:51 | also a little bit more rigid than matboard.
| | 04:53 | Sometimes I will use Foamcore for things that
are just going to live as matted prints, rather
| | 04:58 | than framed prints just
because of its extra rigidity.
| | 05:03 | So now we have made our selection on the
Matboard and the backing board, and we are going to
| | 05:08 | proceed to the next step, which
is determining the size of the mat.
| | 05:13 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Deciding on the window size| 00:00 | The next step in matting and framing your
photographs is to determine the size of the
| | 00:04 | mat and the size of the window that you're
going to cut in that mat to display the artwork.
| | 00:09 | In this case, for the student work, in order
to be a unifying factor in the exhibition
| | 00:14 | we decided to take all the smaller
works on paper and mat them in 11x14 mats.
| | 00:20 | There are all mostly a round letter size
and there will be some variation in the size
| | 00:24 | of the windows, but the consistent mat size will
lend a nice rhythm when we start to hang the exhibition.
| | 00:32 | So with that in mind we need to first measure the work
in order to determine how large a window it's going to be.
| | 00:38 | We'll take a straight edge, and in this case,
if you look at the straight edge the first
| | 00:42 | inch starts with a mark that in set slightly
from end of the ruler this makes this ruler
| | 00:48 | inherently more accurate than one were the
first inch starts the beginning of the metal edge.
| | 00:53 | If you do have a ruler that starts at the
first leading edge of the metal always burn
| | 00:59 | an inch in your measurements
that will be more accurate.
| | 01:01 | The other part of its ruler that's important
is its backed with a soft foam, this foam backing
| | 01:06 | allows us to place the ruler directly
over the photograph without causing it any damage.
| | 01:12 | Another aesthetic we need to consider in
choosing the size of the window is whether or not we
| | 01:16 | want to expose any of the white paper
around the edge of the actual image.
| | 01:22 | Sometimes you will cut a mat to overlap that
edge, sometimes you'll expose that edge.
| | 01:26 | There is no tried and true aesthetic for determining
whether you want to expose the white or not.
| | 01:31 | But in this case, since the edges are so clean,
and we also have works that will be in this
| | 01:36 | exhibition where the edges become
sort of decorative parts of the work.
| | 01:40 | For consistency's sake we're going to go ahead
and expose the edge, another way you can determine
| | 01:45 | whether or not you like it is just to take a corner
sample of matboard and lay it directly on the work.
| | 01:52 | And you can see here if I expose about an 1/8
of an inch we get that nice, crisp white line
| | 01:57 | around the work, where if we cover it we kind of
lose that little extra dimension we're gaining.
| | 02:03 | So I want to go a head ahead and measure the
window to expose an 1/8 of an inch of the
| | 02:07 | white around the image.
| | 02:10 | So in order to do that I'll take my ruler,
and I will place it on the edge burning an
| | 02:18 | 1/8 of an inch for the gap,
and I'll measure over here.
| | 02:21 | So again, the horizontal dimension we want
our window to be 10 & 1/4 inches wide,
| | 02:26 | its good right these things
down so you get the math right.
| | 02:29 | Then I'll go in the other direction, and
once again an 1/8 of an inch, and that gives me
| | 02:34 | 6 & 1/2 inches in that dimension.
| | 02:37 | So the next step we're going in an 11x14
mat, so I will subtract 10 & 1/4 from
| | 02:43 | 14, and that leaves me 3 & 3/4 inches and then I'll
subtract 6 & 1/2 from 11, and that leaves me 4 & 1/2 inches.
| | 02:53 | Then we will divide those by two to determine
the width of the legs on each side of the mat.
| | 03:00 | The one problem we have here is we have got
3 & 3/4 divided by 2 equals 1 & 7/8, and 4 & 1/2
| | 03:08 | divided by 2 equals 2 & 1/4. If we cut the
legs that way the mat, the appearance of the mat
| | 03:16 | is going to not be as attractive
| | 03:19 | as if we make three of the legs match in
dimension and leave a slightly wider leg on
| | 03:24 | the bottom. This technique is called bottom
waiting, and it serves as a nice visual aid
| | 03:29 | to the ground the work for the viewer.
| | 03:31 | It really help stabilize the lower edge of
the work of art and helps the viewer understand
| | 03:36 | top and bottom, it seems a little bit
more stable on the wall when it's hung.
| | 03:40 | The way I like to do that is made for free
sides match so we'll take the 4 & 1/2-inch dimension
| | 03:46 | and subtract 1 & 7/8 from that, and that leaves
us a dimension of 2 & 5/8 inches for the bottom of the mat.
| | 03:53 | So now we have the dimensions
that we want to use for the mat.
| | 03:56 | So let's set the work aside and cut the matboard down to
size first and then we will cut the window for the artwork.
| | 04:04 | Matboard comes in a standard size of
32x40 inches, here is a full sheet of board, and
| | 04:11 | you need to think a little bit
before you cut the board down the size.
| | 04:14 | If we do it properly we will be able to get
six 11x14 mats out of this one 32x40 board.
| | 04:21 | I'm going to start out making a cut in the
11-inch dimension out of the 40-inch width
| | 04:27 | if we do that three times that
will use up 33 inches of the 40 inches.
| | 04:31 | If I try to go in the other direction, the
32-inch direction, we'd yield two matboards and
| | 04:38 | a lot more waste.
| | 04:40 | So I'm going to that my ruler, and I
want to make too little marks at 11 inches.
| | 04:50 | And an important note, the pencil I'm using
to make these marks is an architects pencil, a
| | 04:55 | 6h, and it's a very hard lead. The
advantage of a hard leaded pencil for this kind work
| | 05:01 | as it leaves very little graphite residue.
| | 05:04 | Notice also that I'm not drawing a line to
cut along I'm just making two tiny, little marks
| | 05:09 | so I don't make any extra mess
on the surface of the matboard.
| | 05:13 | And then I'm going to line a heavy steel
straight edge on those marks, I'm going to cut with
| | 05:19 | an X-Acto knife with a brand-new blade in it.
| | 05:23 | Some people prefer to do this with a heavier
knife, such as utility knife, but I don't think
| | 05:27 | the blade quality is as good.
| | 05:28 | I am going to keep the blade at an angle
with the handle perpendicular and cut straight
| | 05:34 | through, drawing the blade towards me in a
smooth motion, it'll take a couple of passes
| | 05:39 | to get all the way
through this four ply matboard.
| | 05:43 | Once again keep in mind that the point of
the blade is not the sharpest part of the
| | 05:48 | blade, so I'm keeping the blade
perpendicular to the paper or to the matboard but add an
| | 05:54 | angle so I'm using the
sharpest part of blade to make the cut.
| | 05:59 | And once again, it takes a
few passes to get through.
| | 06:02 | But you can kind of feel it when
you get to through that last layer.
| | 06:07 | And we just got a little bit that's stuck here at
the end, and then I have got this board cut
| | 06:12 | in the 11-inch dimension.
| | 06:15 | Normally I'll go ahead and make all my 11-inch
cuts and then all my 14-inch cuts, but
| | 06:19 | I'm just going to slide this to the side.
| | 06:21 | I am going to turn the board 90 degrees, I'm going
to get my ruler, and once again, make two little
| | 06:29 | ticks at 14 inches, rather than the 11 inches.
| | 06:33 | And it's important that you always measure
from the same side of the board as sometimes
| | 06:38 | humidity can cause the board do expand and
contract, and this becomes even more critical
| | 06:42 | when we start measuring for the window.
| | 06:44 | Once again, the heavy straight edge, carefully
line it up on my marks, and then draw the blade
| | 06:53 | towards me in smooth motion, using the
sharpest part of the blade cut the 11x14-inch board.
| | 07:03 | The next step is to mark it for the window
we're going to cut, this board has a front
| | 07:10 | and back surface to it, it's slightly
different colors on the front and back, and you always
| | 07:13 | want mark the mat on the back.
| | 07:15 | So we're going to turn it over onto its
backside, we're going to take our straight edge again,
| | 07:20 | in our hard pencil, and measuring from one
side we're going to come in and make our marks
| | 07:27 | at 1 & 7/8 inches, we'll make another mark
at 1 & 7/8 inches on the other side.
| | 07:32 | Notice my 0 reference point is the same for
both marks, once again 1 & 7/8, coming up
| | 07:41 | from both sides. It's important, too, to keep
your ruler parallel to the edges of the mat.
| | 07:45 | If it's an angle like this, it will change
the positioning of the mark significantly
| | 07:51 | so work very hard at
keeping that ruler parallel.
| | 07:53 | Now I am going to rotate this 90 degrees, and I
am going to measure my 1 & 7/8 for the top
| | 08:01 | and remember the bottom
dimension is a different at 2 & 5/8.
| | 08:05 | So I am going to come up to 2 & 5/8 once
again, 1 & 7/8, 2 & 5/8, and once I have
| | 08:14 | made all those little marks I am going to
take my photograph, and I'm going to place
| | 08:18 | it against the marks just to double-check
to make sure I have mark the window to right
| | 08:23 | size, and it looks perfect.
So the next step is to connect the dots.
| | 08:29 | It's one my favorite things when I was a child, and
I'm glad I still to get to connect the dots as an adult.
| | 08:35 | I'm going to take the pencil and draw it
towards myself, and another thing I am going to do
| | 08:39 | in order to keep my pencil marks really
consistent is I'm going to rotate the pencil in my fingers
| | 08:46 | while I make the line.
| | 08:48 | What this does is it serves the where the
lead down evenly so that the pencil line will
| | 08:54 | always stay the same distance
from the edge of the straight edge.
| | 08:59 | And when I'm working with a knife I attend
to draw towards myself when I'm working with
| | 09:02 | the pencil I more comfortable
going side to side, okay.
| | 09:07 | So once again, now here's the window, and
you can see the bottom waiting here, the three
| | 09:12 | equal legs on the sides and just to be sure
I'll always double-check again just to make
| | 09:18 | sure I didn't do anything wrong.
| | 09:20 | And what I'm doing is as I am just holding
this up and visually verifying the alignment
| | 09:24 | of where I am going to cut the window.
| | 09:29 |
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| Understanding standard vs. custom mats| 00:00 | Another consideration in the matting
process is making a decision between working with
| | 00:05 | standard or custom sizes.
| | 00:08 | There are whole series of standard sizes
for mattes, frames, and glass that you probably
| | 00:14 | know a few, the by 5x7, the 8x10.
| | 00:16 | I imagine you have some easel back frames
somewhere in the home with some photographs of those sizes.
| | 00:21 | There's a whole array of standard sizes
running from 5x7 all the way up to 32x40 inches.
| | 00:28 | You might consider when making your
photographs working towards standard sizes because they
| | 00:33 | can help you with budgetary concerns.
| | 00:35 | There is a vast array of ready-made frames,
precut glass, precut mattes that work towards
| | 00:42 | the standard sizes.
| | 00:44 | Something you need to keep in mind though, most
of the standard sizes were based on dimensions
| | 00:49 | of old sheet film cameras.
| | 00:51 | 5x7 cameras, 8x10 cameras, those were common
sizes and lot of these standard size frames
| | 00:56 | relate to that rather than the size
of the chip in your digital camera.
| | 01:01 | Sensor size proportionately does not
match many of the standard sizes well.
| | 01:07 | So, if you're making portraits with the intent
of framing them, if you have a landscape photograph
| | 01:12 | that you want to frame in a standard sized
mat, you need to contemplate that when
| | 01:16 | you're making the image or when you're
doing a postproduction and cropping the image in
| | 01:20 | order to make that photograph
match a standard sized mat and frame.
| | 01:25 | If you do go to custom size, as opposed to
standard size, as far as cost frame shops
| | 01:31 | typically calculate the cost of a frame and
mat, based on the next highest standard size.
| | 01:37 | So, to a certain degree, you pay a little
bit extra for custom and then you are paying
| | 01:41 | a little more than you might if you'd
match to the standard size.
| | 01:46 |
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| Using a handheld mat cutter| 00:00 | The next step is to take the mat cutter, and
we're working here with a Dexter handheld mat cutter.
| | 00:06 | They're pretty reasonably priced, and it's one of
the most affordable ways to cut a good-quality mat.
| | 00:12 | And the retail on these is around $30, and
it's a very ergonomic handle that you can
| | 00:17 | grip comfortably, and it holds the blade at
a consistent angle, so we can make a beveled
| | 00:22 | cut for the window of the mat.
Blade depth positioning is real important.
| | 00:27 | You do that by loosening this, and you can
slide the blade up and down, and I will always
| | 00:32 | verify blade depth by holding the
blade against the edge of the matboard.
| | 00:37 | You want it to just penetrate the board, and
you can test this by drawing the blade through
| | 00:43 | the part of the mat you're going to discard.
So I just pulled it through there real quickly.
| | 00:47 | We want to make sure we came
through on the other side, and we did.
| | 00:50 | We have got a nice clean cut through.
| | 00:53 | So now I'm going to position my matboard
and get my heavy straight edge again, and I'm
| | 00:58 | going to use the thicker side of the
straight edge when I use the mat cutter.
| | 01:03 | Notice also that on the mat cutter, if you
look at it in alignment, the blade is slightly
| | 01:07 | recessed from the side of the cutter that's
going to be in contact with the straight edge.
| | 01:11 | I need to allow for that in the positioning
of the straight edge, so that I cut precisely
| | 01:18 | on the line, and it's actually
just a hair over an 1/8 of an inch.
| | 01:22 | The reason why I don't actually make my
marks at that point is I really want to cut away
| | 01:26 | the graphite line so it falls
away when I'm finished with my cut.
| | 01:30 | That way you don't have any graphite coming
into contact with the work of art underneath
| | 01:34 | it and possibly rubbing off.
| | 01:37 | So I'm positioning my
straight edge, I'm holding it firmly.
| | 01:40 | I'm starting to cut slightly above the crossing
line to allow for the bevel and allow a little
| | 01:47 | bit of space for me to draw the blade into
the board, and then I'll just pull it towards
| | 01:51 | myself in one smooth motion, and
slightly overlap the finish line.
| | 01:57 | Then I'll set the cutter aside, lift it just a
little bit and determine that I cut it cleanly
| | 02:02 | and then rotate it.
| | 02:05 | Also notice I have got a piece of matboard
underneath as a backing surface, so I don't
| | 02:09 | cut the table I'm on.
| | 02:10 | That's really important, if you go and slap
this down on the dining table and cut a mat,
| | 02:15 | the wife is not going to be real happy.
| | 02:18 | Okay, we're going to take this, we're
going to make another cut just like the other.
| | 02:22 | The drawing it in at the start is very
important too, because if you try to force the blade
| | 02:27 | in at the beginning of the cut,
you can end up with a little wiggle.
| | 02:31 | And in this case, I didn't start quite far
enough over the overlap, and so I'm going
| | 02:35 | to go back and carefully re-cut just
that first section there, rotate it.
| | 02:44 | Also, in every case here, I'm being
careful to keep my cuts all parallel.
| | 02:50 | The reason why I do this is as you use a
backing board for multiple cuts, it scars the backing
| | 02:55 | board just a little bit, and if there are
all sorts of different angles, those previous
| | 02:59 | cuts can actually grab the
blade and cause a little wiggle.
| | 03:03 | So ideally you want to always be over an
area of the backing board that you have not cut
| | 03:07 | on before, and all the cuts are parallel.
| | 03:19 | I need this last leg, and you can see in this
one corner it's still slightly attached, that
| | 03:32 | happens sometimes when the cuts
are not of the exact proper length.
| | 03:36 | I'll carefully hold the center
in position and turn it over.
| | 03:40 | Once again go back to my X-Acto knife,
it's very sharp, bring it in very carefully at
| | 03:44 | the angle of the bevel, and
you can cut that free neatly.
| | 03:50 | Set aside our fallout, lay down our artwork,
lay the mat over, and you can see that we
| | 03:58 | cut it very neatly with that
wonderful 1/8-inch border all around.
| | 04:02 | The next step we're going to go to is
assembling the mat where we put together the backing
| | 04:06 | board and the mat and then we
will mount the artwork within the mat.
| | 04:11 |
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| Using a production mat cutter| 00:01 | Earlier we demonstrated techniques for cutting
down board with an X-Acto knife and a straight
| | 00:06 | edge to get it to the size you needed to
make your mat, and then using a hand held cutter
| | 00:10 | to create the window in that mat.
| | 00:13 | That's a really affordable and
accessible way to get started in mat cutting.
| | 00:18 | However, sometimes you may find yourself in a
situation where you need to do a much higher
| | 00:22 | volume of mat cutting.
| | 00:24 | In that case, I think you'd find the hand
held work a little bit painstaking and a little
| | 00:29 | bit too time consuming.
| | 00:31 | When I came out here to Quartz Mountain to
work on this photo workshop of the students,
| | 00:36 | one of my responsibilities here is to
prepare the final exhibition for hanging. And with
| | 00:41 | that in mind I knew that we were going to
be dealing with close to 80 works of art that
| | 00:46 | all needed to be matted.
| | 00:48 | So initially 80 mats does
seem like a high number.
| | 00:51 | But when you start to think about the logistics
of actually producing 80 mats, first the board
| | 00:57 | has to all be cut down to size and 80
mats translates into at least 160 boards.
| | 01:03 | One of the things that our lead instructor,
Susan Grant, brought with her as part of her
| | 01:07 | toolkit was a series of techniques that allowed the
students to print on a vast variety of substrates.
| | 01:14 | We have prints being made on metal, prints
being made on wood, prints being made on fabric,
| | 01:19 | plexiglas, and as lovely as they were, they
were presented a great series of challenges
| | 01:23 | for me as far as the matting went.
| | 01:26 | Mounting a work on paper is really quite simple,
and you just need an over mat and a backing
| | 01:31 | board but as soon as we started to deal with
the thicker materials, I had to start to cut
| | 01:35 | spacer boards, I had to start to cut insets,
and recessed boards in order to hold the work
| | 01:40 | in place and make it ready for
mounting on the wall and display.
| | 01:44 | So by the time it was all said and done, I have
made well over a thousand cuts using this cutter.
| | 01:50 | And finally, in order to prepare for the
exhibition we do all the mounting and preparation and
| | 01:55 | the hanging of the show in just two days.
| | 01:58 | So you can imagine without the tool of a
production cutter how difficult, if not impossible, it
| | 02:04 | would have been to make this all happen.
| | 02:07 | This particular cutter is made by Logan, and
it's capable of handling oversized matboards.
| | 02:14 | This will have a cut length of at least 60
inches. Standard matboards, as we have discussed
| | 02:19 | earlier, are 32x40 inches and Logan, Fletcher,
several other companies make cutters in both sizes.
| | 02:26 | The smaller ones to accommodate
up to 40 inches, the larger one 60.
| | 02:31 | Prices vary anywhere from a few hundred
dollars to the smaller ones to a thousand and more
| | 02:36 | for the larger production cutters.
| | 02:39 | Several advantages to the production cutter,
number one, it comes with graded stops that
| | 02:45 | allow you to cut the boards down to size,
to cut your windows without actually having
| | 02:50 | to make any marks on the board or window.
| | 02:53 | As an example we're going to start out by cutting
this full sheet of matboard here down to 11x14 pieces.
| | 03:00 | I'll make it happen first by setting the
production stop here, at 11 inches, I'll open up the
| | 03:08 | cutter and take the 32x40 board and place
the 40-inch side along my baseboard here,
| | 03:17 | close the cutter, slide forward, and notice
there are two blades here, one on each side.
| | 03:23 | This is for perpendicular cuts basically
cutting the board down to size, this is the one we'll
| | 03:27 | use later that's beveled to cut the window.
| | 03:30 | I clicked this forward, and this little rod
comes out locking it in place that puts the
| | 03:34 | blade down and then I just draw it towards
myself, and sometimes I get a little catch
| | 03:41 | at the end but did you see how quickly
and cleanly that cut that down to 11 inches.
| | 03:46 | Once again I'm going to slide it over to the
stop right here, that sets my distance correctly.
| | 03:52 | Lock the blade down, and
just pull towards myself.
| | 03:57 | I'm going to reset this to 14 inches.
| | 04:01 | I'm going to take the 11-inch wide piece I just
cut, turn it 90 degrees, and then cut it to 14.
| | 04:13 | Slide it over to the stop, and I always take a
minute to just make sure everything is square,
| | 04:19 | against the different stops that makes for
accurate cuts, and you can see I'm getting
| | 04:22 | some scrap left over there, and I'm just
setting off to the side, we'll use some of that later.
| | 04:32 | You can see as I go along how quickly and
smoothly this works compared to what we did
| | 04:39 | with the hand-held cutter.
| | 04:40 | If you remember, when I was cutting the
boards to size it took three to four passes with
| | 04:45 | the X-Acto knife to get through the board.
| | 04:47 | Where this does it very
cleanly in a single pass.
| | 04:53 | And so here I am, I have taken that one full
size board and cut it into six 11x14 boards in about
| | 05:00 | the same amount of time--or maybe a little more--than
it took to make one cut with the hand held cutter.
| | 05:05 | And if you look at the edges here you'll
see they're all very clean and square, and if
| | 05:11 | you look at the size of the
boards they're all wonderfully uniform.
| | 05:16 | You see nice square edges
everywhere on the board.
| | 05:20 | So next what we want to do is use this other
set of production stops here, here, and with
| | 05:27 | this adjustable arm here to
cut the window and the mat.
| | 05:33 | This arm you need to take off when you're
cutting the board down to size then you'll
| | 05:37 | replace it when it's time to cut the window,
and we'll take a piece of the scrap that we
| | 05:41 | saved to use as a backing board to make sure
that the cuts in the window are very clean.
| | 05:47 | We don't use a backing board when we're
cutting the board to size because we want the blade
| | 05:52 | to completely penetrate through.
| | 05:53 | It actually comes through about an eighth of an
inch, and you get a nice clean cut without backing.
| | 05:58 | Okay, we're going to take a
look at our work of art up here.
| | 06:01 | This is another one of the student pieces
from here at the Oklahoma Arts Institute.
| | 06:05 | We're going to measure it to
determine the size of the window we want.
| | 06:11 | We're going to make a window that's
10& 1/4x6 & 7/8, and so looking at the math on that
| | 06:21 | 10 & 1/4 out of the 14-inch dimension leaves
3 & 3/4 inches divide by 2, and that's 1 & 7/8 inches
| | 06:27 | for the legs on each side.
| | 06:29 | 6 & 7/8 out of 11 gives us
a 4 & 1/8-inch remainder.
| | 06:34 | Once again, we're going to make three legs
the same, so we're going to make the top one
| | 06:38 | in 7/8 inches and the bottom 2 & 1/4 inches
just giving us a nice bottom weighted mat.
| | 06:44 | So I'm going to take a matboard,
I'm going to put it face down.
| | 06:50 | I'm going to cut the odd-sized leg first,
so I'm going to set this stop at 2 & 1/4 inches
| | 06:56 | and tighten these screws to keep
it from moving while I make the cut.
| | 07:00 | And you want to be sure not to over tighten
these, if you do that you'll slowly wear out
| | 07:04 | your cutter by putting more pressure
on the adjustable parts than they need.
| | 07:09 | And then I'm going to set this starting
point at 1 & 7/8 inches and the stopping point at
| | 07:17 | 1 & 7/8 inches as well.
| | 07:19 | We mark our start with this little device
here, then I'm going to turn the blade in
| | 07:25 | and pull it towards myself in a smooth motion.
| | 07:28 | And now we have made our 2 & 1/4-inch cut for
the bottom of the mat, I'll then reset this
| | 07:33 | to 1 & 7/8 inches, rotate the board 90 degrees.
| | 07:40 | Cut, lift, turn, cut, lift, turn, and stop
for a second remembering that this bottom
| | 07:54 | leg is thicker so I need to readjust my
stop to make the cut stop at 2 & 1/4 inches that
| | 08:00 | way I won't have an over cut.
| | 08:08 | And there the center falls out, and we can
line it up with the work and see that we have
| | 08:16 | got a very accurately cut window, very clean
cuts in a fraction of the time it took with
| | 08:22 | the hand-held cutter.
| | 08:24 | What I'd like to do now is go on with this,
and we'll go back to the mat we did with the
| | 08:30 | hand-held cutter and start to show you some
different techniques for assembling mats and
| | 08:34 | mounting the photographs.
| | 08:39 |
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| Assembling the mat| 00:00 | Now that we have cut the window in the mat,
| | 00:02 | the next step is assembling the mat in order
to prepare it for the placement of the artwork.
| | 00:07 | I have the board that we cut the window in
here and then another matboard that's cut
| | 00:12 | to the same 11x14 size.
| | 00:14 | There are numerous choices you can use
for backing board, but in this case, we have a
| | 00:18 | quite a bit of matboard on hand.
| | 00:20 | It also makes for a when we're hanging it
just as a matted work having a double layer
| | 00:26 | matboard is a little bit more elegant than
some of the other backing boards you can choose.
| | 00:30 | So I have got both mattes face up and
then I'm going to fold this one back.
| | 00:35 | So the side that I have marked is visible.
| | 00:38 | And the bevel is going in the right direction,
I'm going to very carefully align the edges.
| | 00:41 | And then I'm going to take
an acid-free artist tape.
| | 00:46 | I'm going to tear a small strip of it off.
And then double checking my corner alignment.
| | 00:52 | I'm going to place tape at this corner.
| | 00:56 | And take another small
strip and tape this corner.
| | 01:02 | And now that I have kind of stabilized the
two pieces together, I'm going to take a third
| | 01:05 | strip, the length of the
junction, center it carefully.
| | 01:14 | And now I have the two sides of
the mat well affixed together.
| | 01:19 | Then I'm going to fold it closed.
| | 01:22 | Make sure everything is aligned well. And
I'm going to take this moment too to just
| | 01:25 | visually inspect the mat, and make sure
there are no flaws in it at all, make sure
| | 01:30 | there's no marks on the surface.
| | 01:32 | And one thing I always look to is the
corners where there's the slight overlap in the cuts
| | 01:36 | that we had to make in order to make the
beveled corners nice looking and the cuts even.
| | 01:42 | And I notice, there's a couple of places where there
are little over cuts, and I have a burnishing bone here.
| | 01:48 | And I'm going to take and just
gently rub on those over cuts.
| | 01:52 | This place has a little bump and just by
the slightest little bit of pressure with this
| | 01:56 | burnishing bone, we smooth all that
out and make the mat really pristine.
| | 02:02 | And at this point it's ready
for the insertion of the artwork.
| | 02:07 |
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| Mounting art in a mat| 00:00 | Okay, now that we have assembled the mat package, the
next step is to mount the photograph within the mat.
| | 00:06 | So, I'm going to open up where I have hinged it
and notice too the hinge is at the top of the mat.
| | 00:11 | So, if you were doing a vertical work,
the hinge would be on the other end.
| | 00:15 | So I'm going to open up the hinge, and I'm
going to slide the work in and then I'm going
| | 00:18 | to let the hinge kind of fall down to where
I can see accurately and position the work
| | 00:23 | very carefully, so that all the edges are even.
| | 00:29 | I'm going to take a little piece of
matboard and set that on the work to protect it and
| | 00:32 | then set a brick on top of that, and I
have taped this brick up with gaff tape.
| | 00:37 | So, we don't want any little
crumbly bits getting on the art.
| | 00:39 | Then I am going to open the mat back up
and for these small works on paper like this,
| | 00:44 | I typically mount them with a linen hinge,
or in this case, I'm using a Filmoplast hinge.
| | 00:50 | This particular tape does not work well for heavier
works, but for a work of this size, works very well.
| | 00:56 | So, I'm going to tear off two pieces of this,
one fairly long and one a little bit shorter.
| | 01:02 | So the long is about 2 inches and the
short one is just about an inch and a half, and
| | 01:07 | I'm going to put those adhesive side with
the adhesive side and then with the shorter
| | 01:12 | piece going down, I'm going to lift the edge
of the work, and this is where the brick comes
| | 01:16 | in, and I can get my hand under
there and lift it without moving it.
| | 01:20 | And then I'm going to come back, and I'm going
to apply pressure to hold this piece of tape
| | 01:25 | down and then I use the back of my fingernail,
to rub on the other, the back of your fingernail
| | 01:30 | works like a burnishing bone
| | 01:32 | essentially, if you don't have a burnishing
bone like I demonstrated in the previous movie,
| | 01:37 | you can just use your fingernail,
assuming of course your hands are clean.
| | 01:41 | So, once again a piece of tape of about 2
inches long, and then a piece of tape about
| | 01:48 | an inch and a half long, face-to-face. And
one of the things that I like about this tape,
| | 01:53 | and I really insist on in any tape that
I use for this is that it be reversible.
| | 01:59 | One of the tenets I always hold on to when I'm
doing matting and framing is I like everything
| | 02:04 | I do to be a reversible process.
| | 02:07 | That way, you can undo it,
without damaging the work of art.
| | 02:11 | This comes in handy if you redecorate and
want to change the way things appear, if some
| | 02:16 | damage occurs to the mat, you can always undo
what you have done without any damage to the
| | 02:21 | work of art that you have been dealing with.
So now I have got it affixed in place.
| | 02:25 | I'm going to move my brick and the little bit of
matboard and here we have the work assembled in the mat.
| | 02:33 | At this point, I would stop if I was going
to put this immediately in a frame, but since
| | 02:37 | this work is going to hang on the wall just
in the mat as part of the "Tour de Quartz"
| | 02:42 | exhibition, I am going to do one more step.
| | 02:44 | I'm going to open this back up,
and I'm going to get an ATG gun.
| | 02:49 | This essentially is a cool little machine
that spits out a strip of rubber cement.
| | 02:53 | And so I'm going to place this along the
bottom and pull the trigger and draw across, and
| | 02:58 | you can see I have got a little strip of
adhesive here, that's a double-sided adhesive.
| | 03:02 | Then I'm going to come down both sides.
| | 03:05 | The reason I'm doing this is when we mounted on
the wall, all the sides will be securely attached.
| | 03:12 | And so, we won't have it opening up.
| | 03:15 | And so now, you can see
it's become a solid unit.
| | 03:19 | It's not loose any more.
And it's ready to hang.
| | 03:24 |
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| Mounting the art with photo corners| 00:00 | Earlier I showed you how to mount
a photograph using linen hinges.
| | 00:04 | The method we're going to use for the
photo exhibition here at Quartz Mountain.
| | 00:09 | Another very effective and reversible way to
mount photographs is the use of photo corners.
| | 00:14 | It's a method that's been in
use for quite a long time.
| | 00:17 | Here we have the window mat and backing board
we cut with the production cutter, and we're
| | 00:22 | going to work with this photograph to
show you that alternate mounting technique.
| | 00:25 | I have already assembled the backing board
and window mat, the way we showed earlier,
| | 00:30 | and then I'm just going to line up
the photograph within the window.
| | 00:35 | I'm going to place once again the matboard
and the brick, there, to hold it in position.
| | 00:41 | Then I'm going to open this back up. And the
way we make these photo corners is first cut
| | 00:47 | a piece of just--any acid-free paper will
work, you don't want one that is too heavy
| | 00:52 | in weight or one that has much texture.
| | 00:54 | So smooth acid-free paper, and
I usually work with two sizes.
| | 00:58 | For larger prints I'll work with
this size, which is 1x3 inches.
| | 01:01 | For a smaller print like this, I'll work
with a 0.5x2-inch piece of paper, but in order
| | 01:07 | to make it easier to visualize, I'm going to show
you how you how I fold it with this large piece.
| | 01:12 | Just kind of channel your inner paper
airplane and fold these two edges over so they meet
| | 01:20 | tightly and create a point and fold that down
to creases, and if you turn it over, and you
| | 01:25 | have created a very nice corner piece
that's an exact 90 degree angle out of the paper.
| | 01:31 | So I have already done that with these
smaller strips to create the exact same corner, and
| | 01:37 | I'll place those on the four corners of the
photograph, sliding those two little end strips
| | 01:46 | underneath the photograph, and then I'll go
around to the four corners of the photograph
| | 01:54 | with my acid-free tape.
| | 01:56 | And just tear a small strip of the acid-free
tape off and then tape down the photo corner,
| | 02:04 | being very careful not to
overlap into the image area.
| | 02:08 | I'm making sure that my tape only comes in
contact with the folded piece of paper, and
| | 02:14 | then I'll use my finger to firmly press down
that tape, so I know that I get good adhesion.
| | 02:21 | So once again, a small strip of tape, make
sure the corner is aligned properly, over
| | 02:27 | the paper corner, never touching the image
area of the photograph, and working with all
| | 02:33 | these reversible processes, I really try to
avoid having any kind of adhesive ever come
| | 02:37 | in contact with the image itself.
| | 02:40 | And then on these two, don't worry about
making them super tight, I like to give a little
| | 02:45 | wiggle room. And when I say a little, we are
thinking fairly precisely here, probably between
| | 02:50 | the 64th and 32nd of an inch is all
you need as far as wiggle room.
| | 02:54 | This will allow the photograph to expand
and contract slightly if the humidity changes
| | 02:59 | without buckling within the mat.
| | 03:01 | So once again, tape only over the paper,
secure it firmly with pressure from your fingertip,
| | 03:12 | and we can remove our brick, fold our mat
closed, and you can see the finished result.
| | 03:20 | Now I want to show you too, for larger works,
you may want to consider, you can see how
| | 03:27 | easily this comes out, we're just going to
take our fingers and get under it in the center
| | 03:32 | and very carefully kind of fold it up, and
you can see it slides right out of the mounts.
| | 03:37 | And if you set the picture to the side, you
can see here the little flaps of paper, if
| | 03:42 | you want to reinforce this for a larger work,
so it's capable of handling more weight.
| | 03:47 | You can take an additional strip of tape and
place it over those two lower parts, and you're
| | 03:54 | essentially doubling the
strength of these corners.
| | 03:56 | You make it much less likely that your
adhesive is going to fail and allow the print to shift
| | 04:01 | within its matting at all.
| | 04:02 | This is one of the things I am always sad
and every once in while you are looking and
| | 04:07 | see a work of art on the wall, where it's
come loose from its mounting, and it's hanging
| | 04:10 | crooked in the mat, and I just, makes
we want to go get my tools and fix it.
| | 04:17 | So once again, if you add those four extra
strips of tape, you can slide the photograph
| | 04:26 | right back into the corners.
| | 04:30 | Notice I'm being very careful too, as I handle the
photograph, not to put any creases or dings in it.
| | 04:36 | And now I'll spread it back out into the mounts
carefully, you can see it's laying completely flat again.
| | 04:42 | We can re-close it, and now we have a
mounted photograph in a lovely mat that is ready to
| | 04:48 | take on gale-force winds.
| | 04:53 |
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| Mounting the art with repositionable mounting adhesive (RPMA)| 00:00 | There's one more mounting technique that I'd
like to demonstrate for you that has occasional
| | 00:05 | application when mounting photographs.
| | 00:07 | The reason I don't recommend it unequivocally is
because it is a nonreversible mounting technique.
| | 00:14 | That being said there may be occasion to use
this, say you have a photograph that you want
| | 00:19 | to trim to the exact edge of the photograph
and show the backing board inside the window
| | 00:24 | mat, or if you wanted to surface mount a
photograph and just float it recessed in a
| | 00:29 | deep frame, this would be the
material I would recommend for doing that.
| | 00:34 | Old-school methodology, we used to use a
heat and pressure method called Dry Mounting.
| | 00:41 | Once again, it was nonreversible.
| | 00:43 | Another way to do the same thing is with a
spray adhesive, spray mount, there are a lot
| | 00:49 | of different brands out there.
| | 00:51 | Those are solvent born things that scatter a
lot of adhesive around wherever we use them,
| | 00:56 | I don't recommend those either.
| | 00:58 | So if you want an adhesive based mount, this
is what I would suggest, it's a product called
| | 01:03 | Repositionable Mounting Adhesive or RPMA.
I'm going to set the artwork aside here.
| | 01:11 | What I did, I went to the one we just finished
in photo corners, and because it was reversible,
| | 01:15 | I just pulled the same photograph out.
| | 01:18 | I'm using the same window we cut with the
production cutter, and I just put a fresh
| | 01:21 | backing board there.
| | 01:24 | This is the RPMA, it comes
in rolls of different sizes.
| | 01:27 | I think this is the
smallest width roll they make.
| | 01:30 | And here you have got a backing paper,
and it's got adhesive on one side.
| | 01:36 | It's essentially in a lot of ways just like
a great big roll of double stick tape.
| | 01:41 | And so what I'm going to do is roll out a little
bit and then I'm going to take my photograph.
| | 01:48 | And I'm going to line up the edge, and I want
to kind of get to the corner here, so I don't
| | 01:54 | waste much of the material.
| | 01:56 | You can see, this sticks to the backing, and
then I'm going to take my straight edge and
| | 02:04 | just cut this precisely on
the black edge of the image.
| | 02:15 | I'm using, once again, an X-Acto knife with a number 11
blade, and I have got a very sharp blade working.
| | 02:21 | And one of the things I always try to do when
I'm cutting a work of art, remember I talked
| | 02:26 | earlier about the foam backing
on this straight edge I'm using.
| | 02:30 | It protects the surface of the art, so I'm
not going to do any damage to it and by putting
| | 02:34 | the ruler over the art, if I slip with the
knife, I can't slip into the surface of the art.
| | 02:39 | So if I make a mistake, if the dog bumps
into me while I am trying to work, if I hear a
| | 02:44 | scream in an adjoining room, if an earthquake
happens--those of you working in California--
| | 02:51 | you won't damage the art, it's very key.
| | 02:53 | So I keep rotating this around, so that I
can keep my ruler positioned over the art, draw
| | 03:00 | the blade towards myself, and I'm going
to make this cut just a little bit farther.
| | 03:12 | I didn't go all the way to the edge, I'm
going to take it all the way to the edge.
| | 03:15 | That way I can just get this out of the way.
| | 03:19 | Oops! I just lost something I'll need in a
minute, I'll grab that, okay, and then I'm
| | 03:25 | going to make my last cut.
| | 03:30 | Okay now I'm just going to stop and inspect and
make sure that I like the way I made all my
| | 03:38 | cuts, and I can see on this end I
left a little tiny sliver of white.
| | 03:43 | So I'm going to go back in and just take off
the nearest hint of the edge of this paper.
| | 03:50 | Because I don't want, I want to
see that uniform black edge, okay.
| | 03:55 | I have cleaned that up now, so I have
got clean black edges all the way around.
| | 04:01 | So I'm going to get my mat back, and so you can
see this will float nicely in the center here.
| | 04:09 | And so in order to position this, since now,
remember I had cut this window, exposing an
| | 04:14 | eighth of an inch of the white paper all
the way around, well, I have cut away all the
| | 04:18 | white paper, but that still leaves me
with an eighth of an inch of clear white.
| | 04:22 | So what I'm going to do is actually
position this while the mat is closed, there is no
| | 04:26 | reason for me to open it up.
| | 04:29 | And I'm going to lift this up, and you can
see we have here the adhesive side has been
| | 04:34 | stuck to the photograph, and there's a
backing paper that I'm just going to carefully peel
| | 04:39 | away, and it's not adhering as well to the
papers I'd like, so I'm going to lay this
| | 04:45 | face down, I'm going to use this little tool
that comes with the RPMA, and I'm just going
| | 04:50 | to apply a little pressure.
| | 04:54 | Okay, so now I know the RPMA is
very well stuck to the photograph.
| | 05:01 | And I'm going to take the backing board away,
and it's coming away much more cleanly now.
| | 05:05 | I'm a much happier man.
| | 05:07 | So I peel the backing paper completely away,
and then holding down the upper mat I'm going
| | 05:17 | to very carefully align this, and notice
that I didn't get it quite right the first time.
| | 05:24 | They call it RPMA, because its initial tack
is not so great that you can't lift it and
| | 05:30 | move it to correct its position.
| | 05:32 | This is really key, particularly in the
early learning stages, you should get practice in
| | 05:37 | properly aligning and placing these things.
| | 05:40 | So I have got that, placed where I
want, and I'm going to open up the mat.
| | 05:43 | I'm going to grab what I dropped.
| | 05:46 | This is a paper that comes with it that you
can lay over the image, and then once again
| | 05:52 | we go back to the little tool that they gave us.
| | 05:55 | This keeps us from scratching the surface of
the image as we put pressure on with this tool.
| | 06:02 | And I'm just making sure that I work my way
around the image, kind of working from the
| | 06:08 | center to be outer edges in order to
firmly affix the image to the board.
| | 06:18 | And then we'll close this, and you can see how
cleanly and neatly that is affixed to the board.
| | 06:25 | You can see the backing board that is exposed
around the edge, and if you look closely
| | 06:30 | you can also see right at the edge a
little bit of the depth of the paper.
| | 06:35 | This is a particularly effective mounting
tool if you're working with heavy papers,
| | 06:39 | perhaps some alternative works where the
paper may have a little bit of extra thickness to
| | 06:44 | it, it's a good solid adhesive.
| | 06:45 | My one complaint about it once
again is that it is nonreversible.
| | 06:49 | Once it's on here, it is on here.
| | 06:54 |
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| Exploring troubleshooting techniques| 00:01 | The last thing you want to do in your
matting process is just look over the finished work
| | 00:06 | and see if there's any little flaws
or problems that need to be fixed.
| | 00:10 | The first place I usually
start is look to the corners.
| | 00:14 | It's very common when you cut a mat, no
matter how well you have your production cutter
| | 00:18 | aligned, or how much practice you have had
with your handheld cutter, that your over cut
| | 00:23 | will be a little bit bigger than it
needs to be in order to create the bevel.
| | 00:27 | So they usually will be a little cut line at
the corners that goes beyond the area it should.
| | 00:33 | You probably can't pick it up on camera, but
it's fairly easy to see with the naked eye,
| | 00:38 | and for it in order to fix that we use a tool
called the Burnishing Bone, and put pressure
| | 00:43 | on that little over cut and
rub it in a circular motion.
| | 00:46 | So I'm going to start on this corner here, and
I just see this little over cut, and basically
| | 00:51 | what we're doing is flattening the paper
surface back out from where the pressure of the blade
| | 00:57 | kind of bowed away a little bit, and so
I'll just go to the four corners, and it's just
| | 01:01 | a real tight circular motion.
| | 01:04 | A little bit of pressure, you don't want to
apply too much pressure because you can actually
| | 01:08 | create a depression in the matboard, that they
would be more noticeable than a slight over cut.
| | 01:14 | So we have smoothed those down a little bit.
| | 01:16 | The next thing I'll look for is I
will inspect the edges of the bevel.
| | 01:22 | Occasionally, particularly if you allow your
blade to get dull or if you use the same piece
| | 01:27 | of backing board for too long on your beveled cut,
your cut won't be as clean as it needs to be.
| | 01:32 | You can get little bits of pilling,
you'll see little rough spots.
| | 01:35 | If they're not too bad, you can
use an emery board to clean that up.
| | 01:40 | And so I see this one little area
here, there's a little bit of a pill.
| | 01:43 | I'm going to go in and just lightly sand
that away with the fine side of an emery board.
| | 01:50 | If you can't find an emery board they will be
usually in the beauty section of your local grocery store.
| | 01:56 | They're easy to find.
| | 01:57 | I like these large black ones because since
they're a little bit wider, they make it easier
| | 02:02 | to go on real smoothly.
| | 02:03 | And what I try to do is go ahead at an
angle that is less than the angle of the bevel.
| | 02:08 | That way I don't run the risk of creating any odd
marks in the bevel, and that smoothed out very nicely.
| | 02:14 | The last thing I'll look for is just inspect
the mat and see if there is any dirt or smudges,
| | 02:19 | and over here I see a little bit of a smudge.
| | 02:22 | It could be from something that was on the mat
cutter or something that was on my work surface.
| | 02:26 | The first eraser I have
started with is always an art gum.
| | 02:29 | It's a real soft, noninvasive eraser, and
I'll just go to the spot and try to make that
| | 02:35 | go away, that worked pretty effectively.
| | 02:38 | Another spot right there, and
that got it taken care of.
| | 02:42 | If an art gum doesn't work,
a polymer eraser may work.
| | 02:46 | I also don't have one here, but I keep a
brush around that I use for brushing things off.
| | 02:51 | It's a natural fiber brush that allows you
to get all these little bits of debris away,
| | 02:57 | and you want to always to be sure when
you're using your eraser to get all that eraser to
| | 03:01 | be out of your workstation.
| | 03:03 | The cleaner is better when
you're putting these things together.
| | 03:06 | Occasionally too you'll find flaws in your
matboard, there may be a little something
| | 03:11 | that's embedded in it that won't go away with
an eraser, you can't seem to figure out what
| | 03:16 | to do with it, and you have got all
this time and energy invested in a mat.
| | 03:20 | If it's going to go under glass, you can
usually get away with actually etching the surface
| | 03:25 | slightly to remove a little imperfection.
| | 03:28 | Perhaps a pencil mark that penetrated a
little more deeply into the surface of the board.
| | 03:33 | You literally just go in with the tip of the blade
and very gently pick little bits of the board away.
| | 03:39 | I try to do this very gently, tiny little
bits and only working around the spot where
| | 03:44 | the little flaw is and then go back with the
Burnishing Bone, and you can smooth it out.
| | 03:50 | And generally, if it's going to be under
glass, if you're going to put it in a frame with
| | 03:53 | glass over it, nobody will
ever notice that it's there.
| | 03:57 | So now we have gotten to the point, we have
got our work mounted in the mat, the mat is
| | 04:02 | pristine perfection, and we're ready to
move on to the next part of the framing process.
| | 04:08 |
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|
|
3. Choosing a Frame and GlazingSelecting a frame| 00:00 | We have made it back from Quartz
Mountain to my shop here in Norman.
| | 00:04 | I work out of my home and have done an
extensive remodel in order to be able to accomplish
| | 00:09 | the tasks of the framing business.
| | 00:12 | One souvenir I did bring back from Quartz
Mountain is a little bit of a sore throat.
| | 00:16 | So bear with me if my voice comes and
goes while we do the next few movies.
| | 00:20 | I want to talk to you about the options that are
available to you when you start to select a frame.
| | 00:26 | I think everybody has picked an easel
backed frame, those are the ones that you line up
| | 00:30 | on your mantle piece, or table top,
typically showing family portraits.
| | 00:35 | We have got a few examples here that come
in varying sizes from typical 4x6, 5x7, I
| | 00:42 | think we have a 8x10 one over here.
| | 00:45 | They generally function with a series of
latching mechanisms that will hold a hinged back in
| | 00:53 | place or removable back in place, and you
just insert the art in the back, and we'll
| | 00:57 | go over some important techniques
to do that properly in a little bit.
| | 01:02 | One thing I suggest you look forward in easel
backs, notice there is a strap here that connects
| | 01:07 | the stand to the frame itself that's real
important over time, because most of the backs
| | 01:13 | on those are just a heavyweight cardboard,
and if you have an easel back frame like this
| | 01:17 | without that reinforcing strap, over time,
this cardboard will start to band and the
| | 01:23 | frame will eventually get closer and closer
to flyout, so look for that strap when you're
| | 01:27 | picking an easel back.
| | 01:29 | The next step is in simplicity is a sectional
frame, and we have here a metal section, you
| | 01:36 | buy these in pairs of legs and so truly you
can customize your size to almost any size
| | 01:43 | as long as it's in whole inches and see here
the components we have here for 11x14 frame,
| | 01:48 | and when you buy the two pairs of legs, you'll
also get a hardware kit that has all the parts
| | 01:54 | necessary to assemble the frame.
| | 01:56 | Once again, we'll go over
this in depth in a later movie.
| | 02:01 | Beyond the sectional frame you can
also buy what's called open back frames.
| | 02:06 | These come in a variety of standard sizes
and many different styles, there are great
| | 02:12 | choice price wise that are typically more
economical than having a custom frame made.
| | 02:17 | Disadvantage of them is typically you'll
only find them in the standard frame sizes, but
| | 02:22 | they are fairly simple
proposition to put together.
| | 02:25 | If you look at the back here you can see that
the recess here, the hole where your art package
| | 02:31 | goes this offset we call a rabbit, and this
overhang in the front of the frame is what
| | 02:37 | actually holds the work in place, so you
drop your glass and mat package in there and
| | 02:42 | then use framers points from the
back to apply pressure to hold in place.
| | 02:46 | Once again we'll go over that in
detail, that's an open back frame.
| | 02:52 | This is actually a back quite like an
easel back frame, but it's not an easel back.
| | 02:58 | Oval frames are an interesting choice for
portraits, typically the oval shape is a nice
| | 03:04 | highlight for the shape of the face.
| | 03:06 | They also fit well too in different core
themes, typically oval frames would fit in a more
| | 03:12 | traditional theme than a more contemporary.
| | 03:16 | And lastly, when you're buying custom frames,
you can buy either length, or you buy whole
| | 03:22 | sticks of the molding, typically those sticks
run from eight to ten feet in length, or you
| | 03:27 | can buy chopped molding,
and I typically buy chop.
| | 03:30 | A couple of reasons for that if you buy length
you have to contend with the scrap, you typically
| | 03:36 | have to keep more of an inventory, so it
ties up a lot of space with my studio setup the
| | 03:41 | way it is I don't really have
the storage to deal with length.
| | 03:44 | The other advantage of buying chop if you
look at this piece here, the chop comes like
| | 03:49 | the sectional frames where you buy pairs of
legs and they are cut in to size, the advantage
| | 03:55 | of chop is you don't have to deal with
whole inches, you can get them cut to any size,
| | 04:00 | and you can see here how
clean the cut is on the edge.
| | 04:03 | This is if actually a burl surface, it's a
real nice hardwood veneer and they have, the
| | 04:10 | wholesaler that I buy from, they use this
saw that cost about $10,000 to make this cut,
| | 04:15 | and you can see it's just beautifully smooth.
| | 04:17 | There's no nicks in the veneer,
which makes assembly really easy.
| | 04:20 | I do have a miter saw here, and I
occasionally do chops myself, but because my saw is not
| | 04:27 | of the quality that my wholesaler has, I typically
have to saw then sand to get this kind of an edge.
| | 04:34 | So this is a real timesaver and very affordable
way, you can also buy chopped and joined molding
| | 04:40 | where they'll cut it and put
it together for you as well.
| | 04:44 | One of the things that comes up with buying
either chop or sectionals or open back frames
| | 04:50 | is typically they come without the glazing.
And when I say glazing I'm referring to either
| | 04:56 | the acrylic or glass that is your first
barrier of protection in front of the work.
| | 05:00 | When you buy an easel back frame, you don't
need to worry about glazing because typically
| | 05:04 | the easel back frames will come with
either glass or acrylic already in place.
| | 05:08 | So what I want to talk to you about now is the choices
that you have when you look at glazing materials.
| | 05:13 |
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| Understanding the kinds of glazing| 00:01 | So once you have made a decision on what
type of frame you want to use your next choice
| | 00:05 | involves what type of glazing you want to use.
| | 00:09 | Glazing is a term we refer to, used to
refer to whatever the first transparent barrier
| | 00:14 | is in front of your work. Placed there to
protect it from spills, windborne debris, or whatever.
| | 00:21 | Two basic types are available either acrylic or glass.
And there are advantages and disadvantages to both.
| | 00:29 | I typically use acrylic in settings
| | 00:31 | that are commercial in nature. And the
advantage of acrylic is it's virtually unbreakable if
| | 00:37 | somebody is in the lobby and bumps in to it,
it's not going to cause any damage if it gets
| | 00:42 | knocked off the wall, it typically will
not break, where, of course, glass will shatter.
| | 00:47 | The disadvantage of acrylic is
it is prone to being scratched.
| | 00:50 | It has a fairly hard surface, but over time
it can pick up scratches particularly in a
| | 00:55 | high traffic commercial application.
| | 00:58 | Acrylic is also a little bit more expensive
than glass, both the acrylic and glass surfaces
| | 01:04 | come with a variety of different
treatments that afford different kinds of protection
| | 01:08 | just got one piece of acrylic here, that's
just regular clear acrylic, you can also get
| | 01:13 | acrylic that has UV protection, you want UV
protection, if you're hanging your work in an area
| | 01:19 | where it gets direct sunlight.
| | 01:21 | The UV protection will help to prevent your
work from fading so you need to kind analyze
| | 01:26 | where the work is going to hang. If you're not
sure I tend to err on the side of protecting
| | 01:31 | it rather than not.
| | 01:33 | So acrylic also comes in a variety of
thicknesses, typically the larger the surface area the
| | 01:40 | thicker you want the acrylic to be.
| | 01:43 | One other advantage of acrylic as compared
to glass is it's also lighter in weight, so
| | 01:47 | when you get to very large frame pieces,
sometimes if weight is a consideration, you might want
| | 01:52 | to opt for acrylic.
| | 01:54 | If you're going to go with glass, glass
comes packaged by the box as opposed to acrylic
| | 02:00 | which comes by the sheet and typically acrylic,
if you buy it from a wholesale source will
| | 02:04 | come in 4x8 foot sheets.
| | 02:07 | Advantage of buying an larger
sheets is the price drop is substantial.
| | 02:11 | If you buy thick glass or acrylic cut to size,
you're going to pay almost three times as
| | 02:17 | much for it as you would
if you bought a wholesale.
| | 02:21 | This is why after we go through this here
we're going to talk about different ways to
| | 02:25 | cut it, because the savings are
substantial, if you learn to cut your own.
| | 02:29 | On the 4x8 foot sheets of acrylic however,
those are really hard to handle as an individual,
| | 02:35 | so I typically will have my wholesaler cut
them either to size, or to smaller sizes,
| | 02:41 | still I'm getting a big savings in that regard.
| | 02:43 | Glass, I'm going to show you couple of the
different variety of glass that are available.
| | 02:48 | I can say that comes packed in boxes from
most framing things I just use premium, clear
| | 02:53 | glass, but I talked about UV
protection conservation glass.
| | 03:00 | Typically will provide about 97% UV
protection, and you can see that there is no evidence
| | 03:07 | of any kind of coding on this, it's still
remarkably clear, you can also get conservation
| | 03:13 | glass with a reflection control coating.
| | 03:16 | What reflection control does is it helps
eliminate the reflection of lights in the room, the
| | 03:21 | reflection of even you the observer.
| | 03:24 | Disadvantage of reflection control is you
can see here it has kind of a milky look to it,
| | 03:29 | and when my hand gets very close to it it's
pretty clear, but if you have your work recessed,
| | 03:34 | and if you're floating it further behind the
glazing layer, this kind of reflection control
| | 03:40 | is not a very good choice, which leads us
to the best glass that's out there is museum
| | 03:46 | glass which has a transparent reflection control
coating, you can see here, there is no milkiness
| | 03:51 | to my hand, has 97% UV protection as well.
| | 03:56 | Disadvantage of museum
glass of course is the expense.
| | 03:59 | Museum class typically will cost four
to five times as much as plain glazing.
| | 04:04 | So now that we exposed you to some of
the different types of glazing you can use.
| | 04:08 | In the next couple movies, we're going to
talk about techniques for cutting the
| | 04:11 | glazing to the proper size for your frame.
| | 04:16 |
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| Cutting glass| 00:00 | We are back from Quartz Mountain and the mat cutter
has returned to its natural environment here in my shop.
| | 00:06 | One of the things you will notice about this
table is it's at a much better working height
| | 00:11 | than the situation we had
out at the Quartz Mountain.
| | 00:13 | You can see it's about waist high.
| | 00:15 | I can reach forward and backward without
really putting any kind of strain on my back.
| | 00:19 | The one thing I wanted to do since it had
been transported, and we'd taken it apart,
| | 00:24 | I got my carpenter square out and double-checked
to make sure that the alignment was perfect.
| | 00:28 | So we get exact 90 degrees
on our cuts, and that is good.
| | 00:32 | So we are done with the carpenter square.
And what we are going to do with the mat cutter
| | 00:37 | now is use it as a guide for cutting glass.
| | 00:40 | With that in mind, we don't need
either of the blades on the cutter itself.
| | 00:44 | So I am just going to slide those out of the way
and then we won't need this production stop either.
| | 00:50 | So I am just going to loosen it and remove
it and set it aside, and then I'll grab a
| | 00:56 | scrap of matboard to put underneath
here to help me see the glass more clearly.
| | 01:02 | For measuring, we will use the same production
stop we used when we were using cutting matboards
| | 01:06 | down the size, and we are going
to take this 16x20 piece of glass.
| | 01:11 | We are going to make two cuts
in order to make it 12x14 inches.
| | 01:16 | So I am going to make the 12-inch cut first,
and I am going to set my guide here at
| | 01:21 | 12 & 3/32 of an inch.
| | 01:23 | The reason we do that is to compensate for
the offset of the cutting wheel on the cutter
| | 01:29 | from the guide on the side.
| | 01:31 | And if you look closely here at the
cutter, you can see what I'm talking about.
| | 01:34 | There are a couple of component parts here,
it's a pistol grip, so it's easy to hold onto.
| | 01:40 | This section here holds the cutting wheel right at
its tip, and if you will notice that moves slightly.
| | 01:47 | When you first apply pressure on the piece
of glass you're cutting that little movement
| | 01:51 | releases a drop of oil onto the cutting
blade which allows it to make a clean score.
| | 01:57 | This little cap here removes, and you
can insert oil in the handle of the cutter.
| | 02:02 | So this is not a real expensive tool,
about $20 you can find one at most hobby shops.
| | 02:09 | What you're doing when you make the cut is,
unlike say acrylic where you're making a
| | 02:16 | deep score that the acrylic will crack
based on that score, the cutter actually sets up
| | 02:22 | a molecular vibration within the glass.
| | 02:26 | So you make the score and then quickly use
what's called running pliers, which are these
| | 02:33 | right here, and the running pliers
actually put a slight bit of pressure on each side
| | 02:37 | of that score, and you'll see when we apply
the pressure that the glass will crack cleanly
| | 02:42 | along the score mark.
| | 02:44 | If you score the glass and the phone rings,
and you've got to walk away from it, you'll
| | 02:49 | need to flip the glass to the other side
and rescore, because that molecular vibration
| | 02:54 | lasts for a short period of time.
| | 02:56 | If you wait too long to make the break after
you score, the cutting won't work properly.
| | 03:02 | Another issue for cutting glass cleanly
is the glass itself needs to be clean.
| | 03:06 | If you have any kind of dust or surface
debris on the glass when you make the score, it can
| | 03:12 | also have a negative affect on that little bit
of molecular vibration you're going to create.
| | 03:16 | So in handling the glass,
safety becomes an issue too.
| | 03:21 | Glass comes packaged for the framer.
| | 03:23 | Basically packaged by weight and
each individual sheet is called a light.
| | 03:28 | So if you buy smaller sizes of precut
glass, you'll get more lights in a box.
| | 03:34 | For example, 11x14 size
typically has 47 lights in the box.
| | 03:39 | If you get up the full board size of 32x40.
| | 03:42 | But I remember it's only five lights to a
box, but the boxes all weigh about the same.
| | 03:48 | As far as cutting technique we are
going to cut just plain glass right now.
| | 03:52 | We talked earlier about conservation glass,
about museum glass, those will be very clearly
| | 03:58 | marked along the edge on which side you're
supposed to score them, because of the coding
| | 04:03 | on them there's only one side that you can
use your cutter on to get a good cut, but
| | 04:07 | they are very clearly marked.
The technique for cutting is identical.
| | 04:10 | You just need to double-check that
you're cutting on the right side.
| | 04:14 | So now I am going to open this up.
| | 04:15 | I am going to take the glass
and place it in the cutter.
| | 04:19 | The reason I'm wearing gloves, these edges
will sometimes be slightly sharp, they offer
| | 04:24 | a little bit of protection.
| | 04:26 | These are microfiber, you'll see a
lot of cotton gloves in frame shops.
| | 04:30 | If you're clumsy, there's
nothing wrong with that.
| | 04:33 | I'd recommend getting Kevlar gloves.
| | 04:34 | They will provide you a much
greater degree of protection.
| | 04:37 | What I like about these is I have trouble
finding gloves that fit my hands are kind
| | 04:41 | of big and these fit real tightly, and I can
work with them well and pick up small objects.
| | 04:46 | So we are ready to make our cut now.
I am going to take the cutter.
| | 04:50 | Once again you can see how I am just using
this, essentially, as a very stable straight
| | 04:53 | edge, and I am going to press down
and then pull the cutter towards me.
| | 04:58 | I will open this back up,
take my running pliers.
| | 05:02 | I'll just list this up slightly, and you
should be able to see that score fairly clearly,
| | 05:07 | and I am going to line that up with the line
in the middle of my pliers and just squeeze,
| | 05:13 | and you can see we get a nice clean break,
and I'll set aside the scrap piece that I'm
| | 05:18 | not going to use, and then I keep a towel
here at all times, and what I will do is I
| | 05:24 | will wipe down my guide here to remove any
residual oil that would have come off the cutter.
| | 05:29 | Then I will wipe the edge here.
| | 05:31 | There are usually some really fine little bits of
glass that stick on that, I will wipe that edge off.
| | 05:36 | Then I'll turn this around, I'll reset my
production stop to 14 & 3/32 of an inch.
| | 05:46 | Once again that extra little bit we are putting on
there is to make up for the offset of the cutting wheel.
| | 05:52 | I am going to make sure it's carefully aligned,
close and here we go, and once again, score,
| | 06:00 | open it up, grab the running pliers, right
along the score line, and we get a nice clean break.
| | 06:12 | Then I have a bin I use here in the studio
for scrap glass and sometimes you know what,
| | 06:19 | you'll end up with pieces that are big
enough to use, and I did with other frames.
| | 06:22 | A lot of times it's just small bits like this.
You have got to be careful.
| | 06:25 | You don't really want to put
those in your regular trashcan.
| | 06:28 | The reason being if it's in the regular
trashcan, you might put something else and then cut
| | 06:33 | your hand on a piece of scrap.
So I keep it in a separate place.
| | 06:37 | These pieces that we had left are
really too small for another use.
| | 06:40 | So whenever I have enough of it built
up, I take it to the recycling center.
| | 06:45 | You can see here, we have got
our glass cut down to 12x14.
| | 06:48 | I use the production cutter as a straight edge for the
cutting, because I have it, because it's real stable.
| | 06:54 | You can accomplish this same thing using a
heavy straight edge like we use when demonstrated
| | 06:59 | how to use a handheld mat cutter.
| | 07:01 | Just be sure as you're making your marks,
and you're aligning with a straight edge,
| | 07:04 | you allow for that 3/16-inch offset of the cutting
wheel from the edge of the guide that holds it.
| | 07:12 | From here we are ready to
move on to cutting acrylic.
| | 07:17 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Scoring acrylic| 00:00 | Now I want to show you how to do acrylic
cutting whereas opposed to glass cutting.
| | 00:05 | When you order your acrylic they will offer it
to you two different ways. It's the same product, but
| | 00:09 | they will ask you if you
wanted with paper or film.
| | 00:13 | And I typically ask for
paper for a couple of reasons.
| | 00:16 | It seems to be a better adhered, which
provides greater protection than the film does.
| | 00:23 | The film tends to peel up at the edge, so if I have
usable scrap, it's not as well protected in the studio.
| | 00:29 | So we're going to score
acrylic based on paper packaging.
| | 00:33 | The first thing you need to do is remove the
paper from the packaging, you want to score
| | 00:38 | an unprotected surface.
| | 00:40 | Now the tool we're going to use for the
scoring is this little cutter right here.
| | 00:47 | You can see it has a hook shaped blade and
what that does is that little hook, we will
| | 00:52 | actually put that on the surface of the
acrylic and draw it towards yourself, and that hook
| | 00:57 | will allow it score
pretty deeply with each pass.
| | 01:01 | Unlike glass, acrylic you typically score
two, maybe use as many as four times, making
| | 01:06 | a deeper score for a cleaner break.
| | 01:08 | It's not about the
molecular vibration like glass is.
| | 01:12 | So I'm going to quickly remove the paper
covering here, and you just reach up, find the corner
| | 01:18 | that's loose--and like the glass, I'm
going to glove up just to protect myself.
| | 01:23 | The edges of this acrylic are very sharp,
and like glass you can give yourself a pretty
| | 01:27 | serious cut with them.
| | 01:30 | So I'm going to glove up and remove the
paper, and just pull it towards myself.
| | 01:42 | One thing too, you want to keep in mind, see
how I am kind of rolling this up on top of itself.
| | 01:47 | The surface of this is sticky, it does have
adhesive on it, and while it leaves the Plexiglass
| | 01:53 | clean when we remove it,
| | 01:54 | you have got to remember it's a sticky surface,
and you don't want to allow that to be anywhere
| | 01:57 | near any of the artwork in your studio.
| | 02:00 | So by rolling like this, I have kind of
protected that stickiness and then I'm just
| | 02:03 | going to dispose of it immediately.
| | 02:05 | So now we have exposed one
side of the acrylic here.
| | 02:10 | And like I did when cutting the
glass, I can use the production stop.
| | 02:15 | But I need to allow a slight
offset for the thickness of the blade.
| | 02:19 | Now this blade doesn't have near the
offset that the glass cutter does.
| | 02:23 | It's just about a ooch.
| | 02:24 | So to cut it down on my 12-inch dimension, I'm
going to set my production stop at 12 and a ooch.
| | 02:31 | A notch is about 1/32 of an inch.
| | 02:36 | Then I'm going to line it
up and make sure it's square.
| | 02:38 | And then I'm going to position the cutter
so that that hook digs into the acrylic.
| | 02:45 | And I'm going to apply a
reasonable amount of pressure.
| | 02:50 | And you can see little ribbons of
acrylic coming off as I make the score.
| | 02:55 | Let me go ahead and give it one more.
| | 03:03 | And then I'm going to inspect it just take
a quick look to see if it looks like it's
| | 03:06 | deep enough, and it's clean and
straight, and that all looks good.
| | 03:11 | So then I'm going to move that film covered
piece out of the way and just slide this over
| | 03:16 | here to the edge of the table.
Apply a little pressure.
| | 03:19 | You can see I get a real clean break.
| | 03:22 | And I'm going to take my X-Acto knife and
just cut down through the backing paper.
| | 03:30 | And here we have our piece of plex.
Notice it's a nice clean cut.
| | 03:34 | We still have the backing paper on one side
to protect that, and we will leave that on there
| | 03:38 | until we are ready to put it in the frame.
| | 03:39 | You need to remember that this, unlike glass,
this surface will scratch, so you need to
| | 03:44 | take care with this.
| | 03:45 | And what we're going to do now, in the
next movie, we're going to make the second cut
| | 03:49 | in our Plexiglass using a table saw.
| | 03:54 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Sawing acrylic| 00:01 | I have just shown you how to cut
acrylic by scoring and breaking the acrylic.
| | 00:06 | Now I'd like to show you my
preferred method for cutting acrylic.
| | 00:10 | One thing about it is it necessitates a table saw,
which is a one of the brass rings of the power tool world.
| | 00:16 | They're pretty expensive, a good quality one
you're looking at least $500 to get into it.
| | 00:21 | It's a pretty powerful motor.
| | 00:23 | This particular one is a belt driven model
rather than direct drive, which means the motor
| | 00:27 | turns a belt and the belt turns the blade.
| | 00:30 | You can see here we have got a 10
inch blade on this particular saw.
| | 00:35 | It's a fairly thin Kerf carbide tipped blade.
| | 00:38 | When we talk about blade Kerf, what you're
talking about is the width of the cut it will
| | 00:43 | take out of whatever material you're using.
| | 00:45 | You usually use a wider Kerf
for more coarse applications.
| | 00:49 | This blade I got because I cut a lot of acrylic
and framing parts with it, so I want something
| | 00:53 | a little bit thinner.
| | 00:55 | You can adjust the blade cut
height quite simply with a crank here.
| | 00:59 | It comes up and down.
| | 01:01 | You typically want to adjust it to where it
adjusts slightly higher than the thickness
| | 01:05 | of whatever you're cutting.
| | 01:06 | The more blade you expose it makes a coarser
cut, and it also, there's greater risk every
| | 01:12 | bit of blade you expose.
| | 01:13 | This part of the saw is called the fence, and you
position the fence to determine the width of your cut.
| | 01:20 | So what we're going to do, there are
guidelines here, a little inch increments that you can
| | 01:26 | use to align the fence in relation to
saw blade, but I don't really trust those.
| | 01:31 | I would much rather rely on my tape measure.
I think it's a lot more accurate.
| | 01:34 | We have scored and made the
cut to the 12-inch dimension.
| | 01:37 | So now we want to take this 16 odd inch
dimension down to the 14 to match our frame.
| | 01:44 | So I'm going to take my tape measure, bring
in out here, and I'm going to slide the fence
| | 01:48 | over until I'm close to 14 inches and then
if you look very closely at these carbide
| | 01:54 | tips you'll see that they have a slight
alternate angle to them where the tip angle slightly
| | 01:59 | outward every other tip angles towards
the fence, every other tip angles away.
| | 02:03 | So we want to align the 14-inch exactly
with one of the teeth that is pointing towards
| | 02:11 | the fence and then gently adjusts the fence
to where we get an exact 14-inch dimension.
| | 02:17 | Then when I use this lever on the back of
the fence I'm going to push that down, and
| | 02:21 | that locks the fence in place.
So we have got our fence properly positioned.
| | 02:25 | The next thing to do is to
cut the piece of the acrylic.
| | 02:28 | A couple things to keep in mind.
This blade spins very rapidly.
| | 02:34 | It cannot tell the difference
between acrylic, oak, or your finger.
| | 02:39 | It will cut you seriously very quickly.
| | 02:41 | So you need to be very, very
conscious of where the blade is at all times.
| | 02:46 | What I'm going to do as far as hand
position I'll make this cut, I have got very little
| | 02:50 | scrap on this side of the blade.
| | 02:53 | So I'm not going to worry about
maintaining pressure for an even guide through.
| | 02:58 | I'm going to concentrate, I'm going to put
both hands between the blade and the fence,
| | 03:02 | kind of predicting where those fingers are
going to end up as I go through, and then
| | 03:06 | my major focus is going to be on keeping even
contact with the fence as I slide the piece through.
| | 03:12 | One other thing that's a
little bit different here.
| | 03:15 | Normally, I will not have peeled away the
protective paper on the surface of the acrylic.
| | 03:20 | We did that so we could score
it in the previous demonstration.
| | 03:23 | One of the disadvantages of having it gone, the
surface is little bit slicker, it's harder to hold onto.
| | 03:29 | You also will have the potential for more
edge chipping as the blade goes through.
| | 03:34 | So my swing thoughts here as we get ready to
do this is smooth motion, be aware of where
| | 03:40 | my hands are in relation to the blade and
then the piece of scrap that's going to be
| | 03:45 | cut loose, don't worry about that.
| | 03:48 | Just follow this through until the plex is
completely clear of the blade and then we'll
| | 03:52 | lift out all of the way, we'll turn off
the saw, and then we'll remove the scrap once
| | 03:57 | the blade stops spinning.
| | 03:59 | I'm not going to try to
talk to you while I do this.
| | 04:01 | I warned you the blade is a
little loud and here we go.
| | 04:18 | You can see how much easier that was than
the scoring method where I had to do some
| | 04:23 | multiple passes to score
and then break it on the edge.
| | 04:27 | Once you have got your measurement
made, the cuts are as quick as can be.
| | 04:31 | Once the blade completely stops moving
you can just reach in and remove your scrap.
| | 04:35 | So you can quite simply see that's my much
preferred method for cutting acrylic to size.
| | 04:40 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Keeping the glass clean| 00:01 | Now that I have cut my glass to size, the
next step in preparing it to go into the frame
| | 00:05 | is to clean it thoroughly.
| | 00:07 | The workspace I have here, I just took a
hollow core door and first wrapped it with felt and
| | 00:14 | stapled that in place and then wrapped
it with muslin and stapled that in place.
| | 00:19 | Muslin is inexpensive, I use unbleached muslin,
this way as this gets old and worn I can just
| | 00:26 | peel it off and replace it with another piece
of fabric, and that's why I stapled the felt
| | 00:31 | separately from the muslin, so
the felt layer can stay there.
| | 00:34 | It provides a little bit of padding, a little bit of
give so that it have a lot lower breakage risk on the glass.
| | 00:42 | Also you see we'll use this same table for
the assembling of the frames, the big advantage
| | 00:46 | being as when the frame is face down on this
table surface you don't run any risk of scratching
| | 00:52 | the frame or causing it any damage.
So it's a nice safe working environment.
| | 00:57 | When working with the glass, once again, I do want
to glove up just for the extra bit of protection.
| | 01:02 | And here it provides two things, one it
protects my hands a little bit, but it also keeps me
| | 01:06 | from leaving nasty little fingerprints on the
glass that I'm working so hard to get clean.
| | 01:11 | For plain glass and for acrylic the only
cleaner I recommend is Sprayway Glass Cleaner.
| | 01:18 | It's a non-ammonia glass cleaner and while
ammonia does not cause any problems when you
| | 01:24 | are cleaning glass you cannot
use ammonia to clean acrylic.
| | 01:28 | If you are using ammonia
cleaner on acrylic it will damage it.
| | 01:31 | And so this Sprayway Glass Cleaner I
recommend unequivocally you can find it in any grocery
| | 01:37 | store, most hardware stores carry it, and it costs
about the same as all the other ammoniated glass cleaners.
| | 01:44 | So to use we'll shake it up a little
bit and spray it directly on the glass.
| | 01:50 | And then the towels I'm using these are
flower sack towels, they are pretty easy to find,
| | 01:55 | they are 100% cotton, they
are fairly light in weight.
| | 01:58 | And I find that once they have been washed
a few times they are virtually lint free.
| | 02:02 | I also always select a white towel because
with a white towel you can tell when it gets
| | 02:07 | dirty, and can wash them in hot
water with regular laundry detergent.
| | 02:11 | So the wiping motion I use is circular,
and I really focus on the edges of the glass.
| | 02:19 | Dad taught me that when you're having toast
with your breakfast, if you butter the edges,
| | 02:23 | the middle will kind of take care of itself.
That's really the same way with glass.
| | 02:27 | A lot of times when you are inspecting it,
you'll find that the soil that remains is
| | 02:31 | on the edges, and I'm going to flip it over
and just repeat the procedure on the other side.
| | 02:36 | Notice too, I'm not concerned about
totally covering the glass with the cleaner.
| | 02:41 | That's why I work the cleaner to the edges
of the glass with the towel, and you can see
| | 02:48 | I'm holding the glass in place with my gloved
hands, and I can keep the glass real stable,
| | 02:54 | it's not moving around at all.
| | 02:56 | But I don't put any marks on it
because I have got my gloves on.
| | 02:59 | Along with keeping your towels clean
too, you want to keep your gloves clean.
| | 03:04 | Overtime these will get a little dirty and
these I can just fill in the washing machine
| | 03:07 | just like the towels.
| | 03:09 | So after I have cleaned both sides of the
glass I'll just hold it up and visually inspect
| | 03:14 | it, and it looks pretty good.
| | 03:16 | There is no more marks on it, there is a
few little bits of dust, and we'll clean those
| | 03:20 | away at the very last when we assemble things.
| | 03:23 | The procedure for cleaning acrylic
is exactly the same as cleaning glass.
| | 03:27 | You peel off the other side of the backing and
clean both sides of it just like we did with the glass.
| | 03:34 | One pitfall you may run into, with a lot
of easel back frames, you can see there is a
| | 03:40 | price sticker right on the frame.
| | 03:42 | Some manufacturers put on stickers that are
held in place just by surface tension, but
| | 03:47 | a lot of manufacturers will put a sticker
on with some sort of an adhesive, and the
| | 03:52 | ones that make me crazy are the ones that use
adhesives that are pretty much permanent adhesive.
| | 03:56 | So you end up having to remove this tag and
sometimes there is a glue residue there, which
| | 04:01 | I find really annoying when it's
blocking the view of the photograph.
| | 04:05 | It's just a barrier between your
viewer and the enjoyment of the photograph.
| | 04:09 | So to get rid of that sticker I'll open up
the pack of the frame, take out the little
| | 04:15 | backing board that they put in there.
| | 04:18 | And then if I just reach underneath and push
up I can easily lift the glass out of the frame.
| | 04:23 | I'm just going to set the frame aside and
then I am going to feel, okay the sticker
| | 04:27 | is on this side of the glass.
| | 04:30 | Typically I'll work with a single edge razor blade,
you can buy these, they are really inexpensive.
| | 04:35 | You can buy boxes of anywhere from about 10
to 100, and they all come packaged with this
| | 04:39 | protective paper around the blade.
| | 04:41 | And you can see once I remove that the blade is
very flat, and I'll just place blade underneath
| | 04:47 | the edge of the sticker and kind of rock
it back and forth, so I can get a grip on it
| | 04:53 | and then I'll peel away the rest of the sticker.
| | 04:55 | That one peeled off fairly easily,
sometimes when you try to peel the thing will shred
| | 05:00 | but so far we're doing pretty well with it.
| | 05:04 | Then I'll just kind of look, and you can--I
don't know if you can see this on camera but
| | 05:07 | there's a little tiny bit of
glue residue that's left here.
| | 05:11 | The razor blade is not really the best tool
for picking that up, what I'll typically use
| | 05:16 | then is a little Bestine. It's a fairly
universal solvent that will dissolve almost all the
| | 05:22 | adhesives that are out there.
| | 05:24 | The thing you need to be careful of that
Bestine is to use it in well-ventilated area and be
| | 05:29 | careful about contact with the skin as well.
You can actually absorb it through your skin.
| | 05:33 | So if are going to be doing a lot of this,
some rubber gloves or some kind of impermeable
| | 05:38 | gloves rather than cloth
gloves would be your best choice.
| | 05:42 | So we're going to open up Bestine.
| | 05:45 | Grab a paper towel, and we're just going to
put a little bestine on the paper towel, and
| | 05:54 | wipe down the area where we have that glue
residue, then rotate the paper around, because
| | 06:00 | what the bestine does is it kind of dissolves
the glue and then we pick it up with a clean
| | 06:05 | part of the towel, put the cap on that.
It's pretty strong stuff.
| | 06:11 | And then once again hold it up and inspect
and the glue residue is gone, and at this
| | 06:15 | point I'll proceed with the glass cleaner and clean
it the same way I cleaned the previous piece of glass.
| | 06:21 | One thing to remember about your razor blade,
you can't use the razor blade on the acrylic,
| | 06:26 | the acrylic is prone to scratching, so
you're going to have to rely strictly on solvents
| | 06:30 | when you have adhesive residue on acrylic.
| | 06:34 | Once again, Bestine does
not react with the acrylic.
| | 06:38 | If you have got other cleaners I would
recommend testing them on a piece of scrap before you
| | 06:43 | use them on the main piece of glazing
you're going to put in your work of art.
| | 06:47 | So we have our glass cleaned, now we were ready to
proceed to the next step of assembling the frame.
| | 06:52 |
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|
|
4. Putting It All TogetherAssembling an easel back frame| 00:00 | In these next few movies we're going to talk
about assembling the different types of frames.
| | 00:05 | We're going to start off with the simplest,
which is the Easel Back Frame. I have disassembled
| | 00:10 | it into its component parts, so we have the
frame, the easel, the backing board, and the glass.
| | 00:17 | And we have selected this image to frame
and one of the first things you'll notice when
| | 00:22 | you take a look at it is window and
the size of the image do not match up.
| | 00:27 | Because of this we're going to need to cut it
to size, there are a couple of different
| | 00:32 | ways you can do it.
| | 00:34 | One way is to use the glass itself as a
cutting guide, and if you want to do that, you just
| | 00:39 | take the glass, set it over the image and
position it carefully, exactly where you want
| | 00:47 | and then get an X-Acto knife with a very sharp
blade and make the cuts to match the size of the glass.
| | 00:54 | Notice if I'm going to do that, I have put a
little scrap matboard here as a backing board,
| | 00:58 | that way I don't want the risk of cutting into
the table surface here, this nice fabric surface.
| | 01:03 | It also gives me a more rigid surface to do
the cutting on, that's one way of going about it.
| | 01:08 | Another way, and the typical way I typically
do it is with a little rolling cutter like this.
| | 01:14 | So I'm going to show you how to do with a
rolling cutter, but I'm going to use the glass
| | 01:17 | to kind of define where I want to crop it.
And so I'm positioning the glass, I like this
| | 01:25 | part of the image showing, so I'm going to
take a pencil, and I'm just going to make
| | 01:28 | one little mark outside of the image area
with the pencil that I'll use for a reference
| | 01:34 | once I get to the rolling cutter.
| | 01:35 | Now I'm going to set that glass aside, and
I won't need the backing board, since I'm
| | 01:41 | using the rolling cutter.
| | 01:43 | And the way this cutter works, it's got a
straight edge that functions as a guide, this
| | 01:49 | is really similar to the production mat cutter
we used, where the straight edges held firmly
| | 01:55 | in place, it hinges up to allow you to insert
your work and then we actually make
| | 02:00 | the cut, if you apply pressure, it brings
the blade into the clicker and the blade cuts
| | 02:06 | through the work to this
little rubber backing strip here.
| | 02:10 | So you put in the work, press down and
pull it towards you, and that makes the cut.
| | 02:15 | You can see here it also has a series of,
essentially, production marks that you can use to determine
| | 02:21 | the length for your cut.
| | 02:23 | Notice I have a pair of scissors here on
the table that I have not made mention of.
| | 02:28 | Scissors are handy for some aspects of the framing
process, but when you're cutting the work to size.
| | 02:33 | you only want to use a straight
edge and a blade in some combination.
| | 02:38 | Scissors are almost impossible to make an
accurate straight-line cut with, so we're
| | 02:42 | just going set those aside.
| | 02:45 | We're going to take the print that we have
marked, and I'm going to align that mark up
| | 02:50 | with the cut mark on the rubber backing, that's
a real accurate way to determine exactly where
| | 02:57 | the blade is going to come through, because it's
come through in that position many times before.
| | 03:00 | I'm going to bring the blade to the front,
press down and draw it towards me, and then
| | 03:07 | the next cut I want to make is just above the top
here, I want as much overhead in the crop as I can.
| | 03:14 | So once again I'm going to align
that up just inside the cut mark.
| | 03:18 | I'm going to close this down and notice
what I'm doing, I'm using the edge here, there
| | 03:24 | is a little recess that allows you to
align the paper precisely against that edge.
| | 03:29 | Once again press down and draw it towards
me, then we know that our window here, and
| | 03:36 | I'm just going to double-check that, this is
a 5x7, so you can double-check the measurement
| | 03:39 | there, and that is 5x7 inches.
| | 03:43 | So next I am going to use one of the measurement
stops here, and I'm going to take it to 5 inches.
| | 03:51 | Align it up and make sure the edge is square,
close it down, once again press down and draw
| | 03:55 | it towards myself, and then last we will align
it up at 7 inches, close it, press down, draw
| | 04:05 | it towards myself, and now
we have cut the work to size.
| | 04:08 | I'll get rid of this scrap.
| | 04:10 | I won't need the cutter anymore, and then
the next step, I'll go ahead and put the glove
| | 04:16 | back up, because I'm going to
be handling the glass again.
| | 04:23 | So I have got my gloves on now, I'm going
to take the glass, and I'm going to place
| | 04:27 | it back within frame and set the art off to
the side there, and then one thing I'm going
| | 04:32 | to do wherever mentioned when we were talking
about cutting and cleaning the glazing, that
| | 04:35 | there is sometimes a
little bit of dust residue left.
| | 04:39 | In any environment, there is going to be
airborne dust that is going to accumulate on the glass
| | 04:43 | surface quickly after you clean it.
| | 04:45 | So one of the last things I do is I use a
little compressed air just to blow that dust
| | 04:51 | free of the surface.
| | 04:52 | Now this is just an air hose connected to a
compressor with a little spray valve where
| | 05:01 | I just squeeze the trigger, and it
blows a jet of air across the glass.
| | 05:06 | I use the compressor for a lot of other things too.
| | 05:08 | I have got several air tools
that I use in other assembly projects.
| | 05:12 | They're kind of expensive, if you don't want to invest
in a compressor, you can buy cans of compressed
| | 05:18 | gas that'll accomplish the same
thing for you, but some kind of pressurized air
| | 05:22 | to blow off the glass is really key.
| | 05:27 | So we have gotten that last little bit of
dust removal done, then I'm going to take
| | 05:30 | the artwork and place it in, and then I'm
going to take the backing board and place
| | 05:35 | it in, and at this point I'm just going to
hold it down and turn it around, and see if
| | 05:41 | I can see any bits of dust, I
don't see any, it looks real clean.
| | 05:47 | So then the other thing as I flip it over, remember,
this is the top, so I want to make sure that
| | 05:52 | the easel goes back in
with this part facing down.
| | 05:58 | So I slide the easel in, and this one works
by, you center the corner, slide it across
| | 06:02 | and then I have got two little clips.
| | 06:04 | And you can see there is one clip right
there and another clip right here, and once those
| | 06:12 | are spun 90 degrees, it locks in place and then
you bring your work up, and you have completely
| | 06:19 | assembled an Easel Back Frame.
| | 06:24 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Assembling a metal frame| 00:00 | The next technique I'd like to share with
you is how to assemble a metal sectional frame.
| | 00:05 | The work we are going to use for this
demonstration is one of the student pieces that was selected
| | 00:10 | for the "Tour de Quartz" exhibition.
| | 00:13 | A touring show, the best of the student
work from the Oklahoma Summer Arts Institute.
| | 00:18 | This particular piece is called
the Safe Room by Amber Griffith.
| | 00:22 | A metal sectional frame comes in two sets of two
legs, we are framing this to a standard 11x14 size.
| | 00:30 | So I have two 14-inch legs and two 11-inch
legs, and then each frame will come with hardware
| | 00:35 | kit like this, and in that kit
you'll have a series of spring clips.
| | 00:41 | These clips are made out of spring steel
and they are used to actually hold the work in
| | 00:46 | place within the frame.
| | 00:48 | You can see as I bend it, it returns to its
original shape, and this will apply pressure
| | 00:54 | from behind, hold the work where it belongs.
| | 00:57 | These clips here, these pair of clips,
these are used to attach the wire they screw in
| | 01:02 | at the back of the frames and then these
four pairs of pieces here are the corner braces.
| | 01:08 | You have got one that's flat, that goes
underneath and then on top of it goes one that contains
| | 01:14 | two sections of threaded rod that have a
groove in the top for using a slotted screwdriver
| | 01:21 | to tighten them in the corners.
| | 01:23 | So to assemble the frame, we will start
off with one of the 11-inch legs, and we will
| | 01:28 | put it upside-down on our work surface,
and we will get a pair of these brackets, and
| | 01:34 | we will slide them in.
| | 01:35 | If you look at this, you will notice
there's a channel here, and this small channel is
| | 01:39 | where the braces, this corner braces fit, the
large channel here is where the artwork goes.
| | 01:46 | So we are going to slide these two pieces
flat one, and one with the threaded rods in
| | 01:51 | the corner, and we are going to take one of the 14
inch legs, and we are going to slide it together.
| | 01:58 | And once I have got that tight, we are
going to hold the corner in position, put in our
| | 02:02 | slotted screwdriver and screw
those two components tightly together.
| | 02:07 | And you can see too on my screwdriver, it's
a fairly narrow bladed slotted screwdriver.
| | 02:14 | The narrow blade is important, a broad
bladed screwdriver, sometimes won't allow you to
| | 02:18 | get these as tight as they need to be.
| | 02:20 | So once again, we are going to take two of
the corner braces, we are going to put a
| | 02:26 | 14-inch leg upside-down, we are going to
slide those two corner braces into that leg and
| | 02:31 | then slide those two together.
| | 02:34 | We are going to pull that corner tight and
while we are holding it tight, we are going
| | 02:39 | to put in the screw driver and tighten it down.
| | 02:45 | Then we are going to take the remaining leg
and our remaining two sets of brackets and
| | 02:50 | put both of those brackets into the
open ends of our last leg of the frame.
| | 02:57 | Once I have done that, I am going to set
that leg aside and then I am going to take, once
| | 03:04 | again, use the compressor, a little pressurized
air, I am going to blow any surface dust off
| | 03:13 | the mat and the glazing, and then I am going
to glove up for this part, because I am going
| | 03:18 | to be handling the glass again, and I am
going to take the glass and place the surface of
| | 03:25 | the glass, I just blew the dust off against
the surface of the mat and then I am going
| | 03:31 | to inspect it carefully to make sure I don't
have anything trapped between the two layers.
| | 03:36 | Then I am going to turn it over and slide
it in to the slot within the metal frames,
| | 03:45 | and then I am going to take my remaining leg
with brackets attached and slide those into
| | 03:53 | the groves, and I had to lift my glass package
a little bit just to make sure that it seated
| | 04:00 | all the way and then once again holding it tight,
I am going to tighten the screws on those corners.
| | 04:09 | And so now we have the mat and glass
package within the frame, but it's still loose, if
| | 04:15 | you can see here, here it moves around, I
am going to flip it over once again, make
| | 04:19 | a final inspection for dust or
imperfections, it looks good.
| | 04:25 | So now I use these spring clips and at
this point I am done handling with glass, so I
| | 04:30 | don't need gloves anymore, and it's little bit
easier to handle these clips when you don't have gloves.
| | 04:34 | So I am going to take one end of the clip,
I am going to place it under, I am sliding
| | 04:39 | it in between the metal frame in the mat
package and press down and push the other into cross.
| | 04:44 | Once again, that's taking the tip under,
pressing down the other side of the spring clip and
| | 04:50 | sliding it into place.
| | 04:52 | So the first thing I will do is
put these in on all four corners.
| | 04:56 | Once again tip under, press down, slide it
in, tip under, press down slide it in and
| | 05:03 | then I am going to add additional clips in
the center of each leg and what this does
| | 05:09 | is it just makes the image much more secure
within the frame and since the show is going
| | 05:14 | to be traveling around the state, we want
to make sure that it works durable enough
| | 05:17 | to take multiple hangings and removals from the
different gallery spaces where it's going to hang.
| | 05:22 | Okay now I have got all eight clips in place,
then I am going to double-check my orientation
| | 05:27 | and make sure I know which is the top, and
this is the top, so I am going to have the
| | 05:32 | top side facing towards me, I am going to
take these clips for the wiring and they just
| | 05:38 | slide in, if you watch, it just goes in and
slides over and then by tightening this screw
| | 05:44 | here, you can secure it firmly in place.
| | 05:48 | Okay, I am going to take the other clip,
line them up and notice this is about 25% of the
| | 05:56 | way down from the top. That's typically
where I'll mount my wire clips.
| | 06:01 | So I hold it in place, screwing it down tightly
and then the wire I am going to use is a braided
| | 06:09 | steel wire, it's coated with a
plastic coating, it's called soft strand.
| | 06:14 | The reason I use the soft strand, you can
may be see the sheen of the plastic on that.
| | 06:18 | The reason I use the soft strand is the
plain braided wire, if you do a lot of this work,
| | 06:23 | it tends to be a little bit rough on my fingers,
and I found the soft strands a lot more user-friendly.
| | 06:28 | So I will stretch out some of it from a spool
and then the knot that we use is pretty important.
| | 06:34 | What I want to do is come up from underneath,
so I am bringing a piece of wire through the
| | 06:38 | hole, and I will pull them about 4 inches through,
and I am going to bend that down, go underneath
| | 06:44 | the wire that I started with and then take
it and go back down through the hole and then
| | 06:50 | take that loose end and feed it through the
loop that I just created and pull it tight.
| | 06:57 | And once I have got that tight, so I have
got the strand, let's go to the other side
| | 07:02 | in this loose end, and I want to take this
and make five turns, staying tight against
| | 07:10 | the knot and doing the double loop that we
started with, combined with the five turns,
| | 07:17 | ensures that this will
never slip and become loose.
| | 07:19 | So I have got that knot done, come over to
the other side, get myself a little bit of
| | 07:23 | slack to work with and cut the wire, and once
again on the knot, I come up from underneath
| | 07:31 | and then on this one I need to make sure I
have got the right amount of slack in the
| | 07:35 | wire, so you can hang it easily.
| | 07:36 | You need a little bit of room there, so you
can get your hand behind it to guide it on
| | 07:41 | to whatever hanger you are using.
| | 07:43 | So I will pull that there, I will make a tight
bend to establish the slack amount, once again,
| | 07:48 | go under, through from the top and out of
the loop we are creating and pull it tight
| | 07:54 | with loose end of the wire, so we don't change
the angle we have there, then once again five
| | 08:00 | turns, pulling it tight, notice applying a
little downward pressure pulling it towards
| | 08:05 | the knot every time I make a loop,
that helps ensure really neat work.
| | 08:10 | And then once I made my five turns, I will
take my wire cutters again and make two cuts
| | 08:16 | clipping the wire off
very close to the crosswire.
| | 08:20 | You don't want to have loose ends of this
wire hanging around, because they can be sharp,
| | 08:23 | and you can actually cut yourself on them.
| | 08:25 | So now we have wired the clips in place, it's
secured, and this piece is ready for hanging.
| | 08:32 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Using a V-nailer to assemble a chopped frame| 00:01 | What I'd like to do for you now is demonstrate
how to use a V-Nailer or Underpinner to assemble
| | 00:06 | a chopped wooden frame.
| | 00:09 | This particular V-Nailer is made my
INMES, it's a Brazilian made product.
| | 00:13 | It's operated by a foot pedal,
and it works fairly simply.
| | 00:17 | I have just got a piece of scrap
wood to show you its operation.
| | 00:21 | This little V here is where the nail comes
out, and I am just going to hold this, what
| | 00:26 | would be half of a leg of the
two legs I am molding in place.
| | 00:30 | And you can see as I put my foot on this
paddle the first thing that happens is this top unit
| | 00:34 | comes down till it strikes the wood.
| | 00:37 | As soon as that strikes the wood, it stops
moving and the pressure from the peddle drives
| | 00:42 | a nail up through the wood,
as you can see, right there.
| | 00:46 | Once again, and here I will just move it
forward a little bit so you can see that again.
| | 00:50 | Press down this stops, as soon as this is
stopped the force is transferred to the nail,
| | 00:54 | and you can see it drives the nail cleanly
up into the end of the side of the frame.
| | 00:58 | So you can see these are two halves of the
nail, there is the other half of the V there,
| | 01:04 | and so what we are going to do is use this
to put a series of V nails in the back of
| | 01:09 | the joints of the chopped frame.
| | 01:11 | The v-nails come in cartridges, and you
can see here looking at the cartridges, these
| | 01:15 | two different sizes, there
are multiple choices in size.
| | 01:19 | I am just showing you two here
one fairly tall, one fairly short.
| | 01:23 | You want to match the size as closely as
you can to the thickness of the frame molding
| | 01:28 | you are using, and you need to be very
careful not to use too long a V-nail because in a
| | 01:32 | thin frame if your V-nail is too long this
machine doesn't know when to stop and will
| | 01:37 | drive that too long V-nail all the way through the
back of your frame, which is not a real attractive look.
| | 01:43 | So the nails are in cartridges.
| | 01:45 | You can see if you look at the unit here we
have got one of the cartridges installed right
| | 01:49 | here, this guide you set to match the depth
of the molding you are using, and this you
| | 01:56 | adjust to match the thickness.
| | 01:58 | So let's go to the molding we are actually
going to use. And to align this what I will
| | 02:04 | do is take a piece of the molding just one
for the alignment, so you can see it clearly,
| | 02:09 | and I will use these stops, over here, and
these loosen and these control the positioning of
| | 02:15 | your guide here, this little V-shaped
thing is the guide that forces both halves, the
| | 02:21 | two legs you are joining into the exact right
position, lines it up over where the V comes
| | 02:26 | out, and we want to set that first stop so
the first V-nail will come in at least a quarter
| | 02:33 | of an inch back from that edge,
but not more than half an inch.
| | 02:37 | Then we want to set the back stop,
essentially with the same thing in mind, we want that
| | 02:42 | to come in one quarter, one half inch from
the edge of the frame and then depending on
| | 02:47 | the depth of the frame we will do multiple
stops as we go through the nailing process.
| | 02:53 | Typically on a frame of this
size I will put four nails in it.
| | 02:58 | The last thing we want to do to prepare our
wood, you can see these unfinished ends where
| | 03:02 | the molding was chopped, and if we don't
get an absolute perfect fit, you'll sometimes
| | 03:07 | see beyond the actual seam and catch a
little bit of that light-colored wood.
| | 03:12 | So what we are going to do is use a marker,
and this particular one is a medium cherry,
| | 03:19 | you can get any kind of art marker, and I
keep a series of different colors around.
| | 03:23 | Here's just a few of them to match
the different types of molding I use.
| | 03:27 | In this particular case, the medium cherry
matches the molding well, and I am just going
| | 03:32 | to mark the edges, that would be exposed.
| | 03:38 | Notice I don't bother to mark down here, you
will never see that deeply into the molding,
| | 03:42 | but once again I just take the marker, and
mark the edge, and I am being careful with
| | 03:49 | my marker, not to come around and
get any on the surface of the molding.
| | 03:53 | Okay, so I have got that done, I had already marked
the other ones in preparation for the demonstration.
| | 03:59 | So now I have my molding ready to go.
| | 04:02 | Notice my frame is not the same length on
all sides, it's 12x14-inch frame, so I have
| | 04:08 | got the two 12-inch legs here, the two 14-inch
legs here, and the way I do this all, I always
| | 04:13 | take the long leg and put it on the right
side, place it in the little V guide here,
| | 04:21 | and then I'll take the short
leg and a good quality wood glue.
| | 04:26 | Typically, you want a fast-drying wood
glue that has a real good bond and they're all
| | 04:30 | water-based glues rather
than solvent-based glues.
| | 04:33 | I will apply the glue on the joint, so I am
using both the glue and nails to double the
| | 04:41 | strength of the joint.
| | 04:43 | I carefully align the two parts, and I
visually inspect to make sure everything is aligned,
| | 04:48 | and I'll put in the nail that's going in
closest to the center of the frame first, applying
| | 04:53 | the foot pressure, and I have
forgotten one critical adjustment.
| | 04:56 | Notice the big gap here, this actually needs
to be lower so that it doesn't have to travel
| | 05:02 | so far before it engages the
pressure to drive in the V-nail.
| | 05:06 | What happened on that first one I drove was
it didn't seat completely because I didn't
| | 05:10 | have this adjusted properly.
| | 05:11 | So I have dropped that down a little closer,
and what I am going to do, this is going to
| | 05:14 | be a little awkward but I am going to lift
this and move it forward when I drive the
| | 05:18 | second nail it'll position the second
nail and finish driving the first one.
| | 05:24 | Okay, so there we are back on track, then
we will bring it forward again, a third nail,
| | 05:30 | and finally all the way to the stop,
and we will bring in the fourth nail.
| | 05:34 | And so I have got this one pair of legs
assembled, and I am going to set that over here, pick
| | 05:43 | up the next pair once again the long leg
always on the right, the short leg on the left, and
| | 05:50 | I think I am bringing this down one more
stop just to make this work a little smoother.
| | 05:54 | And you want this down as low as you can fit the
molding, so that's really in the ideal position there.
| | 06:03 | So we have got our glue there, when you
have got a low glue bottle too, if you leave it
| | 06:06 | sitting on its side, it's not going to leak
any glue, and you won't waste time waiting
| | 06:12 | for it to flow back.
| | 06:14 | Once again start at the center nail and then I
am just kind of ironing the guide to determine
| | 06:19 | the placement sort of visually dividing it
into force, and you can see if you look at
| | 06:25 | the back here, we have driven in these v-nails
very evenly, and we have got a nice tight joint.
| | 06:33 | So now I have two legs or two pairs of legs
assembled in these little L shapes, and so
| | 06:38 | the final part of the
assembling is to glue those together.
| | 06:42 | So in this case I am going to apply glue to
both of the joints because as soon as I do
| | 06:49 | the third connection, the
fourth one will be pressed together.
| | 06:52 | I am going to take them into the guide.
| | 06:59 | Make sure they are firmly aligned, and once
again one, two, three, four nails, rotated
| | 07:10 | at 180 degrees, line it up,
squeeze it tightly together.
| | 07:16 | One, two, three, four nails, and at
this point the frame is nicely assembled.
| | 07:25 | The last thing I'll do is kind of look it
over and make sure that no glue was forced
| | 07:29 | out on to the service of the molding.
| | 07:32 | If that does happen, I have always got a
moist paper towel, and you can just clean up any
| | 07:36 | surface spills of the glue, but at this point
I'll let this glue dry, it usually takes about
| | 07:41 | one to two hours and then we are ready to go
ahead and install the glazing and mat package
| | 07:46 | and finish the assembly of the frame.
| | 07:51 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Putting the frame, glazing, mat, and art together| 00:00 | So once you have assembled your wood frame
using an underpinner, and you can see this
| | 00:05 | one was assembled the same way as that
molding we have just demonstrated with.
| | 00:08 | The next step is to put together
the component parts within the frame.
| | 00:13 | But before I do that I want to talk a
little bit about the aesthetics that were involved
| | 00:17 | in matching up this particular frame
with the photograph and matting package.
| | 00:24 | Decoratively this was going to be installed
on fairly neutral tile, so we wanted something
| | 00:29 | that wasn't too rich in color, but something
that could sustain a detailed visual inspection.
| | 00:35 | If you look at the molding, it's really
quite ornate, you have got on the sides here some
| | 00:39 | filigree work that matches in tone.
| | 00:43 | This center area here, there
is very delicate painting here.
| | 00:47 | There is weathering where it appears as the
paint has been weathered, giving this frame
| | 00:51 | kind of an instant appearance of age.
| | 00:54 | And one of the things I looked at in
matching it up with this photograph, the hues in the
| | 01:00 | lighter areas here, where the sun is striking
the rock are echoed in these areas of the frame.
| | 01:06 | The deeper red tones here start to come out in
some of these more weathered areas in the frame.
| | 01:12 | The other thing too, we even have a reference
to the green and some of the brush work around
| | 01:17 | this little detail painting.
| | 01:19 | So there are a lot colored tie-ins between
the work and the frame, and then to further
| | 01:23 | accentuate those relationships, I did a much
more complicated matting package than we used
| | 01:29 | from the student work from Quartz Mountain.
| | 01:32 | If you look at the side of this, you
can see that this is multiple layers.
| | 01:35 | We started with a stucco mat in kind of an
almond hue and then there's a spacer between
| | 01:41 | that stucco mat and a suede mat underneath
it, with a black core, and then yet another
| | 01:47 | spacer between that and the artwork.
| | 01:50 | What this does is it
serves to add depth to the work.
| | 01:53 | It makes the whole matting
package a little bit more substantial.
| | 01:57 | And I think visually it draws the
viewer's eye into the work very well.
| | 02:01 | Another way we added space, if you
look at our glazing package, we're working with clear
| | 02:06 | glass, but we have added a spacer on the side
of the glass, and this is just a black plastic
| | 02:12 | strip that has an adhesive back
you will fix directly to the glass.
| | 02:17 | Here is a couple of samples of that spacer,
you can see it comes in black and clear and
| | 02:23 | a couple of different depths, and there is
an adhesive backing here just you peel away
| | 02:28 | the paper, and what I do is I'll cut
it to size and then peel and stick.
| | 02:33 | And once again, you stick it to the glass.
You do not attach it to inside of the frame.
| | 02:39 | The other thing about using this as a spacer
it's really affordable. Retail cost on this
| | 02:44 | is less than a dollar a foot.
| | 02:46 | So from here it's time to
start assembling the package.
| | 02:49 | Once again, I'm going to glove
up as we do this next part.
| | 02:54 | One of the things too, when you start to
deal with a more decorative frames, as you put
| | 02:57 | them together, sometimes they sort of develop
a top and bottom where the frame looks better
| | 03:03 | one-way up than the other.
| | 03:04 | In this case it's really
pretty, even all the way around.
| | 03:08 | So we don't have that issue, but I'm looking
here, I see these two kind of darker weathered
| | 03:13 | areas here are a little
heavier than the ones up on the top.
| | 03:17 | So I'm going to choose to
make this bottom of my frame.
| | 03:19 | So I'm going to turn this
over with the bottom towards me.
| | 03:23 | I'm going to take my glazing package.
| | 03:26 | I'm going to go ahead and drop it in, and
then I'm going to get my air once again, and
| | 03:32 | I'm going to blow off any surface dust.
| | 03:38 | And particularly once you have those fixtures,
watch the corners, because things tend to
| | 03:42 | collect in the corners.
| | 03:47 | Blowing off the surface of the mat, and then
making sure I keep the bottom towards the bottom.
| | 03:54 | I'm going to put the package together and
then I'm going to turn it over and hold it
| | 03:59 | in place and inspect it, and I don't see
any visible dust or anything that's caught in
| | 04:06 | there, so we were clean so far.
| | 04:08 | A, at this point I can get rid of the gloves,
and we're going to hold this in place using
| | 04:15 | what's called a Framing Pointer.
This is the tool right here.
| | 04:19 | It's kind of a glorified staple gun that shoots what
are called framer's points sideways into the molding.
| | 04:26 | And the points come packaged in strips are
held together with adhesive, and as it drives
| | 04:34 | each individual point, it's separated from the
adhesive, and you can see the point looks like this.
| | 04:42 | It's got a little bit--you notice a bit
of the arrowhead there, and then it's got
| | 04:45 | a little gap and then it's thick again.
| | 04:47 | That little recessed area would go beyond
the arrowhead with insertion that helps it
| | 04:53 | hold, but the little gap towards the back,
if for whatever reason you ever need to remove
| | 04:57 | them, gives you something to hold on to,
while you remove the framer's point.
| | 05:02 | You can adjust the depth that they fire in
by changing the tension on the spring that
| | 05:08 | drives in with this screw right here.
| | 05:10 | The farther it's screwed in, the
farther it will penetrate into the molding.
| | 05:14 | When you're working with hardwood, such to
oak and maple, you would generally want to
| | 05:18 | screw that in a little bit farther.
| | 05:20 | This particular molding is done on a fairly
soft wood, so I don't think we're going to
| | 05:23 | have problems driving the points.
| | 05:25 | And then the point comes out right here,
and so what we'll do is we'll position it in a
| | 05:29 | corner, and I'll use to hold the front down
with my thumb, and use these little guides
| | 05:34 | on the back to make sure it's completely flat
and then you just squeeze and pull it straight
| | 05:39 | back, and you can see it's driven a point in.
| | 05:41 | And then I'll go to the opposite corner,
hold it, make sure it's flat, squeeze and pull
| | 05:47 | straight back, and you'd see
we have inserted another point.
| | 05:50 | And then I'll just go around and typically
on a work that's of this size, 11x14, I'll
| | 05:57 | put three points in on the sides, three points
on the top, and three points along the bottom.
| | 06:09 | Once we have got all the points in place,
once again, I like to stop and inspect a lot,
| | 06:15 | so I'll turn it back over, make sure nothing
crept in there while I was doing that work,
| | 06:20 | and it still looks clean.
| | 06:22 | The next step we want to do is apply a
backing paper to the back of the frame.
| | 06:26 | The purpose of the backing paper is
it will prevent dust from penetrating.
| | 06:31 | If you have a house open up the windows,
and it's a dusty day, wind could actually blow
| | 06:35 | dust around these edges of the mat
and in between the glass and the mat.
| | 06:41 | We don't want that to happen.
| | 06:43 | If you remember on the metal sectional frames,
we did not put backing paper on, reason being
| | 06:48 | with the metal sectionals, they are easy enough
to disassemble if you do get a little penetration
| | 06:53 | of dust like that, you can take it apart,
clean it, put it back together real quickly.
| | 06:57 | These wooden frames, as you can see, these
points are harder to remove, it's a more complicated
| | 07:01 | process to disassemble.
| | 07:03 | So hold the backing paper in place, I'm going
to use an ATG gun, what this does is it dispenses
| | 07:09 | essentially double stick tape, it's a very
tacky double stick tape, and you just place
| | 07:14 | this down, pull the trigger and
draw it across the edge of the frame.
| | 07:19 | And I'm keeping my double stick line about a
quarter of an inch in from the edge of the frame.
| | 07:25 | Then I'm going to turn the frame 90 degrees
just because it's easier to be accurate with
| | 07:30 | this if you draw it straight towards you.
| | 07:32 | It's the same thought process that we talked
about when you're handling knives and making the cuts.
| | 07:37 | That pulling motion straight towards yourself
is one of the most easily repeatable motions
| | 07:42 | that you can do accurately.
And I'm going to set the ATG gun aside.
| | 07:45 | I am going to get a roll of brown craft paper
and make sure I have got clearance here, and
| | 07:52 | I'm going to roll this paper tight and
make sure it's tight on the spool and then I'm
| | 07:57 | going to press it down on that first row of
the tape and then I'm going to pull it towards
| | 08:02 | myself under some tension, until it's all
the way across the back of the frame here,
| | 08:09 | and I'm going to go around the edges and
press down on them, to make sure I have got a good
| | 08:13 | tape seal, and I'm going to take the
utility knife and just make a cut to get the roll
| | 08:23 | free and set it aside.
| | 08:26 | And then I'm going to take this tool to
do the final cutting on the paper edge.
| | 08:30 | This tool holds the mat cutting blade.
| | 08:33 | You can change the blade by unscrewing and
screwing right here, and this serves as a
| | 08:38 | guide where I'll fold the paper edge over
so I have got a nice clean line there and
| | 08:43 | then press that guide against the side of
the frame, and with downward pressure just
| | 08:49 | pull it towards me, and you can see it
gives a nice clean cut, and you can see here we
| | 08:54 | were exposing about 3/16 of an inch of
the edge of the frame, that's why we wanted to
| | 09:00 | make sure that we put our tape down
about a quarter of an inch to the inside.
| | 09:04 | Ideally, if you do this right, you wouldn't
have any of that stick tape exposed once you
| | 09:10 | have made these series of cut.
| | 09:11 | If you notice too, I turned it and
got rid of the two long pieces first.
| | 09:16 | Then it's easier to get rid of the short
ones, because you can make a cleaner fold.
| | 09:20 | And once again just fold it over and the
pressure thing is interesting, because you're pushing
| | 09:27 | in to keep it flush with the side, at the
same time you're pressing downward to make
| | 09:32 | sure you get a clean cut through the paper.
| | 09:37 | One consideration with this too, a couple
of times with really hardwoods, with strong
| | 09:42 | grain patterns like oak, every once a while
the grain will grab your blade and kind of
| | 09:47 | push you out sideways.
| | 09:48 | So as I'm drawing through, I try to be aware
of where my hand is, and if it starts to pull
| | 09:53 | that way just lift it up, go back and start your
cut and concentrate more on the sideways pressure.
| | 09:59 | So once again here, we have got--I always
stop and double-check, it still looks good.
| | 10:04 | I'm reorienting myself to the top, so I know
where to put the D rings, which we're going
| | 10:09 | to attach to use with the wire.
| | 10:11 | So now I have got the top towards me, and
what I have here are a pair of D rings, these
| | 10:19 | are single hole D rings, you can see there
is a little hole there for the screw to go
| | 10:23 | in and then this part here is hinged so you can lift
it away in order to ease the insertion of the wire.
| | 10:31 | And then I have just got two wood screws here,
they are pan head wood screws that I'm going
| | 10:36 | to use to secure the D ring in place.
| | 10:40 | One thing you need to think about is
screw length and molding thickness.
| | 10:44 | If you have got a molding that's only a half
inch thick, and you use a three quarter inch screw,
| | 10:48 | you're going to have a really ugly screw
heads sticking out through the molding.
| | 10:51 | So I always double-check by holding my
screw to the side of the molding and making sure
| | 10:57 | it's not going to go too far,
and I think we are okay there.
| | 11:01 | As far as distance down, once again, about
25% of the distance and, in this case, what
| | 11:08 | I'm going to use to make sure they're
consistent, I'm just lining up on this little line in
| | 11:12 | the Keyless Chuck part of the drill, and
then I'm going to put the screw on to the drill
| | 11:19 | and then just drive it into place.
Repeat this over on the other side.
| | 11:23 | Once again, I'm using my powered screwdriver
here kind of as a measuring device, setting
| | 11:28 | that up in the same position, put the screw on
the tip, and then I want these angle slightly
| | 11:38 | up, so I'm going to loosen that a little bit,
and I'm just going to establish that slight
| | 11:42 | upward angle in both of them, okay.
| | 11:50 | Then from here I go back in, and I'll attach
the wire in the exact same way we did on the
| | 11:55 | metal back sectional, that same double
loop with five twists, and once the wire is in
| | 12:00 | place, you have a finished frame
that's ready for hanging on the wall.
| | 12:05 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Using a band clamp for assembly| 00:00 | When assembling very large frames, a
few other considerations come to mind.
| | 00:06 | One is the pressure plate of the Underpinner
is not going to work as effectively because
| | 00:10 | of the depth of the molding. You can see
the large gap I have here as compared to what
| | 00:16 | I have when I pull the frame into this
position. There is what I consider a proper gap.
| | 00:21 | So we need to use
something to fill in that space.
| | 00:25 | I have already pinned together the two L
sections as you saw on the previous movie, and what
| | 00:30 | we're going to do now is just
assemble the final two corners.
| | 00:33 | So to protect the frame, I'm going to slide
this piece of cloth in, and then I have just
| | 00:37 | got this plywood corner that I'm going to
use as a spacer, and I'll slide that in.
| | 00:42 | The other thing you may notice is I have
got this table that the molding is resting on.
| | 00:47 | In the smaller frame that we put together
earlier I was able to stand back and keep
| | 00:51 | it directly in front of me.
It was very easy to manage.
| | 00:54 | What happens when you get to these larger
frames is the weight of the legs is fighting
| | 00:58 | to pull apart the joint, and so you really
need to support it as you go from assembling
| | 01:03 | the two L-shape sections to
the final assembly of the frame.
| | 01:07 | So I made this table to exactly match the
height of my Underpinner, made a little cut
| | 01:12 | out, so there is room for me to stand in
the middle, and now I have already applied the
| | 01:15 | glue here, I'm going to carefully line up
these two corners, hold it tight and press
| | 01:22 | down, and you see how the pressure plate hits
the plywood quickly, and then I'm just going
| | 01:25 | to go through as I did before and put in a
series of V-nails wrapping up with direct
| | 01:33 | contact to the outer edge of the frame, and
you see we have got a nice clean joint there.
| | 01:38 | And then I'm going to carefully
rotate the frame to the opposite corner.
| | 01:43 | Once again, I have already applied my glue there.
| | 01:44 | But you notice how I kept the frame flat on
the table surface? That was in order to place
| | 01:50 | as little strain as possible on the joints
that already glued. Then we'll just repeat
| | 01:54 | what we just did, we'll put in the fabric to
protect it, put in a little plywood spacer.
| | 02:01 | You can see here, too, I have got a little
overspill with the glue. I'll clean that up in just
| | 02:06 | a little bit with a damp paper towel.
| | 02:10 | Once again, apply pressure for that first
nail and then slide your guide back, and I have
| | 02:18 | several of these spacers that I use with
different depths of frames that I just keep where my
| | 02:22 | underpinner is in the shop.
| | 02:24 | Okay, so now we have completed our joint there,
I'm going to get that glue cleaned up in just
| | 02:29 | a second, and then to get out of here I just
lift the frame and then the table is on wheels,
| | 02:35 | so I can step back, then I'm
going to set the frame down.
| | 02:38 | We're down with the Underpinner for now,
so I'm going to set it out of the way.
| | 02:41 | I want to show you one more tool, it's really
handy on a large frame like this, it's called
| | 02:48 | a Band Clamp, and you can see here is the
band. It has four special little braces that
| | 02:58 | go on the corners, and you can see this
crank here. This great big spool is always webbed
| | 03:04 | banding, and so what I'm going to do is pull out
enough of the band so that it will completely
| | 03:10 | surround the frame, I am going to set kind
of the handle unit there, and then I'm going
| | 03:18 | to make sure I have enough
slack to go all the way around.
| | 03:31 | Maybe just a little bit more.
| | 03:36 | And then these four corner pieces, I
am going to start just taking this one.
| | 03:42 | They slide, you can also pop them off, they
go along, you see you have got these two legs
| | 03:48 | and the band slides into those two legs like
that, and you want these two little pressure
| | 03:56 | points to line up the flat sides on the corner.
| | 04:01 | I have got the second corner, and you want
to do this on a table that will support these.
| | 04:08 | Once they are in tension, they'll stay in
position, but until you put tension on the Band Clamp,
| | 04:15 | they would just slide off.
| | 04:19 | So once again, I'm going to slide this back
a little bit so that, that one is supported,
| | 04:23 | and now I have got all four corners placed,
I'm going to use this crank and wind it tight
| | 04:29 | to take up some of the slack and the band,
and as it gets a little bit tighter, I'm going
| | 04:35 | to double check that all my corner clamps
have that flat side in and stayed in position.
| | 04:40 | Sometimes they'll shift as you're
applying the initial tension of the clamp.
| | 04:46 | So now I have all four corners where they
are supposed to be properly aligned, and you
| | 04:49 | can see here I'm already starting to
generate some tension in the band, so it's already
| | 04:55 | pretty tight, I have got as
much as I can with this crank.
| | 04:57 | Then I shift over to this one, and what this
does, if you watch that you can see how that's
| | 05:04 | moving, pulling it tighter and tighter, and
you can inspect the corners, and you can see
| | 05:10 | that the little joints
have been pulled very tight.
| | 05:13 | And what I'll do, I'll give this a couple
more turns, you can see how much more tension
| | 05:19 | is on that now. You have got to be careful.
This tool--you can put on enough pressure to
| | 05:25 | actually dent softwood frames, so you have
got a kind of find the fine line, and I usually
| | 05:30 | find it by inspecting the corner
to make sure I have got a good seal.
| | 05:34 | And now that the clamp is on here, I'll
leave it until the glue is completely set, which
| | 05:38 | usually takes about 2 hours.
| | 05:40 | I suggest the Band Clamp on any molding with
this kind of depth. I use them almost always
| | 05:45 | on Shadow Box Moldings.
| | 05:47 | Sometimes they are handy even on small
frames. If you have had a little bit of warpage
| | 05:51 | due to humidity or other things, they can help
pull the frame more tightly together. And remember,
| | 05:56 | the glue is as important as the V-nail in
providing the strength in the corner joint.
| | 06:01 | On a frame of this scale, the glass starts
to get pretty heavy, so you really want to
| | 06:06 | make sure the frame is secure at the corners.
| | 06:11 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Reviewing alternative hanging devices| 00:00 | So on the demonstrations we done so far, we
either had an Easel back frame which needed
| | 00:05 | no hanging and hardware, or I have shown
you how to use wired hardware on both metal
| | 00:10 | frame and the wood frame.
| | 00:12 | What I'd like to show you now are a couple
of alternative methods for hanging the work.
| | 00:18 | These generally are good for high-traffic
areas where the work might be bumped or extremely
| | 00:23 | heavy pieces, and in the case of the security
hardware, they can help with theft deterrent as well.
| | 00:29 | For a double D ring mounting method which
is used a lot in museums because it's so
| | 00:33 | stable, first thing I'll do is take these
D rings, you can see they're similar to the
| | 00:38 | ones we used in our previous movie,
but they have two holes rather than one.
| | 00:43 | This makes a little bit stronger, and you
can get these in heavier duty depending on
| | 00:47 | the scale of the work you're hanging.
| | 00:49 | I'm going to measure down from the top of
the piece exactly 3 inches, and I'm going
| | 00:55 | to make a crosswise pencil mark, and I'm
going to do it on the other side as well.
| | 00:59 | Once again, that's coming down 3
inches and a crosswise pencil mark.
| | 01:04 | Then I'm going to measure across, and I'm
going to burn an inch just to make it easier
| | 01:09 | for me to hold this in place, and I'm going
to try to come up with a nice whole number.
| | 01:14 | In this case, 14 inches looks like it.
So I'm going to make a vertical mark there.
| | 01:21 | So what I'll do then once I have established,
these are going to be 3 inches down and
| | 01:25 | 14 inches on center, I'll actually
write on the paper on the back.
| | 01:30 | 14 inch with an arrow that's
horizontal and 3 with an arrow that's vertical.
| | 01:36 | That way if someone's in the know they
will look at this and will go, okay, I need to
| | 01:40 | come down 3 inches from the top of where I
want the frame and hang it on 14-inch centers.
| | 01:45 | So then I'll take the D ring, and I'll
carefully align it where that crosshatch is coming right
| | 01:52 | in the point of the D ring.
| | 01:53 | That's where we will rest
on the screw or the hook.
| | 01:57 | So once again the crosshatch is aligned
precisely in the point of the D ring, and then I'll take
| | 02:04 | wood screws and carefully line
it up and drive the screws home.
| | 02:14 | Once again, it's a fairly softwood frame,
so I don't need to do any pre-drilling.
| | 02:22 | I'm just going to double check
alignment, put both the screws in.
| | 02:33 | Then to mount this at this point what I'd
do is I'd measure the height on the wall that
| | 02:38 | I want the top of the print to be,
| | 02:40 | I'd measure it down from that 3 inches, and
I'd make a mark where I wanted the print to
| | 02:44 | be centered, and then I'd use my laser level
and shine it across that line and 7 inches
| | 02:50 | on each side of that center mark I'd make my
cross-hatch, and then I'd put screws on anchors
| | 02:56 | and each one of those points, and then I
just bring this up to those two screws who are
| | 03:02 | coming out of the wall, and the D rings
hang directly on the screws.
| | 03:06 | It's a very stable mounting system where
you'll get very little movement of the art.
| | 03:11 | So once again, that's double D rings.
| | 03:14 | Another method that you can
use is using security hardware.
| | 03:18 | The security hardware is really pretty simple.
| | 03:19 | It consists of two brackets that have a little
L-shape hook at the top and then a flat section
| | 03:27 | with a rectangular opening that allows you to
adjust them upwards or downwards for perfect positioning.
| | 03:33 | They're held on the wall by putting a screw through
this slot into a screw anchor that's set in drywall.
| | 03:39 | If you happen to work on a wood
surface, you don't need to use the anchors.
| | 03:43 | The way these work is you take these two
brackets and mount them side by side on the wall and
| | 03:51 | then the top of this metal
frame actually interlocks with them.
| | 03:56 | So the weight of the frame
will be hanging on these.
| | 03:58 | You're looking at the wall-side view here.
| | 04:01 | Then once those are in position, you have
another hole that's directly on center of the channel
| | 04:08 | where you in split the corner brackets
when you assemble the frame, and this T-shaped
| | 04:14 | screw was at the top as T-shape
that's got a little flat area here.
| | 04:20 | You screw this into yet another screw anchor,
and when you bring the work down so you put
| | 04:25 | on the brackets on the top.
| | 04:28 | As you fold the work flat on the wall, you have
this T set up parallel to the base of the frame.
| | 04:34 | So when that groove used to set the corner
braces hits that, this T will slide inside
| | 04:40 | it and then you use this tool to reach
around and grab the flat side, and you turn it 90
| | 04:47 | degrees, and when you make that 90 degree
turn it locks the bottom of the frame in place
| | 04:52 | so it can't be moved.
| | 04:53 | So this is a very secure
way to mount work on the wall.
| | 04:56 | If somebody was determined they could still
rip it out of the wall, but they have to take
| | 04:59 | out the screw anchors.
| | 05:01 | So it's a pretty theft deterrent, but it
also prevents the art from moving around if it
| | 05:05 | just happens to get bumped.
| | 05:07 | So here are two nice secure
ways to mount your work on the wall.
| | 05:12 |
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|
|
5. Hanging a ShowPrepping the show| 00:00 | So for two weeks in June in southwestern
Oklahoma, 18 gifted young Oklahoma photographers spent
| | 00:08 | two weeks of instruction in the darkroom,
in a wonderful digital lab, and out in the
| | 00:14 | field creating images and learning new ways
to present those images in preparation for
| | 00:19 | an exhibition of their work.
| | 00:22 | Ben Long, Susan K. Grant, and I worked
together to teach the students techniques particularly
| | 00:27 | some alternative media things that Susan
is very familiar with doing transfers.
| | 00:33 | Ben wrangled the digital end of the program,
working towards prints in two different sizes,
| | 00:39 | and then I worked with the students in the
darkroom doing traditional gelatin silver prints.
| | 00:43 | Our goal was to come up with a coherent
exhibition that we could mount at the end of two weeks
| | 00:49 | showing the progress these students had
made during the course of the instruction.
| | 00:53 | As we worked toward the exhibition, the
challenge became how to select four pieces from each
| | 00:59 | student and create a show that
would function as an integrated whole.
| | 01:04 | We accomplished some of this by limiting
the sizes that the students printed to.
| | 01:09 | We wanted to establish a rhythm between
large and small works with larger works printed
| | 01:14 | on 13x19 paper and the small works printed or
8.5x11 paper or transferred on the alternate
| | 01:21 | media in that same size range.
| | 01:24 | So once the students had completed a body of
work, we sat down with them and essentially
| | 01:28 | went through an adjudication process to
determine which we felt were the strongest of the four works
| | 01:34 | out of what they created it in
the course of their two weeks there.
| | 01:38 | We then went about preparing them for the
exhibition in an attempt to unify that preparation,
| | 01:44 | we went with the same white
matboard on every piece we matted.
| | 01:48 | And we used essentially the same techniques
just add mat and backing board. There were
| | 01:52 | no frames, nothing was under glass.
| | 01:55 | One of the last things we talked about
once the work was all in the mats is we taught
| | 01:58 | the students kind of the standard
practices for labeling and signing their work.
| | 02:03 | Basically you sign it on the mat on the lower
right with a pencil, and you'll try to align
| | 02:09 | the end of your signature with the cut edge
of the window on the mat and then new title
| | 02:14 | it exactly on the opposite side
starting at the cut edge of the mat.
| | 02:18 | So next we went on to take these 72 works and figure
out how to organize them into a coherent whole.
| | 02:24 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Using a wall as a canvas| 00:00 | All righty, welcome to your Gallery Space.
| | 00:02 | I know it doesn't look like much yet, but
I see what you have created over the past
| | 00:07 | couple of weeks, and I think
it's some astonishingly good work.
| | 00:10 | (Konrad Eek narrating: So after all the student
work had been matted, the next step is to
| | 00:14 | take the work from the pavilion we worked
in relative obscurity and the exhibit hall
| | 00:20 | where it was going to hang. Once there, we
spread it out on the floor, and the students
| | 00:25 | for the first time saw all their work
collected together in a public space and realized the
| | 00:31 | enormity of what they had accomplished in
the two weeks leading up to the exhibition.)
| | 00:35 | If you look at it everything,
right now we have got 72 works of art, and
| | 00:42 | what do you think when you see them right now?
What comes to mind?
| | 00:45 | Student: Disjointed.
Konrad: Disjointed, messy, stretched.
| | 00:50 | Looking at something of this scale one of
the first and easiest ways to start to build
| | 00:56 | some kind of rhythm in the exhibition is to
look at scale as kind of--you look at the
| | 01:02 | larger prints we have got, think of those
as maybe being the big bass notes in a melody
| | 01:07 | that you're starting to develop, okay.
| | 01:09 | And so, let's get all the little
ones out of here for right now.
| | 01:13 | (Konrad narrating: The other thing that they
came to realize for the first time was we
| | 01:16 | had 2 & 1/2 hours to take all these
disparate pieces of work and put them into a coherent
| | 01:22 | whole and to get them mounted on the wall.
| | 01:26 | Our next step was to look at the wall
where things we're going to hang and look at
| | 01:31 | 72 pieces we had and try to figure out some way
to approach the wall as a canvas and use those
| | 01:37 | 72 individual works of art as parts of a
puzzle to make a coherent whole upon the wall.)
| | 01:44 | Okay, as far as scale and anchoring,
what I'd suggest, let's look at the two ends
| | 01:50 | and think of combining on the
ends so they'll have more weight.
| | 01:53 | Okay, these ends are where it is
going to hold this whole thing together.
| | 01:57 | So think just look at the graphic nature.
At this end we want to be eye-catching and
| | 02:02 | point this way, that end the only real concern
is it has to point back this way, so suggestions?
| | 02:09 | I think the old man should be on that end because
he points that way, and he's really eye-catching.
| | 02:15 | I think this one should be on that end because
it's a really nice movement to take you back that way.
| | 02:20 | (Konrad narrating: This is something similar
to what you may do at homework where if you are
| | 02:23 | putting a few pieces on the wall and want
to arrange them artfully, you first think
| | 02:28 | about which are the most important pieces.
What piece is the centerpiece? Or if there's
| | 02:32 | two pieces that you wan to feature, how do you
use the other works to make those stand out more?
| | 02:38 | And what we did after we got past the gross
geometry, we started to talk about content,
| | 02:43 | we started to talk about balancing color
with black and white, how color can draw so much
| | 02:48 | attention, and if you concentrate too much
color in one area and have large areas of
| | 02:53 | black and white, viewers
interest will be a little confused.
| | 02:57 | In the center spaces we were mostly looking
at trying to avoid focal point, where we didn't
| | 03:02 | want to set up something where there were
one or two really, really intense or really
| | 03:06 | strong visual images that would sort of
trap the viewer. Typically, really high contrast
| | 03:11 | will draw someone's eye or
very, very bright colors.
| | 03:15 | So those high contrast and brightly colored
pieces we tried to scatter evenly throughout
| | 03:20 | the lengthy exhibit to help keep drawing
the viewer through it both horizontally and through
| | 03:25 | it moving up and down as well.)
| | 03:27 | Yeah, I think we are good on
where we are with large, let's go ahead and
| | 03:31 | introduce some small. And now here I really
what to start looking at--so we have got
| | 03:37 | them separated by vertical and horizontal,
let's lay them out over here, and I want them
| | 03:43 | sorted vertical and horizontal
and black and white and color, okay.
| | 03:47 | (Konrad narrating: Once we'd established the
pattern with the large ones that we liked,
| | 03:51 | then we went back through, and because of
time constraints, remember, we had about
| | 03:55 | 2 & 1/2 hours from start to finish.
| | 03:57 | Then I went back and took the smaller
prints and placed them strictly based on vertical
| | 04:03 | or horizontal orientation.
| | 04:04 | I paid no attention at all to the content.
I just tried to fill out the framework we'd
| | 04:10 | established with the large prints by placing
the small ones in nice orientation so that
| | 04:15 | rhythm that we'd started was completed with kind
of counter-rhythms and little other bits of motion.
| | 04:21 | just by the gross shapes of the images.)
| | 04:24 | Typically, what I work with
in something like this, I try to think on
| | 04:28 | gaps between the work, working with 2 inches
is kind of our--what we hope for as a standard
| | 04:33 | and then if that doesn't fit due to the
shape of different works, we will stretch that,
| | 04:38 | but always looking for some
kind of a quality and balance.
| | 04:41 | (Konrad narrating: We then divided the
rectangle that we'd established into four sections,
| | 04:45 | broke the students into four groups, and
told them to take the tools that we have given
| | 04:50 | them in laying out the large ones and reposition
the small ones, never changing orientation
| | 04:56 | but feeling free to alter
their position based on content.
| | 05:00 | We also told the students that feel free to
negotiate with members of the other groups
| | 05:06 | for pieces that were located
in other sections on the wall.)
| | 05:08 | Can you switch one up?
Yeah, that one with the color one.
| | 05:12 | (Konrad narrating: One other thing, too, that I think
is a trap that a lot of people fall into when
| | 05:15 | they're having their work is being bound to
symmetry. We see so many symmetrical things
| | 05:21 | as we go through our lives that it's
sometimes hard to break out of that box.
| | 05:25 | And I find ofttimes that asymmetrical works
much better, typically in most of the groupings
| | 05:31 | of art I have in my home. If I have got a
large wall space, I will typically try to work
| | 05:36 | with an odd number of pieces with different
sizes in order to create an asymmetric arrangement.
| | 05:43 | And the trick becomes how to find some sort
of balance in an asymmetrical arrangement.
| | 05:48 | And this is where before you hang anything,
if you have a place where you can lay it out
| | 05:52 | on the floor and just shift them around
and look at them in different combinations.
| | 05:56 | I think it's a great idea.
| | 05:58 | Sometimes when I'm looking at a hanging space,
if I have the time, it's wonderful to put
| | 06:02 | things in a position and look at it for a
day or two even before you make a decision
| | 06:06 | on whether or not that's
really the way you want to hang it.
| | 06:09 | The other thing that's nice to know, too, is
most hanging methods are reversible, and so
| | 06:15 | if after a week or month you realize, well,
I really got that wrong, it's not that hard
| | 06:20 | to go back and undo it.)
There we go!
| | 06:29 | (Konrad narrating: So now we finally had all the work
arranged in a rectangle on the floor, and our next step
| | 06:34 | was to start to look at the rectangle
mathematically and analyze how we're going to translate
| | 06:40 | what was lying on the floor to a precisely-
ordered exhibition that was affixed to the wall.)
| | 06:45 |
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| Hanging the show| 00:00 | The final part of the preparation of the
exhibition was translating the grid that we had laid
| | 00:05 | out onto the floor to a mathematically
precise hanging rectangle on the wall that we had
| | 00:12 | to use as our canvas.
| | 00:13 | So, the first thing I did was I went down
the grid we laid out and just took a piece
| | 00:19 | of paper and made note of the top width of
every matted piece as I walked down the line.
| | 00:26 | Then I counted the number of spaces in that
row, added to that an extra 2 inches thinking
| | 00:32 | I really wanted a tightly spaced grid
in order to make it hold together well.
| | 00:38 | And then I took that total number of inches,
divided it by 2, found the center of the wall
| | 00:45 | and working from the center to the left side,
made my starting mark for horizontal positioning.
| | 00:52 | I then measured up from the floor and made
by starting mark for vertical positioning.
| | 00:57 | So I essentially established the top-left
corner of the exhibition as a starting place
| | 01:03 | for the hanging of the work.
| | 01:05 | Once we had accomplished this, I went over
the adhesive we were going to use, which is
| | 01:09 | a padded Permanent Double Stick Adhesive--
| | 01:12 | Permanent and adhesives is a relative term--
and I knew from experimentation that this
| | 01:17 | provided a strong enough bond to
support the weight of the work.
| | 01:21 | Particularly some of the work on alternative
media that had quite a bit of weight to them,
| | 01:25 | but I knew we could stick it to the vinyl,
it would adhere well, but it was also possible
| | 01:30 | to remove it without damaging the vinyl.
| | 01:33 | It comes in rolls with a backing tape on one
side, and I had the students tear it in the
| | 01:38 | specific length and on the smaller pieces just put
one piece, stretched horizontally at each corner.
| | 01:45 | On the larger pieces, I had them--the students--
put one piece at each corner as well as another
| | 01:49 | piece in the top-center to help support
the additional weight of the bigger pieces.
| | 01:54 | So, once we had established our starting
point both horizontally and vertically, I got up
| | 01:59 | on the ladder and used a laser level.
| | 02:02 | Because of the nature of this wall, it's a
very tall wall, there was no active measure
| | 02:06 | to the ceiling and the floor is uneven,
so I couldn't use it as a reference point.
| | 02:11 | So, the laser was really a key in
allowing me to lay this out precisely.
| | 02:16 | One of the things that I have gained over
all the years of doing this is an ability
| | 02:19 | to very precisely place things by my eye.
| | 02:23 | I can generally get within a 16th of an
inch of accuracy just by eyeballing things.
| | 02:28 | So as you'll see, as I go down here, I use
a measuring device sometimes to establish
| | 02:34 | distances, especially in the placement of
the larger images, but a lot of the smaller
| | 02:38 | ones, you'll see me put in
position without measuring at all.
| | 02:42 | So finally, we worked our way down the wall,
the last few pieces were hung, and the students
| | 02:47 | were able to stand back and for the first
time see this assemblage of work in a coherent
| | 02:52 | whole, elevated to a great level by all their
hard work and our attention to detail, and
| | 02:59 | presented in a manner and in a scale that I don't
think any of them had really experienced before.
| | 03:06 | I know visitors and parents alike are always stunned
by the professional quality of the photography exhibition.
| | 03:12 | I think the matting helps that in some ways,
but really, my goal with the matting and the
| | 03:17 | hanging of the show is to really direct the
viewers' attention, the quality of the work
| | 03:22 | that these astonishing students have
created in the two short weeks we have with them.
| | 03:28 | One of the other real joys as an instructor
is it's often this point in time that we get
| | 03:32 | to meet the parents of the
students for the first time.
| | 03:35 | And it's something we're always grateful for,
an opportunity to talk about the promise
| | 03:40 | and the challenges of a life in the arts, and
also about the individual gifts and abilities
| | 03:45 | of the students that they have so
graciously put into our care for the two weeks.
| | 03:50 | The responses I have had from parents over
the years have been truly astonishing, and
| | 03:54 | it's also been really delightful to see the
success that several of our graduates have
| | 03:59 | gone on to achieve particularly in photography.
| | 04:02 | I have several former students that are
working successful professionals in the field.
| | 04:07 |
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|
|
6. Hanging Work at HomeIntroduction to hanging tools| 00:01 | In discussing the hanging of photographs,
everything we have done so far has been in
| | 00:05 | reference to a gallery setting.
| | 00:07 | I think the bulk of the hanging work you do
will probably be in a residential situation.
| | 00:11 | So, what I want to talk about now are the
tools you'll need and the techniques you'll
| | 00:16 | use to hang your work at home.
| | 00:17 | We're going to start off
with a discussion of the tools.
| | 00:21 | First is a drill. I prefer a cordless drill.
| | 00:25 | There are a lot of different brands out
there, most of them are really pretty good.
| | 00:30 | And then I went and purchased--in addition
to the cordless drill which has a keyless
| | 00:34 | chuck, so you can just
unscrew and release your bits--
| | 00:37 | I also purchased a Speed Release Chuck which
allows you to just pull and release, so it's
| | 00:43 | really easy to swap out bits from your screwdriver
bit to your drilling bit if you need to drill holes.
| | 00:51 | Once again, I got a good selection and
assortment of drill bits in different sizes.
| | 00:56 | Different anchors we'll use will
require different size drill bits.
| | 00:59 | So a good assortment like
this is a worthwhile investment.
| | 01:04 | In addition to a regular drill, if you're
going to deal with stone or brick, you'll
| | 01:09 | need a specialized drill called a Hammer Drill.
This is a hammer drill here.
| | 01:14 | You can see it's quite a bit heavier in weight,
and it will function as a regular drill, but
| | 01:18 | you can see here you have a Drill Setting and
a Hammer Setting as well as two Speed Settings.
| | 01:24 | I'm going to show you this in action, but
what happens when you put it in Hammer setting
| | 01:28 | is the bit rotates, but it also goes in and
out with the hammering motion, which is key
| | 01:32 | for drilling in masonry.
| | 01:37 | You'll also need a tape
measure and one that locks.
| | 01:40 | Notice this one, when you pull out the
measuring blade, it locks in place, and you need to
| | 01:46 | press this button to
release it and then wind back up.
| | 01:49 | The locking feature is really handy.
| | 01:52 | I would also recommend, too, the longer the
length of the tape measure--and this is a
| | 01:57 | 25 footer which is plenty for most
residential applications--but what happens as you get
| | 02:02 | longer ones as the blade gets wider too.
| | 02:04 | So, you can extend at a greater distance without it
bending and making it a little bit more difficult to use.
| | 02:10 | So a good tape measure is key.
| | 02:14 | You'll need a hammer, and I
recommend this is a 16-ounce hammer.
| | 02:18 | Hammers come in multiple weights.
| | 02:20 | If you haven't used one much, you might want
to get a smaller one, maybe a 13 ounce head.
| | 02:25 | I would avoid going much beyond 16.
| | 02:27 | The reason being if you're not real
familiar with them, you can lose control of it, and
| | 02:32 | do collateral damage when
you're trying to drive a nail.
| | 02:35 | So, if it's a little lighter
weight hammer, it's easier to operate.
| | 02:40 | A pair of pliers is good.
| | 02:44 | What you'll need the
pliers for is to undo mistakes.
| | 02:46 | Most of these fasteners that we're going to
use most of these hanging devices can be removed
| | 02:50 | with a pair of pliers.
| | 02:52 | So if it's in the wrong place, or you decide
to change your decor, this is the tool you'll
| | 02:56 | want for removing the bulk of these hangers.
| | 03:00 | If you're going to do quite a bit of work,
it's really worth investing in a laser level.
| | 03:05 | The cost on these would come down quite a
bit, and I'm going to talk more about the
| | 03:08 | laser level in a little.
| | 03:12 | Other little accessories, these little
rubber bump-ons, you may add on the bottom corners
| | 03:16 | of the work, and they function real
well to keep the work from shifting.
| | 03:21 | They aren't adhesive, but they kind of tend
to stick a little bit to the wall surface,
| | 03:25 | so they will keep the work
from shifting once it's been hung.
| | 03:28 | The last tool I want to mention is in addition to the
laser level, it's good to have a small bubble level.
| | 03:34 | This will help you determine if the
picture is hanging straight on the wall.
| | 03:38 | So, those are the basic tools we're going to
use in all the different surfaces we mount on.
| | 03:43 | Now I really want to talk about the
fasteners that we'll use to put things on the wall.
| | 03:48 | Some smaller pieces may come with this type of
sawtooth hanger mounted directly on the back.
| | 03:55 | Typically, this will be on pieces that are
at most 11x14 inches, and they're mounted
| | 04:00 | kind of on the top edge of the frame.
| | 04:02 | And what happens is that little sawtooth just
is designed to rest on a nail, and for these
| | 04:08 | sawtooth hangers, I like
to use these nail fixtures.
| | 04:11 | They have a little brass plate, and you
put the nail in at an angle and drive it till
| | 04:16 | the plate is flushed with the wall.
| | 04:18 | And all it leaves is that little rod
sticking up, and with this type of sawtooth hanger,
| | 04:23 | if you use these, the frame will
completely obscure the hanging device.
| | 04:27 | With the other type of hangers we're going
to use, they would not disappear behind the
| | 04:32 | framed work, which is what we want.
| | 04:34 | Ideally, you don't want to see any of the
hanging mechanism, you just want to see the
| | 04:37 | framed piece on the wall.
You have all probably seen this type of hanger.
| | 04:43 | Once again, one of the themes that you'll
see through all of these is they are designed
| | 04:47 | to bring the nail in at an angle.
| | 04:49 | So if this is flushed with the wall, the nail
comes in at an angle, the picture hangs here,
| | 04:54 | and because the nail is at an angle, it helps
secure it against the wall and downward pressure
| | 04:59 | does not pull the nail out.
| | 05:01 | If you drill the nail in straight, the
downward pressure would tend to create torsion which
| | 05:05 | would draw the nail out of the wall.
| | 05:07 | So, with this type of hanger, the
nail at an angle, that won't happen.
| | 05:11 | The step up from this quality-wise is this
type of hanger, and they use a tool steel
| | 05:19 | nail which is harder and slightly
smaller than the nail that's used in this one.
| | 05:24 | If you look at these two nails side by side,
you'll see that the tool steel nail is a little
| | 05:30 | bit thinner, and it's also a little bit shorter.
| | 05:33 | And I find this to be great particularly if
you're working on wallpaper, if you remove
| | 05:38 | it, it's such a tiny hole.
| | 05:39 | A lot of times you can just burnish
the wallpaper to cover up your mistake.
| | 05:43 | You can see here that you can buy these in an
assortment pack that has a variety of different sizes.
| | 05:50 | You always need to pay attention to the
packaging because it will tell you what weight of artwork
| | 05:56 | that the particular hook is rated for.
And I err on the side of prudence in this.
| | 06:00 | If I have got a piece of art that weighs 5 pounds,
I'll always put it on a 10-pound hanger.
| | 06:06 | You're always better off if you use a little
bit more heavily-rated hanger than what the
| | 06:10 | work actually requires.
| | 06:12 | Another specialized thing that these particular
hangers do is they make security hangers like this.
| | 06:18 | You can see it takes three nails, and this
one is actually rated to hold up to 75 pounds.
| | 06:23 | But it also has this little
sprung brass clip right here.
| | 06:29 | And what that does is when you put the wire
over this, it goes behind this clip, and then
| | 06:33 | the clip holds the wire in place.
| | 06:35 | So, even if the work is bumped,
the wire will not come loose.
| | 06:40 | And the way you release it is you just reach
behind it, press that in, and lift the wire off.
| | 06:44 | But if you have got things in high traffic areas,
a hanger like this would be worthy investment.
| | 06:49 | Another hanger that I like a lot are these,
they are called Wall-Dogs, and they work on
| | 06:56 | drywall--but more than drywall,
they work on plaster and lath.
| | 06:59 | And those of you who live in older homes
have learned the hard way probably that if you
| | 07:04 | try to drive a nail into a plaster and lath
wall, you usually end up with a great big hole.
| | 07:09 | And these are self-tapping screws that
have a little hook attached, and we're going to
| | 07:12 | demonstrate these so you'll see exactly how
well they work on a plaster and lath wall.
| | 07:18 | Another thing we'll talk about as we go
through this chapter is lighting for the home.
| | 07:23 | And one of the things about photographs, the
better the photographs are lit, the more detail
| | 07:28 | you'll see in them and the more important
they can become as accent pieces in your home.
| | 07:33 | So here we have kind of talked about all
the tools that we're going to use, emitted our
| | 07:37 | glass cleaner probably in handling these
things as you put them up on the wall, you have a
| | 07:41 | little touch-up cleaning to do.
| | 07:43 | And I'm going to talk to you about specific
techniques for that, because once a work is
| | 07:46 | framed, you want to clean
it a little bit differently.
| | 07:49 | So from here, we're going to go on to
discuss the laser level and its applications, and
| | 07:54 | I have to tell you this tool
has changed the way I do things.
| | 07:58 | I think if you invest in one of
these, you'll be really happy with it.
| | 08:03 |
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| Using lasers for precision| 00:00 | Our challenge here is to mount a photograph
in this space that will exactly mirror the
| | 00:07 | photograph we have
already hung on the other side.
| | 00:10 | It's made more difficult by the fact that
in this old house the floor and the ceilings
| | 00:14 | aren't always level, and the art needs to be.
| | 00:17 | So I don't have a reference point to work from.
| | 00:20 | That brings us to one of our
most helpful tools, the laser level.
| | 00:24 | You have seen me use this tool before, most particularly
as we were hanging the exhibition at Quartz Mountain.
| | 00:30 | It was what enabled me to go down my whole
length of that wall covering about 30 feet
| | 00:35 | with the exhibit, and have everything exactly
even along both the top and the bottom rows.
| | 00:42 | I wanted to take a minute to tell you a
little bit more about exactly what this tool does
| | 00:46 | and how much of a help it can be for you.
| | 00:48 | This particular one has two functions, it
works as a stud finder and a laser level.
| | 00:54 | The stud finding feature may be handy if
you're ever hanging something extremely heavy.
| | 00:58 | You make a selection as to whether you're
working for wood or metal studs, and then
| | 01:03 | you hold it against the wall and press this
button on the right, and you'll get a test
| | 01:09 | tone while it sort of establishes what's there, and
then you just slide it until you come across a stud.
| | 01:16 | And it gives you that big bright indicator,
and a beep to let you know you found a stud.
| | 01:20 | That function could be
handy if you need to find studs.
| | 01:23 | The one I use this the most for is
actually finding a level line along the wall.
| | 01:29 | And the way that works, place it against
the wall and flip the switch, and you can see
| | 01:35 | this laser projects down the wall.
| | 01:37 | It swings a little bit when you first turn
it on because the laser is very precisely
| | 01:41 | weighted on gimbals, so it
will find a precise level.
| | 01:46 | You can see when you move it,
it starts shaking again.
| | 01:49 | But once again, once it
settles, it becomes level.
| | 01:52 | The kit also comes with this tool steel pin.
| | 01:57 | And the tool steel pin can be used to affix
the level in place while you're making marks.
| | 02:03 | This allows you to find a position for the laser
level, and then free your hands to do other tasks.
| | 02:08 | So, what I want to do is slide this level
up, and you can see the laser beam projects
| | 02:16 | behind the break front, and so I can see
the laser actually striking the picture frame
| | 02:21 | on the other side of the break front.
| | 02:23 | So I'm just going to raise this level until it
precisely lines up with the very top of that frame.
| | 02:30 | And then, I'm going to insert my pin to
this hole in the center, and then I can release
| | 02:36 | the level, and I will get my pencil
and use the pencil to make the mark
| | 02:44 | that will be my starting point for the
vertical positioning of the photograph.
| | 02:49 | Once I have made my mark, I can turn the
level off, pull the pin, and bring it back down.
| | 02:59 | These are available with lots of different
bells and whistles, but the level part is
| | 03:03 | really all you need, and you should be able to
find one at a hardware store in the $50 price range.
| | 03:09 | The amount of time it can save you
when you're hanging work is priceless.
| | 03:13 | So, I strongly recommend adding this
to your toolkit for hanging your work.
| | 03:18 |
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| Hanging on plaster and lath| 00:00 | Okay, so what I like to demonstrate for you now
is the technique you'd use if you're going
| | 00:05 | to hang a photograph on a
wall that was plaster and lath.
| | 00:09 | You probably won't run
into this in new construction.
| | 00:12 | The technique went out a long time ago.
| | 00:14 | For those of you who have plaster and lath
walls, you've probably had the joyous experience
| | 00:19 | of trying to drive a nail into the wall
and finding a cone shaped chunk flying out in
| | 00:24 | between the spaces of the walls leaving
a huge nearly impossible to fill hole.
| | 00:29 | That's not a good thing.
So we're going to show you a way to avoid that.
| | 00:32 | Before we move onto that, though, I want to talk a
little bit about the aesthetic we consider
| | 00:38 | in choosing the frame and matting
that we use for these two pieces.
| | 00:42 | You can see we have already hung the
one, and this is its companion piece.
| | 00:46 | They're in matched frames in mats.
| | 00:50 | Our goal here was to put into pieces that
would really accentuate this break front.
| | 00:54 | It's a lovely antique piece that's been in
the family for four generations, and we really
| | 00:59 | wanted to highlight it here in the dining room.
| | 01:03 | So what we did is we picked a molding
that reflected the era when this was made.
| | 01:07 | It's more Victorian style.
| | 01:09 | You can see the warm wood tones are kind of
echoed, and this decorative motif fits well
| | 01:15 | with the piece we're trying to highlight.
| | 01:18 | Then we also selected two photographs
that we felt visually played to the center.
| | 01:23 | If you look here you see the strong diagonal
line leads inward and the photo on the other
| | 01:28 | side has another diagonal line leading inwards.
| | 01:32 | Both those diagonal lines are sort of pointing
towards the antique piece we're trying to highlight.
| | 01:38 | The other thing we did, too, was we wanted to
sort of minimize the attention on the mats.
| | 01:43 | So we tried to match the mat color is
exactly as we could to the wall color.
| | 01:48 | Then you get the wonderful
image in kind of these soft warm tones,
| | 01:52 | once again, that sort of echo the tones of
the wood the central antique piece that seems
| | 01:57 | almost float within the frame.
| | 02:00 | So we have got a little
ornate and then really simple.
| | 02:04 | And I think it's a
combination that works well for us.
| | 02:08 | We have made a mark to establish the
vertical position of the work using our laser level,
| | 02:14 | and now we're going to go from
that mark to position the work.
| | 02:19 | So we now where the top of the piece is
going to be, but if you will think about it, that
| | 02:22 | mark we made where the top of the frame
is does not match where the hook belongs.
| | 02:27 | You can see the wire is obviously
well below the top of the frame.
| | 02:32 | So the first thing we need to do is measure
the drop we're dealing with from the top of
| | 02:36 | the frame to where the wire is.
| | 02:38 | So I'll take a wire at the approximate
center and pull it up tightly with my finger and
| | 02:44 | measure the distance from there to the
top of the frame, and it's 4 & 1/8 inch.
| | 02:50 | So the hook part our wall mount needs to be
positioned for 4 & 1/8 inch below the pencil
| | 02:57 | mark we made based on the line the laser level
threw from the top of the opposite frame.
| | 03:04 | So that's the first to
dimension we have in mind.
| | 03:06 | We're going to come down from
this mark we made 4 & 1/8 inch.
| | 03:10 | That's our vertical dimension.
| | 03:11 | We also need a horizontal position in order to
accurately mimic what we did on the other side.
| | 03:17 | You notice how centered
that appears in that space?
| | 03:22 | It appears centered because it's not.
| | 03:26 | Your eyes play some tricks on you and
visual things happen, and one of the things there
| | 03:30 | because there's a large piece hanging on
that wall, that tends to push outwards.
| | 03:35 | So we actually have that photograph is
2 inches off center towards the break front.
| | 03:40 | If you look on this wall, we have got this
lamp over here that's going to do the
| | 03:44 | same sort of thing.
| | 03:45 | So we're going to exactly mimic the
positioning of that piece on this wall.
| | 03:50 | So in order to that, we're going to measure
the distance from the wall to the edge of
| | 03:54 | a break front, and we have exactly 46 inches.
| | 03:59 | If we divided that in half, that will be
23 inches, but remember, we want to cheat it
| | 04:05 | 2 inches this way, so we're going to make a
horizontal positioning mark at 25 inches.
| | 04:10 | So I am going to major
across the wall, 25 inches.
| | 04:15 | Now I am going to make a little mark here,
and then I am going to go down for my vertical
| | 04:23 | mark positioning mark that I made off the
at top of the other frame, and notice here
| | 04:28 | I'm burning an inch.
| | 04:30 | So I'll need to go down 5 & 1/8 inch from
my horizontal mark, and then I'll combine those
| | 04:36 | two marks in a little cross mark that will
very exactly tell me where I need to position
| | 04:43 | the hook part of the Wall-Dog.
Once again, the Wall-Dog consists of two parts.
| | 04:49 | You have this flat brass piece with a hook
where the wire will go and then you have a
| | 04:54 | self-tapping screw that goes
through this whole in the Wall-Dog.
| | 04:59 | So I am going to get my drill, and this
drill has a nice feature on its screwdriver.
| | 05:04 | It has a little sleeve that slides out, and
that sleeve allows me to position the screw
| | 05:13 | and not have to use a hand to hold the screw.
| | 05:16 | The screw stays in place
without any help from me.
| | 05:18 | That's gives me one hand from for
the drill and one hand for the hook.
| | 05:22 | Then I'm going to go
back to my mark on the wall.
| | 05:25 | I want to carefully position the base of the
hook at crosshair and place the very center
| | 05:31 | point of the Wall-Dog screw
precisely in the center of that hole.
| | 05:38 | You can see how we got it
started on the wall now.
| | 05:40 | Then I'll just hold the hook part in place
while I drive the screw the rest of the way in.
| | 05:48 | So we have got that securely fastened now.
| | 05:50 | The next step in hanging the
work is to pick it up by the wire.
| | 05:55 | You always want to pick up work
you to by the wire or the base.
| | 05:59 | Trying to pick it up by
the top can damage the frame.
| | 06:01 | So I have got it about the wire in the base,
and I am going to turn my hand outwards so
| | 06:06 | that I can feel the wall to find the hook and
then I'll just slide the wire over the hook.
| | 06:13 | Find the hook and gently let it take the
weight of the print and then also shift it back and
| | 06:21 | forth until it's in rough alignment.
| | 06:23 | I'll take my bubble level, place it on the top,
and shift the print until it's perfectly level.
| | 06:35 | And you can see we have ended up with exactly even
prints with very comfortable spacing on both sides.
| | 06:40 |
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| Hanging on either drywall or panelling| 00:00 | In this next demonstration, I'm going to show
you techniques for hanging your art on either
| | 00:06 | drywall or wood paneling.
| | 00:07 | You use the same set of hangers and
tools to accomplish it on either surface.
| | 00:13 | The work we're going to hang for the
demonstration are two pieces by Kevin Bubriski from his
| | 00:18 | series of Portrait of Nepal.
| | 00:20 | The first one we already have on the wall here,
the second one is going to go in this space here.
| | 00:26 | The pieces are both gelatin silver prints,
and the frames are matching frames of black
| | 00:32 | wood with a slight relief to them.
| | 00:35 | We chose a large white mat to
play off the black and white.
| | 00:39 | We're keeping it real simple.
| | 00:40 | We wanted the extra width of the
mat to generate a sense of scale.
| | 00:44 | The black frames that are identical unify the
works, and will make them work well together.
| | 00:52 | The first step is to measure the
space that we have to work with.
| | 00:57 | So we're going to start at the edge of the
wall we have already hung and measure from
| | 01:00 | the side of that frame to
the molding on the door here.
| | 01:05 | Notice how the tape measure stays rigid through
this whole span. This is one of the advantages
| | 01:10 | of the larger tape measure
that I mentioned earlier.
| | 01:12 | You can see our distance here, we have 48 inches.
| | 01:15 | So there are 48 inches from the
edge of that frame to this molding.
| | 01:19 | The simplest way to hang this would be just
to divide that distance by 2 and make a mark
| | 01:25 | on a 24-inch center and center the work.
| | 01:28 | I don't want to do that, though, because we
have these two light switch plate covers here
| | 01:33 | that add a little bit of weight to the
side of the space we're working with.
| | 01:37 | So, in order to avoid them kind of crowding
things and making it look uncomfortable, I'm
| | 01:43 | actually going to shift the work a little
closer to the one we have already hung, and
| | 01:47 | hang it centered 21 inches away
from the edge of the other piece.
| | 01:52 | So, I'm going to make that
mark now. Get my pencil.
| | 01:57 | Measure over from the edge of that frame
to 21 inches, and I'm going to make a little
| | 02:03 | vertical mark right there at 21 inches.
| | 02:06 | The next dimension we need to determine is
the height that we are going to place our hook.
| | 02:11 | We're going to place it on this
line vertically, we've determined that.
| | 02:15 | Next, we need to decide
at what height we place it.
| | 02:18 | I want to do these offset with this one
slightly higher than this one, so it will lead you
| | 02:24 | down the wall visually to some other
artifacts that we have here in my living room.
| | 02:29 | So I'm going to start by measuring from
the ceiling to the top of this frame, and you
| | 02:33 | can see there from the ceiling to top of
the frame, we have a dimension of 24 inches.
| | 02:38 | I want to make my offset enough so
that it is obviously intentional.
| | 02:42 | If it's just the slight offset, people
might think you are trying to mount them evenly
| | 02:46 | and just got it wrong.
| | 02:47 | So, we're going to make a 3-inch offset.
| | 02:50 | So I want the top of this
piece to hang at 21 inches.
| | 02:53 | In order to determine where my mark will be
in order to get the hook at the right place,
| | 02:58 | I need to determine the drop from the top
of this frame to where the hanging wire is.
| | 03:07 | In order to do that, once again I get my
trusty tape measure, I pull this tight, and it's
| | 03:12 | important, pull it tight
at the center of the work.
| | 03:15 | I pull it tight, and measure from the top
of that wire to the top of the frame, and
| | 03:19 | I get a dimension of 4 inches.
| | 03:21 | It's important to pull it tight because the
weight of the work when it hangs will pull that tight.
| | 03:25 | So, once again, pull it tight, measure from
the wire to the top of the frame, and you
| | 03:29 | get a dimension of 4 inches.
| | 03:33 | So we have got our crosswise dimension
at 21, we want the top of this at 21.
| | 03:38 | We need to add 4 to that for the drop from
the wire, so we're going to make our cross
| | 03:42 | mark for height at 25 inches.
| | 03:46 | That's 21 inches plus the 4 of the offset,
and we make our mark at 25 inches down from
| | 03:52 | the ceiling and 21 inches across.
| | 03:58 | I'm going to use one of these
brass hangers with a tool steel nail.
| | 04:03 | These are great for either drywall or paneling.
| | 04:05 | I'm going to position it on the wall with
the hook part of the hanger right where I
| | 04:12 | made my cross marks.
| | 04:14 | Remember, the wire hangs on the hook, so you
don't put the nail there, you put the hook there.
| | 04:20 | And then I am going to get my hammer
and gently tap the nail into the wall.
| | 04:25 | Notice how the hanger establishes the nail
at an angle, and then carefully tap it all
| | 04:32 | the way in and the hook
will be tight on the wall.
| | 04:36 | I'm then going to pick up the work, and
it's important to remember you don't ever want
| | 04:41 | to pick up framed work by
the top center of the frame.
| | 04:45 | Ofttimes this part of the frame will
not be strong enough to sustain the weight of
| | 04:49 | the frame, and you can get things out
of line and screw it up a little bit.
| | 04:52 | So I'm going to lift by the bottom with
one hand, and with my other hand, I'm holding
| | 04:56 | on the wire in back, and I'm going to have
the wire on my fingers and feel for the hook
| | 05:03 | with my fingertips, find the hook, slip the
wire over the hook, align this so that the
| | 05:12 | weight is keeping it fairly square, get the
bubble level, place it on the top and make
| | 05:22 | sure it's completely level.
| | 05:25 | And for extra stability, I have
some little rubber bumpers here.
| | 05:32 | You can apply those to the bottom corners,
they are adhesive, and I'm just reaching around
| | 05:37 | back and sticking them on
to the back of the frame.
| | 05:44 | And then once again I'll double check it
with the level, and you can see now that those
| | 05:48 | are there, it's much more
stable and stays where I have put it.
| | 05:51 | And then the last thing we want to do, in
case we have got our fingerprints on it, and
| | 05:55 | I can see a couple of places here on the glass
where I'm handling it, I have left a fingerprint.
| | 06:00 | It's all right to clean the glass on a framed
print, but there is a certain way you need to do it.
| | 06:05 | When I demonstrated cleaning glass as we
were framing the prints, the glass is lying flat
| | 06:10 | on a table surface, we sprayed the
cleaner directly on to the glass.
| | 06:13 | Once it is in the frame, you
do not want to do that anymore.
| | 06:17 | The risk being overspray can get between
the edge of the frame and the glass, penetrate
| | 06:22 | through that gap and actually soak
into the matboard and discolor it.
| | 06:26 | So, what you want to do is take--once again--
the same ammonia-free glass cleaner, spray
| | 06:31 | it directly on the towel rather than on the
glass, and then you can really control where it is.
| | 06:39 | So, I'm getting those couple of little fingerprint
spots that I saw, looking over the rest of
| | 06:44 | the work, it looks good.
| | 06:46 | Since I moved around a little bit, I'm going to
double-check level again, and now we're good to go.
| | 06:56 |
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| Hanging on brick, stone, or steel| 00:00 | In this next movie I'd like to talk to you
about how to hang your photographs on brick,
| | 00:05 | stone, or steel, arguably some of the most
difficult surfaces to mount your work on.
| | 00:11 | We're working with a brick surface here for the
demonstration, and we have got an interesting situation.
| | 00:18 | We had a decorative piece hanging here, and
we have removed it and these were the screws
| | 00:23 | that were mounting it.
| | 00:25 | The new piece that we are
replacing it with will cover those screws.
| | 00:28 | So I am not going to bother removing them.
| | 00:30 | If you did need to remove those screws, it
is really the question of backing the screws
| | 00:34 | out, getting a pair of needle-nose pliers,
and pulling up the screw anchors and then
| | 00:38 | filling the hole with an
appropriately colored putty.
| | 00:42 | Since we are going to cover them, I
am not going to worry about that.
| | 00:44 | Also, we may choose to go back to the
decorative piece at a different point in time.
| | 00:49 | The piece we are going to be using is this
gelatin silver print of a pinhole photograph
| | 00:54 | that was made by Martha Casanave.
| | 00:56 | It's a lovely image of cormorants on
the rocks on the coast of California.
| | 01:01 | The matting is a very simple, double mat in
white, and then the frame molding we picked
| | 01:06 | is a fairly simple wood molding in red hue
that works well with the tones of the brick.
| | 01:12 | One of the things I find when you are working
with wood molding, wood tends to go with wood
| | 01:17 | well, and wood and stone
also tend to go well together.
| | 01:21 | The thing that you want to be sure of is
it's fine to have different tones of wood, but
| | 01:26 | avoid clashing tones of wood,
and that's fairly easy to do.
| | 01:30 | So our next step here.
We know what we want to hang.
| | 01:33 | We are going to do our
measuring to get ready to hang this.
| | 01:36 | A couple of aesthetics involved here, where
this sits in the room, there is a chair that
| | 01:41 | sits in front of this that faces away from it.
| | 01:44 | So we are hanging this really for the
pleasure of the people on the other side of the room
| | 01:48 | rather than this side of the room, but
they'll be seeing it over a seated person.
| | 01:51 | So we will probably take it a
little higher up on the wall than normal.
| | 01:56 | The other consideration, too, when hanging
on brick, bricks really limit you because of
| | 02:00 | the mortar lines, and I tend to avoid having the
edge of the frame fall within the line of the mortar.
| | 02:06 | And it usually looks a little bit better if the edge
of the frame comes in the midst of the line of brick.
| | 02:12 | That way you get the line a
little bit more broken up.
| | 02:14 | You don't get this strong
linear feel to the top of the image.
| | 02:18 | So this is our target for
height is about right here.
| | 02:22 | To make my measurements, this particular space
is a little challenging, because the measurements
| | 02:27 | we need to make are all a little bit offline.
| | 02:30 | We first look at the width of the space,
and we have got 41 inches, but once again, it's
| | 02:37 | complicated by the switch plate
cover here that's on a lower plane.
| | 02:41 | So I am going to come down and
measure that, and that edge is 6 inches in.
| | 02:44 | So I am really dealing with
a space about 35 inches wide.
| | 02:48 | So if I go look at half of that 35
inches, that gives me 17 & 1/2 inches.
| | 02:54 | If you look at that 17 & 1/2 inches, it comes
right on the edge of the brick and the mortar,
| | 03:00 | and that's a really
difficult place to drill accurately.
| | 03:03 | So what I am going to do is I am going
to make that dimension 18 full inches.
| | 03:07 | The slight shift to the left will still be okay.
| | 03:09 | We are not going to run into the switch plate
cover, and we still accomplish the aesthetic
| | 03:13 | of that slight rightward shift.
| | 03:16 | So I am going to make a
pencil mark there at 18 inches.
| | 03:20 | So this is my mark for horizontal placement.
| | 03:24 | Next I am going to determine my vertical
placement, and remember we wanted the top of the print
| | 03:28 | to be in the middle of this line of brick.
| | 03:31 | So I am going to do the same thing I did
before to measure the drop from the wire.
| | 03:36 | I am going to measure up to the back of the frame,
stretching it tight, and that gives me 3 & 1/2 inches.
| | 03:44 | So we will start there.
We will line up on our 18-inch mark.
| | 03:50 | We will start in the center of that brick
and come down 3 & 1/2 inches, and we are going
| | 03:56 | to make our crosshairs, and that's our
mark for where we want to drill our hole.
| | 04:02 | We are going to drill the hole using a
Hammer Drill, which is a very messy tool.
| | 04:08 | So I am going to set the artwork out of the
way, and when you are doing this, if you're
| | 04:12 | doing a lot of drilling, you
may want to put down a drop cloth.
| | 04:15 | You certainly want to get things out of
the way, because of the dust involved.
| | 04:19 | Hammer Drills also--because you're drilling
into a very, very hard surface, little chips
| | 04:24 | of the brick or stone can fly away.
I have got on shatterproof glasses.
| | 04:28 | If you don't have those or doing quite a bit
of this work, I'd recommend safety goggles.
| | 04:33 | I would also recommend if you're doing a lot
some kind of a breathing filter, because the
| | 04:38 | stone dust, brick dust, if it gets
in your lungs, it's not a good thing.
| | 04:43 | What we're going to use for drilling is a
Hammer Drill, and it's the same drill I'd
| | 04:47 | use for drilling in
either brick, stone, or steel.
| | 04:51 | In steel I'd have it set in just its
standard drill mode at low speed, and the reason I'd
| | 04:56 | want this for steel is it's a substantial
piece of equipment, it's powerful, and it's just
| | 05:00 | got this extra grip handle to
make it easier to hold onto.
| | 05:04 | Since for drilling on brick, I want to change it over
to its Hammer function and increase the speed to High.
| | 05:10 | Sometimes when you turn the speed thing, you
have got to twist the chuck a little bit just
| | 05:14 | to make the gears align.
| | 05:16 | So I am set in high speed in the Hammer mode,
and I have made my mark on the wall, I am
| | 05:22 | going to get a secured grip on the drill,
I am going to put it on a starting point,
| | 05:27 | and I want to warn you, this is going to be
loud, and once again, I am making sure I am
| | 05:31 | going straight into the wall.
| | 05:33 | Everything else we have done, we have taken
our nails in at an angle, but in this case
| | 05:37 | working with an anchor we are going straight in.
| | 05:45 | You notice it jumped a
little bit at the start there.
| | 05:48 | I always just give it a few little goose
just trying to hold it in place to get the right
| | 05:52 | starting hole, and now that I have got the
right starting hole we are going to go ahead
| | 05:56 | and drill along through, like a hot knife through butter.
| | 06:04 | That's a Hammer Drill.
That was a joyous sound, wasn't it?
| | 06:07 | Okay, so what we have done is we have done
the small hole here, and in that hole I am
| | 06:13 | going to take one of these little screw anchors.
| | 06:16 | This is just a little plastic sleeve that
we'll pound into the hole, and then we'll drive
| | 06:23 | the screw right into the center of it.
| | 06:26 | And you can see I just
pound that into the brick.
| | 06:31 | So there is the anchor, and then I have got
the hook from a Wall-Dog, and on the Wall-Dog
| | 06:40 | packaging it says you can use their screws
for light-duty masonry anchors, but I feel
| | 06:46 | much more secure with this hanging method.
| | 06:48 | Then I am going to take a 1.25-inch fine-thread
drywall screw, and I am going to use the Wall-Dog
| | 06:56 | hook, line them up, and then just get my
regular drill with a Phillips screwdriver bit in it,
| | 07:07 | and drive that home.
So my Wall-Dog is there and ready to go.
| | 07:13 | I am going to take this lovely
photograph, and there you go.
| | 07:23 | So now we have it mounted nicely on the brick.
| | 07:26 | We have been through all the different surfaces
you will probably have to deal with in mounting,
| | 07:30 | and now it's time to turn to the next
consideration which would be lighting the work.
| | 07:35 |
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| Lighting your work| 00:00 | So now that you have learned all the different
techniques for hanging your work on the wall,
| | 00:05 | and it's the final and one of the more important
considerations is thinking about lighting the work.
| | 00:11 | What we have done here, we are back in my
living room, and as I started to build and art
| | 00:15 | collection, I felt the lighting here
was really inadequate to the task.
| | 00:20 | And I found at one of the local home
improvement stores a set of low-voltage gallery lights
| | 00:25 | that operates off a transformer that runs
power to these two wires and then has a series
| | 00:31 | of clip-on fixtures that clip to those two
wires that carry the juice, the bulb makes
| | 00:37 | the connection, and it comes a set of five
positionable lights that mount on this system.
| | 00:43 | When I decided to install it, I looked at
what I had to work with and essentially we're
| | 00:47 | looking a remodeling install.
So I first analyzed on my wall here.
| | 00:51 | This was the existing switch for
the sconces that were in the room.
| | 00:55 | I knew I could pull power from it.
| | 00:57 | So I got my stud finder and checked to make
sure where studs were in this wall and realize
| | 01:03 | that I could tie power in from here to here and
then I add a gap in the studs from here to here.
| | 01:10 | So I knew I could draw wire up to this
point here in order to power the transform.
| | 01:15 | So it was really a fairly simple procedure.
| | 01:17 | I drilled the hole big
enough to accommodate the wire.
| | 01:21 | I cut a rectangular square here, big
enough to accommodate remodeling circuit box.
| | 01:27 | I pulled wire from this to this switch,
and I mounted it on a dimming light switch.
| | 01:33 | This allows me to adjust the intensity of these
lights, depending on how bright the ambient light is.
| | 01:40 | The other advantage of these positionable
lights is you can carefully control the incident
| | 01:45 | angle of light source that hits to work.
It's very important.
| | 01:49 | If you think about it the light will bounce
off or reflect off the surface at the exact
| | 01:54 | opposite angle that it strikes at.
| | 01:56 | So a typical viewer is going to be looking
in form eye level this way, the incident angle
| | 02:01 | of reflection is going to be
down below their eye level.
| | 02:04 | So they won't be distracted
by a reflection off the work.
| | 02:08 | You can see how the light shining on these
really helps pop them off the walls, and the
| | 02:13 | multiple directional ability is great because you
can see I have got these two washing on this wall.
| | 02:19 | Back here I have got one of them
washing on these two pieces here.
| | 02:22 | And this one I have actually got
washing on a different wall of the room.
| | 02:26 | So it's a very flexible
set and quite affordable.
| | 02:30 | There are many other types of gallery
lighting that are available for home use now as well.
| | 02:35 | There are several variations on this theme.
| | 02:38 | You can get wired light that
actually attach to the top of the frame.
| | 02:42 | You can get battery lights or wired lights.
| | 02:45 | I'm not big on the battery lights just
because of battery consumption, recycling issues.
| | 02:50 | There are some new stuff
having with LED lights as well.
| | 02:55 | One thing to keep in mind though, and one
of the things I like about these tungsten
| | 02:59 | lights, these are small court halogen lights.
| | 03:01 | They have extremely long bulb life and they
have a very pleasing warm tone to the light too.
| | 03:08 | The different types of fixtures will all
have kind of different color qualities.
| | 03:11 | And LED to me, they're starting to get some
variation in it, but for most part they're
| | 03:15 | kind of blue and cold, where in a residential setting
I really prefer a little bit of warmth in the lighting.
| | 03:22 | So look at your choices for lighting and think of
it as the last step in the enhancement of your photographs.
| | 03:27 |
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ConclusionGoodbye| 00:00 | I certainly hope you have enjoyed learning all the
techniques I have demonstrated during this course.
| | 00:05 | A couple of things I want to
leave you with is thoughts.
| | 00:09 | First: practice, don't feel bad if the
first time you try to pull that handheld cutter
| | 00:15 | through the board the line is crooked. I
threw away hundreds of mattes early on.
| | 00:20 | And what you see me do is
the ease of long practice.
| | 00:24 | Also, the other encouragement I'd give you:
don't be afraid to try new things, don't be
| | 00:29 | afraid to go outside the box.
| | 00:32 | Ofttimes, artistic innovation comes from
that outside-of-the-box thinking and change.
| | 00:38 | Take all this information not as a series
of hard and fast rules, but a starting point
| | 00:44 | to embrace these techniques and take
them much farther than I have shown to you.
| | 00:48 | I really hope you enjoy what you
have learned and make it your own.
| | 00:53 |
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