Beldames’ Saloon

It seems that there is usually a trade-off when it comes to finding a digital photo printing service. In order to obtain good quality prints, a customer probably will have to shell out a little extra money. On the other hand, a customer who is stingy with their money will most likely be left with pictures that leave something to be desired in the area of quality. These ideas represent the stereotype within the digital photo printing community that less cash equals bad prints and the only way to get good ones is to shop at high-priced companies. However, there is a way to find cheap digital good photo printing quality if you take the proper time to look.

The first step on any quest to get good digital photo printing at cheap prices is to do an online search that compares the price per print of different websites. You’ll find also find other options that enhance the pricing packages offered by companies such as membership programs and discounts on bulk orders. After ranking the different websites in terms of price, it is time to check out some reviews on photo quality. Begin by searching for reviews on the sites that offer deals within your price range and compile a small list of companies that have what you desire in terms of quality. When you narrow the search to the most attractive website in terms of quality and price, you’re ready to start ordering some pictures.

Although price and quality should be the main determinants in your search for cheap digital good photo printing quality, other factors still remain. Some websites are cluttered with pop-up advertisements that can hamper a person’s efforts to order pictures and in turn, waste precious time for busy people. Other companies only allow a person to store pictures on their online albums for so long before they are deleted. There are sites that do not enhance digital photos of low quality as well. Make sure to keep an eye out for these other factors so that you can find the best bargains available for your digital photo needs.

To view our list of recommended sources for digital photo printing online,
visit this page: Photo Mugs.

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What have you done with the photos you’ve taken with your digital camera? Hands up if they are languishing on your hard drive waiting to be printed. If your hand is up you are not alone. Well I have my hand up too! But I’ve promised myself that two years worth of digital photography will see the light of day before Christmas.

The problem is that we expect to do out own digital printing. Its supposed to be a feature. This “feature” puts many people off buying a digital camera in the first place. For one thing its not cheap. First you may need to upgrade your printer, or buy a photo printer. Then there are the running costs, which come as a shock to most new printer owners. The price of inkjets and photo paper doesn’t encourage much trial and error.

Having assembled all the equipment we then have to spend some time working out how to use it. Suddenly we have a hobby that we really didn’t want and don’t have time for. We just wanted a nice easy way to take fantastic photos. How much simpler it was to take a roll of film into the photo shop and collect the prints an hour later!

Well, here is the good news, you can still take you photos to the photo shop. Not only that but you can delete the duds first. Now that’s an improvement on film. Even better you can email your digital images to an online photo lab and receive the prints back in the post. If you have Microsoft Windows XP you can just click on “Order Prints” in the My Pictures folder and off they go. What could be simpler?

Ok so what about all the cool stuff you can do with digital images? You can do that too, but you don’t have to. The best thing for non experts to do is very little. You can crop and usually adjust the contrast and brightness with a single click using the software that came with your camera. If the software can manage red eye removal too, that is a trick worth learning-its easy.

The thing to remember is that digital images are free. Take lots. You can ditch the duds and still have one or two that are good for printing. Then you won’t need to bother with a lot of tricky time consuming editing.

Another option, useful if you do not own a computer, is to use one of the self service kiosks that are springing up in urban and tourist centers. These machines allow a little simple editing and you get your prints instantly. Over the next 12 months these are likely to be more widely available.

For more information about printing your digital photos check out http://tinyurl.com/4fm3q.

About The Author

Liz Beresford owns and operates the web site Digital Cameras and Accessories, which provides information and resources for digital camera buyers, particularly new buyers. You can find the best value digital cameras, equipment and accessories online at the Digital Cameras and Accessories shop.

http://www.digital-cameras-and-accessories.com/

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A photo buyer calls for a picture of pigs. It could be about anything. A hundred responses go online and one lucky so-and-so gets the sale. That’s 99 pictures deemed to be second, and that’s no good in any race.

So, what is it about that winning picture that produced a sale? It may good lighting, it may be striking content… but hey, all the pictures submitted were about the same topic, so eliminate that one. Let’s face it, there could be a million reasons for the selection of that winner, but there isn’t!!

The winning shot is unusual. It’s different from the rest. It’s got something the others just don’t have. It’s got oomph. It’s got pizzazz. Call it what you will’ it’s got that winning streak that just knocks spots of the competition. It has? Well what the heck is it? Tell me, and we’ll bottle it.

It might be stunning exposure. Well it might. That certainly helps. In fact, exposure IS a factor, it must be spot on. However, that’s not the killer factor. Picture researchers, editors and publishers don’t set out to look for stunning exposures. No. That’s not it. There is something else, an elusive factor that underpins every sellable photo. It’s not something you can find by playing blind man’s bluff either. If you want to sell photos You have to recognize it, pursue it, capture it, master it and make it work for you.

It there for all to see in practically every photo that sells and yet most people and even many photographers just don’t see it. How can something so obvious be invisible to a creative eye? It’s a mystery. I don’t understand it. When I look at the range of submissions for any photo request, my heart sinks. Most photos betray a complete absence of this elusive essential quality. They are duff!

Shots taken so far away from the subject that life-size objects are mere pimples. Boring views that have 5% coverage of the intended and desired theme. Constant repetition of the same unimaginative angle. Yes, you’ve guessed it. I’m talking about composition.

If you want to sell photos, for pity’s sake THINK about what you shoot. The first angle of view MAY be the best one, but I doubt it. The old gunfighter adage ..no matter how fast your are…seems to apply to photography also.

Stalk around your intended subject, look at it from all angles, make mental photos before committing one to film or digital memory, as the case may be. Don’t TAKE pictures MAKE them. Fill the screen with powerful compelling artwork. Look for interesting shapes, textures, colours in the most fascinating combination possible, given the lighting conditions and your time constraints.

How you compose your photo says everything about you, so train your eye and mind to maximise your artistic ability. When you shoot in pursuit of beauty, you fulfil yourself. When called upon to make pictures of mundane everyday scenes, you will bring a eagle eye to scour the most pleasing elements of vision and combine them in a most powerful way. You will always be an unpredictable photographer who can capture unusual shots.

Shed the snakeskin of normality and kick out the usual suspects in favour of the racy, the dangerous, the exciting and discover how to enjoy your using your camera, finding the unusual angles and great whacking compositions that draw photo-buyers to you like flies to a honey pot.

You just can’t achieve that by shooting the same stuff as the average Joe. Be a special Joe! Be successful and you’ll sell your photos with ease.

About The Author

One of a series of articles by Robert Hartness, successful freelance and author of an hot-linked, flip-over, e-book, published on the web in October 2004. It offers a step-by-step guide to those on the threshold of freelance photography and is illustrated with 40+ published photographs. Acclaimed as a great reference source for serious freelancers. More information and order link - http://www.cashfromyourcamera.com

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When I promised readers that I was going to do an article on this topic I was scared. For two reasons - firstly, it’s a HUGE subject. I get lots of questions about it, and I see a fair bit of misunderstanding about it. Secondly, there are already a lot of good articles about it on the web, like this one on luminous-landscape.com.

But I know that trawling the internet for technical information is not your idea of fun. That’s my job! So here’s my attempt at summing this up quickly for you:

DPI - Dots Per Inch

The most common question I get on this topic is, “My client / boss / nephew has asked me to send an image at a size of 300 dpi. What does that mean”?

The answer: Not much.

You see, DPI stands for Dots Per Inch. It’s a useful measure of image resolution (in other words, how much information is resolved in the picture). But if you don’t know the image size in inches (or feet, miles, centimetres, millimitres, or some other measure of size), then the amount of dots per inch doesn’t mean much.

Using DPI to measure size is like using km/h to measure distance: “How far is it from here to the beach?”
“Oh, about 60 miles per hour”. For this to make sense the answer would need to be “about 10 minutes at 60 miles per hour”.

Likewise, the size of an image needs to be expressed as, say, “six by six inches at 300dpi”.

Different resolutions are used for different purposes. The most common are 72 or 75 dpi for screen viewing (Web use or PowerPoint presentations) and 300 dpi for printing.

OK, so to give an example - 1 inch by 1 inch, 300 dpi image would be 300 pixels by 300 pixels in size. A 2 by 2 inch image at 300 dpi would be 600 by 600 pixels in size. Here’s where megapixels and megabytes come into it. Mega!

Megapixels

The term megapixels is usually used to describe the output size of digital camera images. For example, the Canon Ixus 50 produces images which are 2592 x 1944 pixels in size. Multiply these numbers together and you get 5,038,848 - just over 5 million. Hence this is described as a “5 megapixel” camera.

The last byte

On a couple of occasions, I’ve sent an image of a certain size to someone and they’ve said, “that’s no good, we need a 10 megabyte file”. Now, this I’m sure they were well-intentioned but they were also a little misguided.

The size in bytes (or megabytes - millions of bytes) represents how much storage the image takes up on your computer. This depends on all sorts of things, mainly the bit depth of the image and the file format - for example TIFF or JPEG.

So what should I do?

To avoid confusion, when specifying the file size you need, use pixels.

How do you work out how many pixels you need? Well, that’s why I started this discussion with DPI. Work out the largest size you’re going to want to reproduce the image, in inches; and the resolution - for example 72 dpi for or 300dpi for most print applications. Then just multiply the size in inches by the DPI figure you came up with.

Example: I want to reproduce the image A4 size in a printed magazine. A4 is 210mm x 297mm, or about 8.3 x 11.7 inches. The magazine needs artwork at 300dpi, so:

8.3 x 300 = 2490 and 11.7 x 300 = 3510 so I need an image sized about 2490 x 3510 pixels (about 8.7 megapixels)

By the way: 1 inch = 2.54 centimetres. Did you know you can also do conversions on google? Try it yourself.

Happy pixelling!

Steven Pam is a digital commercial photographer based in Melbourne, Australia, specializing in people, aviation and music photography. http://www.stevenpam.com.au

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There are many different types of photography. You can take pictures of anything and there is someone out there somewhere who would like to see the pictures that you take. So, photography is a great field to get into.

- What is landscape photography?

Landscape photography is a great field of photography, especially if you love nature and if you love to travel. You can travel the world taking pictures of beautiful scenes across many countries. Of course, this is landscape photography on a big scale. Not many people are lucky enough to start off traveling the world.

But you can find beautiful landscapes right where you live. That’s the great thing about nature, it’s everywhere, and landscapes are everywhere. And that same sunset behind the mountain that you’ve seen everyday since you were a kid may look pretty amazing to someone who has never been to the mountains. Seeing the sun rise up out of the oceanfront may be absolutely astonishing to someone who has never been to the beach. It’s all relative.

What you may see every day is someone else’s treasure. If you can open your eyes to the beauty and see it, then other people can see it in your photography. It can be simple and everyday or it can be vast and amazing. It’s all about the great pictures you take. You may see a night city skyline, a series of lightening bolts or an interesting cloud; it’s how you take the picture that makes it beautiful to someone else.

- How to Learn Landscape Photography

If you are serious about landscape photography, you should take a course. You may have already had a course in photography but you will want to take one specifically for landscape photography so you can learn how to get the best pictures possible. You will want to learn what film to use and how to work with the sunlight or other natural light. You will also learn about achieving a sense of balance and scale, how to photograph running water and similar issues that a landscape photographer might face.

If you can’t find any appropriate classes in your area, you can find them on the internet. You can also find many groups and message boards designed for landscape photographers to meet, share photos and tips and ideas. You can get tips and advice for your questions if you join these groups. You can also view the work of others, some that may be much more experienced than you. You can learn from them and their photos.

- How to Make Money with Landscape Photography

If you are considering landscape photography as a career (even part time), the first thing you are going to want to do is learn as much about it as possible; read books, take classes, visit websites. Then you are going to want to practice, and build a portfolio. Your portfolio should be updated often and only include your absolute best work. You may want to send some of your best photos to photo contests or magazines. These are good ways of breaking into the world of professional photography when you have no experience.

Looking for information about Photography?
Go to: http://www.asaphotography.com
‘ASA Photography’ is published by Colin Hartness -
An excellent resource for Photography!
Check out more Photography articles at: http://www.asaphotography.com/archive

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What Is… Exposure Bracketing

Exposure bracketing is a simple technique professional photographers use to ensure they properly expose their pictures, especially in challenging lighting situations.

When you expose for a scene, your camera’s light meter will select an aperture / shutter speed combination that it believes will give a properly exposed picture.

Exposure bracketing means that you take two more pictures: one slightly under-exposed (usually by dialing in a negative exposure compensation, say -1/3EV), and the second one slightly over-exposed (usually by dialing in a positive exposure compensation, say +1/3EV), again according to your camera’s light meter.

The reason you do this is because the camera might have been ‘deceived’ by the light (too much or too little) available and your main subject may be over- or under-exposed. By taking these three shots, you are making sure that if this were ever the case, then you would have properly compensated for it.

As an example, say you are taking a scene where there is an abundance of light around your main subject (for example, at the beach on a sunny day, or surrounded by snow). In this case, using Weighted-Average metering, your camera might be ‘deceived’ by the abundance of light and expose for it by closing down the aperture and/or using a faster shuter speed (assuming ISO is constant), with the result that the main subject might be under-exposed. By taking an extra shot at a slight over-exposure, you would in fact be over-exposing the surroundings, but properly exposing the main subject.

Another example would be the case where the surrounding might be too dark, and the camera exposes for the lack of light by either opening up the aperture and/or using a slower shutter speed (assuming ISO is constant), then the main subject might be over-exposed. By taking an extra shot at a slight under-exposure, you would in fact be under-exposing the surroundings, but properly exposing the main subject.

Now, most digital cameras have auto exposure bracketing, meaning that if you select that option before taking your shot, the camera will automatically take three shots for you: one which it thinks it has perfectly exposed; a second one sightly under-exposed; and the third one slightly over-exposed.

When should you use exposure bracketing? Anytime you feel the scene is a challenging one (too much highlights or shadows) as far as lighting is concerned, e.g. sunsets are usually better taken slightly under-exposed so use exposure bracketing there, or whenever you want to be sure you don’t improperly expose a fabulous shot.

Remember, you are not using film anymore, so there are really no wasted shots (unless you are severely constrained by the size of your storage media).

Digital Dodging & Burning

Should you delete the extra shots right away? No, if storage permits, keep all three shots until you get home and upload them to your PC and into an image editing software, such as Photoshop. By using the layers functionality of Photoshop (or similar functionality of another image editing software), you can load all three shots into different layers and then carefully erase the under-exposed or over-exposed part of one or more layers to end up with a final shot where both the main subject and the surroundings are properly exposed!

This Photoshop functionality allows you to shoot in very extreme lighting situations where there are many parts in different intensity of light and shadows such that you are losing details in the highlights and shadows. In this case, you might need more than two extra shots to obtain details in the different parts. Without moving the camera (a tripod is essential here), take as many shots as you need, exposing for the different parts you want details to be visible. Then you would load them all up into Photoshop, each into its own layer, and by erasing the under- and over-exposed parts in each layer (granted, this equivalent of film ‘dodging’ and ‘burning’ can be a very tedious and challenging task in itself, but done properly it can be well worth the effort), you can end up with an ‘impossible’ shot where every part of the cave is properly exposed.

Used judiciously, exposure bracketing is a simple technique that can ensure proper exposure of a difficult lighting situation.
Make sure you get a camera with good manual Bracketing control

Canon PowerShot S70 - Bracketing control

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Street photography is an approach to photography rather than a location, although the streets are the usual place that it happens.

\”When I saw the photograph of Munkacsi of the black kids running in a wave I couldn\’t believe such a thing could be caught with the camera. I said damn it, I took my camera and went out into the street.\” Henri Cartier-Bresson

Alternatively it is refered to as no rules photography. The plethera of equipment (tripods, lenses,filters,lights etc etc) associated with \”serious\” photography is left at home, or better still in the camera store. Its just too heavy and bulky to cart around, takes way too long to set up and by the time it is set up the moment is gone.
Street photography is shooting from the hip.
Likewise the rules of photograph, the f stops, the shutter speeds, the rule of thirds etc etc are left in their dust jackets on Amazon shelves. By the time all the technical considerations are taken into account, the birdy is in another country.
Thank Canon, Nikon, Fuji et al for point & shoots.

It is just the camera and the photographer with their enthusiasm, intuition and open mind.

Street photography can be and often is: Out of focus; a tilted horizon; a soft focus.

Street photographers are optimists, for them the glass is always half full. They go out on a photo shoot with no plan in mind secure in the knowledge that this wide world of ours will provide. A subject, a situation, a scene will present itself all they have to have is the presence of mind to capture it when it does.

Street photography can be and often is: Odd things in the foreground; no central focus; odd crops.

Street photographers see the usual, the every day with fresh eyes. The reflection in a rain puddle, the colours in a crowd, the balance of a negative space. Their minds are open to all the stimuli that they see and they curse the days when they leave their camera at home.

Street photography can be and often is: very busy; a tilted perspective; upside down.

Street photographers are not only on the streets, they are at weddings,school concerts, next to you on the train. They look a lot like tourists, its their favourite cover but they are one without the big flash. It was left at home, the available light will do.

Street photography can be and often is: under exposed; blurred; suffering from vertigo.

Street photography is, what all photography is, a snap shot.
What shines through is the photographer, his/her interpretation of the scene, what they see in the situation, their reaction to the stimuli, the art they see in the every day.
Technicians take technically correct and often pretty pictures.
Visual artists, whatever their medium, create images that stimulate the mind, the heart and validate the human condition in all its guises. Because, after all, pretty is in the eye of the beholder and consequently very subjective, whereas art speaks to all who are prepared to listen.

Henry Bateman is an artist/photographer who finds a lot of his inspiration in the streets he wanders. His work can be seen at www.pissedpoet.com and this article with pictures at www.pissedpoet.com/art.html

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It took the digital camera to make me finally create a photo album. You see, I had a virtual photo album on the computer, one which would show the images that I had taken, and where I could arrange them in whatever configuration I wanted.

I realized then, that I had to create a photo album, or forever lose track of all of my precious memories. I simply didn’t know where anything was anymore, so I set off to by a lovely hardbound book to create a photo album to organize all of my most precious pictures so that I could show them.

With the prevalence of digital cameras and the fast pace of life, few people really take the time to create a photo album anymore. This is really a shame.

I could even design covers or text for my digital photo album, which was pretty neat. It was so convenient, that I rarely bothered to look at my old pictures any more. I just wasn’t up for the effort of digging through them anymore.

I had always kind of wanted to create a photo album, but had never gotten around to it, and over the years I had become pretty good at hunting for just the image which I wanted in my box of pictures.

Then one day, I was having over my sons fiance. She’s a sweet girl, and I decided to embarrass him and make her feel part of the family by showing off some of his baby pictures. But when I looked for them, try as I might, I couldn’t find them at all.

When you create a photo album, you make something that not only showcases your photos, but arranges them in the personal style that shows you really care about what you are doing.

If you make your own photo album, you can not only select what photos to include, but what kind of book to use, how many per page, and where in your home to display it.
I first decided to create a photo album about a year ago.

Ironically, I didn’t even think to create a photo album until I had been using my digital camera for a good while. Back when I used to use my normal, analog camera, I would keep all of my pictures in boxes, and I could go into them and look at them whenever I wanted.

Life is an accumulation of our cherished memories save them by creating a photo album.

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The photos you took of the party are really great - except for one thing: “red eye” makes everyone look like extras from a low budget horror movie! Red eye can be a real problem if you’re taking photos with a flash. It’s caused by the reaction of light from the flash on the inner workings of your eye. Pictures of animals (especially cats) can suffer from a similar condition know as “pet eye”.

Photoshop offers a solution to this problem, and while it can’t make things look exactly the way they should have been, it can make the people (or pets) in your pictures look less “possessed”.

The first thing to do is upload your photos into your computer, or scan them in if you’re working from prints, then follow these simple steps.

1. To keep your original safe, make a copy of it by going to Image > Duplicate. Rename the copy if you wish, then close the original.

2. Open a duplicate window of the same image. Do this by going to Window > Documents > New Window in Photoshop 7, or View > New View in Photoshop 6 or earlier. Then zoom in on one of the windows so that an eye fills the window. Set the other window’s magnification to 100%. Arrange the windows so you can see them both at the same time. This will enable you to work in close-up, but still see what the finished picture will look like. As it is the same picture in both windows, the 100% view will be updated automatically in real time.

3. Create a new layer.

4. Use the Eyedropper Tool to pick a colour from the iris of the eye - this will be fairly grey, with just a hint of the eye colour. Take the sample from as near to the red area as you can without picking up any of the reddish tint.

5. In the new layer, paint over the red area with this colour. Try various tools (brushes, pencils, Paint Bucket Tool, etc.) to achieve the desired effect. You’ll have to experiment and see which one works best for you on each particular picture - a lot will depend on the photo’s resolution. Be careful to avoid the “white of the eye” on pictures of people. Do small amounts at a time, that way you can easily undo anything that doesn’t look right. If you paint over the pupil, use the Art History Brush to expose it again, or the Burn Tool to paint it in if it was obscured in the first place.

6. Go to Filters > Blur > Gaussian Blur and give the layer a blur of one or two pixels to soften the edges.

7. Now set the layer blend mode to saturation. If this makes the eye look too dull or grey, duplicate the layer and change the blend mode of this new layer to Hue. This should put some of the colour back. If the colour looks too strong, change the opacity of the Hue layer until it looks right.

8. When you’re happy with the results, merge the layers down, save your work, and start again with the next eye.

Shaun Pearce is a writer and video maker.
His latest production “Photoshop Master” shows you how to get the most from Photoshop, and can be downloaded from http://www.learnphotoshopfast.com.

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There are two sources for obtaining the moulding for making a frame. You can firstly start with a straight piece of timber, and using a home routing system make your own moulding shape with a rebate to take the art work. Alternatively you can pick from a large range of ready finished mouldings available from your local frame shop or hardware store. I recommend the latter. It’s easier, the choice is much wider, and it’s more cost effective. However, one word of warning. Always look for a moulding with a good straight back and not too flat on the surface. If the moulding has a bump or some raised section in the top surface it will cut and join easier than a flat moulding. Most mouldings are made from pine or obeche. These are soft grain timbers and cut and join well. Hard timbers like ramin are more difficult to work with.

Measuring and Cutting

How much moulding will you need? The outside dimensions of the frame are determined by the size of the mounted photograph. Carefully measure the overall size of the matted picture you’re framing, adding a little extra (3-smm) for “play” to ensure the picture fits easily into the finished frame.

Add the length and the breadth together, then double the total. This will give you the overall length. But you also have to allow for the mitre cuts, so multiply the width of the moulding by 10 and add this to your total (total length required = 2 x (length + breadth) + 10 x width of moulding). The 45 mitre cuts are most important - a bad cut will never join properly and will always look terrible. There are a number of machines on the market for cutting 45 degree mitres starting with the simple mitre box, radial arm saw with a mitre attachment, or a commercial mitre saw (see picture 1).

Cutting one side of a frame is easy. Cutting the second side to be EXACTLY the same side to the first side is the hard part of frame cutting. Using a measuring system you can cut lengths accurately every time. The FrameCo measuring system will attach to any brand of electric or manual mitre saw and will make the cutting of the frames quick and foolproof.

If you have a saw you can cut without using a measuring system. Follow this easy step-by-step guide to cut mitred lengths for your frame:

* Calculate the dimensions of your frame.

* Place the moulding into the saw.

• Cut off a small piece at 45 degrees with the saw in the lefthand position.

* Remove the moulding from the saw.

• With a tape, measure along the back of the moulding, to the length you require.

To this length you have to take into account the size of the moulding you are using. So you add to the length of the side an amount equal to twice the moulding width - not including the rebate. Then make a pencil mark on the back of the moulding near the top so that you can see the mark.

• Put the moulding back in the saw and align the saw blade on the pencil mark.

• Swing the saw around and cut the next mitre.

• Place the two pieces back to back so you can transfer the size you have just cut to the back of the moulding length.

• Repeat the cutting procedure for the other pieces.

Joining the Frame

To ensure a tight and stable joint, glue should be applied, especially if the frame is large. A light smear of a good quality PVA glue is all that’s necessary. Although it is possible to buy clamps that join two corners at a time, it’s simpler and quicker to clamp all four corners at once. This allows you to see how the corners match up before gluing and securing the mitres. There are several types of clamps…

Cord Clamps: This simple, but effective clamping system works well for small to medium-size frames. It consists of four flexible plastic corners and a length of cord. (See picture 2).

Metal Strap Clamp: This clamping system is slightly more sophisticated and consists of a metal strap, flexible corner pieces and a screw operated tensioning device which allows you to apply a considerable amount of tension so that the corners are pulled together tightly. The Strap Clamp is suitable for large and small frames. (See picture 3).

Once the frame is clamped together and you’ve made sure all the corners are aligned, then the mitre joint should be secured or reinforced. Glue alone is not safe and secure enough for most sized frames. Here are some options.

Panel Pins: You can nail a panel pin across the mitre. It is advisable to pre-drill the holes and secure the joint in a vice before hammering the pins into the frame. Punch home the nail head and fill the hole with a coloured woodfiller.

V-Nails: Professional framers use these v-shaped staples, which are inserted using a special manual or pneumatic joining machine. The “PushMaster” is a DIY version of these machines and is suitable for low-volume high-quality framing such as required for photography or portrait framing.

Biscuit Joints: More suitable for large and heavy frames such as mirrors. Most commercial picture frame mouldings are small and a biscuit joint is not necessary.

V-Nail Joining Machines
There are several models of these machines and all are suitable for the DIY or low-volume picture framing. Here are some of the models.

PushMaster: Similar to a large punch, the PushMaster is a handheld, easy to use tool for inserting the v-nails into the back of timber picture frames. The vnail is loaded onto the magnetic end of the PushMaster, sharp end down, then simply pushed into the wood. The v-nail pulls the joint together because it is made from spring steel. The advantage of the PushMaster is that it doubles as a fitting up tool. The magnetic tip can also be used to fit flexipoints and backing nails to secure the picture into the frame.
(See picture 4).

BenchMaster: The BenchMaster is ideal for the serious DIY framing photographer. The powerful cam action of the handle combined with the heavy duty Push Master drives v-nails into the hardest of timbers. Its gentle hand action suits joining small or odd-shaped mouldings. If you start with FrameCo’s Push Master you can upgrade to the BenchMaster at any time. (See picture 5).

V-Nails - How Do They Work?

Upon entering the wood moulding from the base, the sides of the metal v-nail are deflected outwards. As the v-nail pulls back into its original shape this pulls the joint tightly together. There is a little curl on the outer leading edge of the nail that locks the nail into the grain of the timber. This stops the nail from pulling out of the end of the mitre, keeping the joint stable and secure. The v-nail method of joining is the preferred method of professional picture framers. With a few simple hand tools it’s possible to achieve the same result with a minimal outlay in machinery.

Making Multi-sided Frames

With most good quality suspension type mitre saws there’s always the possibility of cutting mitre angles other than 45 degrees. The problem is that the saws do not have a system of measuring the length of the cut. The FrameCo measuring system has a clever scale included with the unit. It allows you to measure a length for any angle. A six-sided frame has the six mitres cut at 30 degrees, while an eight-sided frame has the eight mitres cut at 22.5 degrees. The Measure Mate Scale converts the measuring system into a multi-angled scale so that each one of these different angled mitres can be measured.

So it’s possible for the amateur framer to make attractive multiangled frames that add style and creativity to your framing.

Finishing and Assembly

Now that the frame is joined and the glue joints dry you’re ready to assemble your mounted photograph into the frame. The PushMaster can be used to fit backing nails or flexipoints into the frame to hold the picture into the rebate.

Seal the back of the picture with gummed tape or good quality backing tape. The best backing tape to use is a silicone coated tape as this will not peel off over time.

Screw two small O-rings or screw eyes into the side of the frame, approximately one third of the distance down the top of the frame, then attach a length of wire or cord securely through the O-rings or screw eyes. After that, your image is ready to hang on a wall.

Gary Leete, of Frameco Picture Framing Supplies, is a professional framer. For further information on any of the his DIY picture framing tools contact FrameCo P/L Australia, Ph: (03) 98723600 or visit the web site at http://www.clubframeco.com

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