
This is my first attempt at building a driftwood frame. The degree of difficulty is a little high when you are working with wood that is not square but the reward is very high because now I can get away from the boring same old type of frames that people have been using for years. This is one log that I found in the woods next to the spillway of Gardner Lake. Living on a lake is great if you're a nature artist like me.
I started by ripping the log into quarters on my table saw. Obviously I couldn't use the rip fence on the saw so I just took it off and ripped it freehand by eyeballing it. after that I just laid the wood out in a square and marked where I wanted the 45 degree angles at the corners. After I cut those I had to go back to the saw and adjust the angles several times because of the non typical irregularities in the wood. After I got all of that figured out I screwed it together and laid it on a piece of thin finished plywood with a nice smooth finish on it. I traced the outline of the frame onto the plywood and cut it out with a band saw. I almost forgot, after I quartered the wood I had to soak the wood in bleach water for 24 hours to kill the bugs and clean the wood real good. I also brushed the wood real good with a stiff bristled scrub brush. Now back to the plywood, after I cut the outline of the frame out of the plywood, I glued it to the back of the frame and screwed it on. I laid the picture in the frame to see how it looked, but the painting looked like it set down inside the frame too much and was overshadowed by the high sides of the frame. My wife gave me the idea of making the painting appear to be floating inside the frame. With this in mind, I had to build a second frame with 2 x 4 lumber that is about a half inch shorter than the length and the width of the painting. I also cut out a 3/4" x 3/4" edge out of the 2x4 frame all of the way around to make sure the viewer cannot see the edge of the floating frame which is attached to the back of the painting to lift it up off of the main outside frame. I stained the inside of the main frame black and spray painted the floating 2x4 frame black to further hide it from the viewers eye. I then positioned the floating frame inside the mainframe without the painting attached to square it up and get the position I liked. With the floating frame in position, I then drilled 4 small holes down through the floating frame and through the plywood of the main frame. This helped me keep the position I wanted by marking it with these holes. I then screwed the floating frame into the back of the painting (make real sure that the screws are not too long because it would really suck if you poked a screw through the face of your finished painting). Now it was simply a matter of lining the predrilled holes back up between the floating frame and the driftwood frame and screwing it in from the back. Again, I cannot stress this enough, if you're not used to working with tools or wood and you feel like trying this out be real careful to check the length of your screws before screwing one in that is going to come straight through the face of your painting if it's too long!

You can see in this picture how the painting sets up from the back as though it's floating. I suggest that you paint the edges of your canvases like I do because this wouldn't look too good with a white edge showing.

Here is a view from the left side just to complete everything.
Hopefully this inspires your creativity and I would like to thank you all for reading my blogs. Don't hesitate to email me any questions or comments. PAINE OUT!
Commentaires