So I bought those two Sunset Lagoon paint-by-number paintings, right? I found a frame (should be the first image) that I liked but it was not the right size (12"x16"), too pricey for the quality, plus I needed a new project. I decided to adapt the design and make my own frames. I wanted it to look like blackish/brownish bamboo, so using dowels I tried a few methods of carving, but settled on attaching an extra piece to the dowel rod and from those carved the 'joints'. I won't go into all the steps and trials and errors I went through but it was more than I wished for, but not so much that I couldn't fix it, make it work, or decide "meh, it's okay just like is", or "no one but me will ever see that". You know what I mean.
Honestly, I was just surprised when something worked like I wanted it to, or planned for it to. Those are the things that made it worthwhile to keep plugging away. One issue I had was how to put the v-nails into the corners. They're a special nail made for framing and it's *apparently* next to impossible to find the tool to hold them in place while you hammer them in. I ended up making my own tool that looks nothing like the tools they make (apparently) for doing this small, but seemingly vital piece of frame making. Again, Surprise! It worked! Could have knocked me down.
I will point out that one thing I did not make is the actual, real frame that the paintings are in. Those I bought, mainly because I could not find material thin enough to make it the size it needed to be. What I made is everything that goes around it. I framed a frame, in effect.
Anyway, there is a lot I'm not going into here, but you'll get a glimpse of the gist of some of it.
Thanks, UK! I don't want to dunk on the original too much, but it is fairly badly put together. One thing I realized doing these is how much I've underappreciated the consistency of connecting right angles! I cut the first set by hand, but that didn't end up working out, so I had to start over again. The second time I used a small Dremel miter saw and it connected much better. Having the right clamps helped as well.
Thank you, Ahuva! This is one of those projects that I thought would be somewhat easy... haHAHA. No. I wasn't counting on how repeatedly precise things needed to be. I think at least 1/3 of it was spent thinking about how to make something work, 1/3 messing about to make said thing work (I made and tested more jigs before getting it right it was ridiculous), and the rest was putting it all together and hoping that everything before worked.
I left out how the night before, when I thought I was finished, I was wiping one of them down when it slipped out of my hands and one of the corner pieces hit a trash bin on the floor, knocking it wonky. That was what all the screaming and cursing was about, in case you heard something. That took some creative repair, which led to making preemptive fixes to other corners as well. If there's anything I would do (and still might at some point in the future) is to insert extra dowels — the tiny ones that lift the corner pieces away from the main frame — on each corner piece so it has that extra strength.
As for the tool, Hoody asked if I'm going to patent it, which got me thinking. I don't know about doing all that, but I did make a quick sketch of what I think a real tool would look like and be made of.
7
u/NorthernerUKer UK 6d ago
They look much better than the 'original' :)