Made a Contact Frame for School

[seabee1999]

Good day all, I just wanted to share a few images of a contact frame I made for a class in school. I am currently taking online classes with the Academy of Art Univ. in San Francisco. The class I am taking is an alternative processes class (cyanotypes, Van Dyke Browns, etc) and one of the things need for the class was the ability to make contact prints. One solution was to buy a frame, the school offered another solution of clamping glass to a back or another piece of glass. Being a bit handy and lacking funds to buy outright a contact print frame, I decided to design one in CAD and build it. It is made of some scrap furniture grade walnut plywood, a few course thread screws and hardware from Home Depot. I think in all, the total coast was $25 in material and about 4 hours of time. PM me if you'd like the PDF schismatic I used to make this.

R/
Dave

https://seabee1999.smugmug.com/Frame/i-cqLvBqj/0/O/frame.jpg

https://seabee1999.smugmug.com/Frame/i-fT4GRWC/0/O/frame%202.jpg

[AtlantaTerry]

Excuse me, I'm no expert in this field but to me this design looks like massive overkill. I say this because I remember from summer YMCA camp in the mid-50s when we were using Kodak contact frames, the wood back only had one piece of spring steel that rotated on a pivot while you pressed on the ends of the steel to slide them into grooves cut into the two long sides. Simple, yet effective.

Oh, and the part of the back that faced the glass was covered with felt.

See photos: https://www.google.com/search?q=images+Kodak+contact+frame&rlz=1C1GGGE_enUS403&espv=2&biw=1910&bih=998&tbm=isch&imgil=fPVxm651UOXy_M%253A%253BANEGOxLHFY8AoM%253Bhttps%25253A%25252F%25252Fwww.etsy.com%25252Flisting%25252F128125963%25252Fvintage-1916-kodak-auto-mask-4x5-print&source=iu&pf=m&fir=fPVxm651UOXy_M%253A%252CANEGOxLHFY8AoM%252C_&usg=__QrzWtqtrTpJsrWNRcpnP6CuHW1w%3D&ved=0CDAQyjdqFQoTCPPPiJ-v2scCFYppPgodXecE1A&ei=W_rnVbO2DIrT-QHdzpOgDQ#imgrc=fPVxm651UOXy_M%3A&usg=__QrzWtqtrTpJsrWNRcpnP6CuHW1w%3D

[Louie Powell]

I can't disagree with the general concept of making a tool rather than buying an expensive commercial product because I do it all the time. In fact, I made a contact printing frame when I was learning Pt/Pd printing.

But in this case, I share Terry's concern. The main issue here would be the apparent inconvenience of having to deal with six bolts whenever this frame is opened or closed.

The main function of the metal spring in the design Terry mentioned is to apply pressure across the back to assure tha there is intimate contact between the negative and the print. In my frame, I did that by making the back a hinged split back that is held in place with four rotating wooded clips. To create the pressure, I attached a sheet of craft foam to the face of the back. Closing the back and rotating the clips to hold the back in place compresses the foam, thereby creating the pressure between the back and the glass on the front of the frame.

[seabee1999]

Thanks all for sharing your thoughts on this this matter. When I did searches for images on something I could easily make, an image I saw on Google showed one similar to this one. Look, I am not the best designer nor the best at building something. I just needed something that could work. If it works and there is a slight "inconvenience" to remove a few bolts and saved me a few dollars, I think I was fairly successful. I do remember seeing a felt on the backs but I forgot to add it. I will do that at a later time.

R/
Dave

[BrianShaw]

definitely built to survive combat situations!

Maybe you could retrofit it with wing nuts. Also converting to a hinged back will be useful to assess exposure.

[Tin Can]

Thanks all for sharing your thoughts on this this matter. When I did searches for images on something I could easily make, an image I saw on Google showed one similar to this one. Look, I am not the best designer nor the best at building something. I just needed something that could work. If it works and there is a slight "inconvenience" to remove a few bolts and saved me a few dollars, I think I was fairly successful. I do remember seeing a felt on the backs but I forgot to add it. I will do that at a later time.

R/
Dave

Good for you! You made it and nicely. Sharpshooters spoil success...without...

:)

[Bruce Schultz]

Use an air wrench and you can have it bolted up in just a few seconds, and tighten that thing down to 100 foot pounds.

[seabee1999]

Thanks for the laugh Bruce. Randy, thank you for your perspective. Brian, I was looking to wing type nuts but my wife and daughter were with me at the store and they were becoming impatient . I may just change them out at a later time. I might hinge the back later as well. I have an idea that might work for that.

R/
Dave

[A_Tabor]

Take a page from industrial fabrication design and set yourself up a custom multi-driver rig for the air wrench so it turns them all at the same time... Get really fancy and add independent pressure sensors for a more even load balance...

But a more serious suggestion would be to at least change the holes for the bolts on the edge to rest in U-slots. Looks like you have to take the nuts all the way off to effectively open it, but you should be able to use a simple design that lets you back them off just a little, and then slide the bars out to the left or right.

Replacing the centre bolts with some manner of leaf spring may also be an easy and useful change that doesn't need much modification to what you currently have.


Personally I'm kind of drawn to gravity frames, that sandwich everything between thick glass plates. So many designs that rely on mechanical pressure application to keep things tight seem to also use fairly thin glass, which has me paranoid that I would crack the glass and scratch a fame.