Things have been quite hectic with projects for me and Rachel, so this post is coming a bit late.  My apologies for the delay.  In this series of posts, I will go over how I print and frame, and why I decided to go this route, and the costs advantage of going the DIY route.   I’ll preface this post by identifying my target audience:  You’re considering printing and matting to save money and increase your profit margin from selling matted and framed art,  and you’re targetting the average consumer for your artwork.  Let’s be honest:  If you’re someone like Chase Jarvis, or if you’re fairly well booked wedding photographer, your time is probably more valuable taking pictures than trying to save a few bucks matting and framing your stuff.

Above is an example piece I did.  Cost of materials is about $55.00, plus the raw material cost of the print.  Print size is 12″ x 18″, printed using Canon dye-based ink on Canon Platinum Pro photo paper (A3+ size).  The framing profiles used  are Nielsen-Bainbridge #11 profiles in German Silver.  All mats are archival, acid-free mats – note that it is a double mat (with secondary border) around the photo.

Cost Analysis and Print Pricing:

One of the traditions that Rachel and I have is that we always try to visit a local farmer’s market every week.  Inevitably, there will be someone out there selling prints and artwork, and being photo geeks, we’d be drawn towards the booth like a furry little footrest going after a doggie biscuit.  And whenever I look another photographer’s work, I look at:

• What they shoot
• How they present their prints
• What they charge

And lately, the prices have been falling.  I’ve seen framed artwork, about 6″ x 6″, go for as little as $40.00.  Another vendor at the Fremont Solstice market was selling 12″ x 36″ panos, framed, for $195.  And let’s face it, with the US entering what most people have termed the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, discretionary spending is going to be down – way down.  Pretty objects to hang on walls certainly falls under discretion spending catagory.  Given what commercial frame shops charge – and let’s face it, they are good people trying to make a living in tough economic times too – it’s quite obvious that the only way these artists can be making money at these prices is by doing all the grunt work themselves, and hoping that increased volume will increase revenue.

In this post, we’ll go over the raw materials and cost data.  These prices are current as of Summer of 2009.  It’ll give you an idea of your “Cost of goods sold”.  You can then factor in your labor costs and know where your base-line pricing for your prints are.

Elements of a Framed Artwork

A framed artwork, for the purpose of our discussion, contains:

• The print – what you’re displaying.
• A frame.  Assumed to be a simple aluminum frame.
• “Lites”, or the protective, transparent cover.  Either glass, or acrylic.
• Mats.
• Dressing for the frame – the hanger wires, etc.

The print:

We’ll cover our experiences with printing in separate posts – Rachel uses a Canon Pixma Pro 9000 series printer – which is a very good, desktop sized, A3+ (13″ x 19″) printer that uses a dye based ink.  Terence uses an Epson Stylus Pro 4000 wide-format printer that’s been rescued and lovingly restored.  It is a 17″ wide roll-feed capable machine (paper tray will feed ANSI C paper @ 17″ x 22″) that uses pigment based ink.

The general rule of thumb is that for 4″ x 6″s, Costco, Walmart, etc, all have very competitive pricing – pricing that home users can’t hope to touch.  However, bigger than 8″ x10″s home users will see a benifit.  Then there is also the instant gratification of being able to see a print right away…

The Frame

I chose to go with metal framing for a few reasons – I like the look of a good brushed, anodized piece of aluminum, and I *hate* gluing.  It is also relatively easy to assemble a metal frame – only simple hand tools are needed if you buy pre-cut extrusions.

The Neilsen-Bainbridge company have been in business for quite a while – and they have a line of aluminum framing extrusions.  Most commonly, you’ll find them in pre-cut kits from a well-stocked arts supply store.  I use Daniel Smith for my art supplies – and this is Neilsen-Bainbridge #11 profile, in precut form:

Note that it takes 2 kits to form a complete frame.  The lengths are the X and Y measurements on a frame – so if you need a frame that’s 22″ x 30″, buy the 22″ kit, and buy the 30″ kit.  The extrusions are cut approximately 1/8″ to 3/16″ over norminal, to allow for the thickness of the aluminum profile and tolerance for the mat and glass.  This typically is typically not a concern for most people, unless you’re setting up an assembly line and are trying to calculate packaging and shelving space requirements.

Each of the frame kits also comes with half of a frame hardware kit:

These are the angle brackets for assembling the frame, the spring clips, and the clip for securing the hanging wires.  If you purchased the framing extrusions pre-cut, the ends are already cut with a 45 degree miter and deburred for you:

See how clean the cuts are?  If you’re going the DIY route and cutting the extrusions from stock 10ft lengths, you’ll need a good power miter saw, or a good fine-teeth hacksaw in a guided miter box to achieve this.  Cutting a thin aluminum profile this cleanly is no easy feat.  You’ll need a fine teeth carbide blade optimized for non-ferrous materials – an 80 teeth 10″ blade, with cutting lubricant, would be a good starting point, plus a scarificial fence setup to support the material to prevent tear-through.  Note that a blade like that costs more than my first chopsaw I bought in college.  Below is a shot with the hardware kit installed and the frame fitted together:

A cost table for pre-cut extrusions can be found here.  The astute reader will note that the pricing of the extrusion goes up per linear inch the shorter the extrusions are.  The really obssessive number crunchers will make the assumption that the pricing follows a linear equation of price = 2a*x + y; where a = cost per linear inch, x is the length of each piece in inches and y is the fixed cost element of the pricing – the costs of the mounting hardware, the store’s profits, etc.  Using linear curve fitting, one can arrive at the cost model of 13 cents per inch for the extrusion and about $4.80 for the fixed cost.   The verification of these figures shall be left as an exercise to the reader .

In an ever obsessive quest to “get a better price”, I started calling around to track down the wholesale distributor of these framing extrusions.  I found one place locally that carries it in 10 ft lengths.  Unfortunately they require a UBI number before they will sell you anything.  Price is $1.77 per foot – about 15c per inch, and a hardware kit costs $1.50.  Looking at the costing data above, this is a savings of, on average, of approximately $8.10 per frame, for cutting it yourself, vs buying pre-cut extrusions.  This does not include the wear and tear, and resharpening expense, of a carbide blade, the initial investment of a miter saw, plus the mess and headache of working with a miter saw and the clean-up time afterwards.  This is also assuming that I don’t have to buy and store additional scrap pieces, left over from cutting 10ft sections.  It is therefore my conclusion that unless I am doing a HUGE amount of framing, to standard sizes, it is not worth my time and effort to do the cuts myself.  (If I’m doing 10 – 20 frames at one time, then the analysis results would be different.  There, I can afford to setup a production stop guide, and at 10 frames, a savings of $81.00 might be worth it to lug out the saw, set it up and cut all my extrusions).

What if you don’t see a frame you like in the precut framing kit section?  You can order custom framing extrusions, cut to order, from the following vendors:

Daniel Smith – PictureFrames.com – AmericanFrame

Lites

In frame shop terminology, “Lites”, or glazing, refers to the glass or acrylic covering the artwork.  This serves to provide protection from the prints – in cases such as Ilford Smooth Pearl / Ilford Smooth Gloss paper, this is important for print archival as the porous microceramic coating on the paper is very susceptable to gas-fading.

In this department, the two most common, affordable choices are single strength window glass and acrylic.  Do not be tempted to use more shatter-resistant polycarbonate for framing – it may be more impact resistant, but it scratches a lot easier.

Glass can be purchased, cut to size, from the local Lowes.  Interestingly enough, Home Depot does not sell glass, cut to size, but Lowes does.  You buy from a pre-cut size and you get 2 cuts free.  Someone from the hardware department will operate the glass cutter for you.  Just remember that cut glass is really just broken glass with the break in a straight line – the edges are razor sharp and will draw blood at the slightest provocation.  In fact, most framing injuries occur with the sharp glass edge.  Make sure you wear leather work gloves when cleaning / handling glass.

Acrylic for framing comes in two grades:  plain, and reflection controlled.  Plain acrylic is just that – clear plastic.  Reflection controlled acrylic had been given a slight texture on one side to cut down on the amount of light reflected off the plastic’s surface.  When framed with an artwork close to the acrylic, this matt texture isn’t apparent, from normal viewing angles.  One can see the difference in the test shot below:

The glazing on the left is reflection controlled acrylic, the glazing on the right is plain window glass.  You’re seeing the glare from the overhead florescent lights in my garage in this shot.  Note that the reflection controlled stuff diffuses out the light evenly and improves somewhat the visibility of the text underneath.   Due to how reflection-controlled acrylic works, the print must be framed fairly close to the glazing.  Therefore, it’ll be very difficult to use this material with deep shadow boxes.

Reflection controlled acrylic is $5.45 per square foot from Tap Plastics, a local vendor, cut to size.  I started using glass, but have now switched over to this stuff, as it’s a lot safer to handle.  It comes with protective paper backing, so I don’t have to spend time cleaning it.  The drawback is that in the process of removing the paper backing, a lot of static electricity can be generated and the plastic becomes a dust magnet.  Still, this is nothing that a quick wipe with alcohol and lint-free wipe can’t fix.  As with any framing material, do not use ammonia-bearing cleaners, such as windex, to clean the glass /plastic, as degassing ammonia will greatly decrease the print’s life.  I’ve found that a mild detergent and distilled water / rubbing alcohol works quite well for cleaning.

One step up from reflection controlled acrylic would be anti-reflective glass.  This is glass that received an optical coating, by means of chemical vapor deposition.  Needless to say, this is very expensive, “museum grade” material.  Personally, if I ever need to frame stuff this way, I’ll go to the local frame shop.

In the next article, we’ll talk about the different types of mats, and the tools to work with them.  Stay tuned.