picture frame wood choice

[thetyreman]

I am going to make a handmade picture frame, I've had a photo professionally printed to a size of 8 x 8 inches, it's going to be a birthday present for the brother.

The photo is black and white photography, so I'm looking for something that compliments that, what wood species is a good choice?

I've got some rippled ash, curly cherry, quartersawn tiger oak, quartersawn beech, brazilian mahogany, and just regular american white oak, and a huge amount of pine and spruce, custard sent me some extremely nice figured woods in august last year, not sure if this would be a good project to use them on, I'm tempted to save the super figured woods for a chess board you see...

could do with some advice, cheers,

Ben.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Keep it plain. People are supposed to look at the picture, not the frame.

 

[poliopete]

Hi Ben

I would be considering a black frame for the black and white photo. You can hand finish a suitable length of moulding.

Most importantly the photo should not be touching the glass. A mount or even a double mount would help preserve and protect the photo. The double mount could perhaps be 3/16ths of black mountboard and 2 or even 3 inches of white mountboard as a top mount. Don't forget to have a piece of mount card (any colour) between the back of the photo and the frame back.

A local picture framer would advise and cut the mounts professionally with a nice bevel to fit your frame.

Good luck.

Peter.

 

[Chris152]

Another vote for black, with an off-white (v light grey) mount. But - sounds like you have some nice wood there and it might be a shame to paint it, could you ebonize? (I wouldn't know where to start but there are some good threads on here about it.)
Another option might be to push the cherry or mahogany toward a deep red, which I also think could work well with B&W.

 

[thetyreman]

there won't be a mount in this case, if you could see the picture you'd understand, it would just look wrong with a mount, but I'll use mount card for the back.

I'm using pegboard that I made from hardboard by drilling holes in it as the backing board, so that it can breathe.

I might consider ebonising or dying the wood frame, I really like the idea of a red dye or red colour, agree that it goes well with black and white, painted red pine might look a bit tacky though, worried that it could ruin it...ah decisions decisions, it's got to be complete by Tuesday night, so no pressure

 

[Geoff_S]

It's all personal taste, but for me wood frames don't go with black & white.

I would favour black, but another option might be a shade of grey. Already said, it's the picture not the frame and black might overpower
the picture (Dunno, I haven't seen the picture )

 

[JWD]

maybe Get some black dye for the white oak?- will look amazing with the grain, not too expensive, you could wax it afterwards and it'll really suit the B&W pic

 

[custard]

I'm with Geoff, it's entirely your personal choice but I think of bare wood frames as great for watercolours, but for B&W photos then black with a mount would be the first choice.

Another thing to consider is that 8" x 8", especially without a mount, is very small. So to prevent the frame overpowering the image you need a correspondingly small frame. Ironically small frames are a lot harder for DIY purposes than medium sized frames. The frame might only be about 9mm wide, and without a framer's underpinner that's awfully fiddly to make, rebate, joint, and assemble using only standard woodworking tools.

You can buy frame materials from wholesalers like Lion, or you can find smaller off-cuts on Ebay, just search using the description "frame moulding".

 

[custard]

One other thing, for a quality archival job you need acid free mount board. Cardboard and pegboard will lead to discolouration of the photo over time.

 

[woodbrains]

there won't be a mount in this case, if you could see the picture you'd understand, it would just look wrong with a mount, but I'll use mount card for the back.

I'm using pegboard that I made from hardboard by drilling holes in it as the backing board, so that it can breathe.

I might consider ebonising or dying the wood frame, I really like the idea of a red dye or red colour, agree that it goes well with black and white, painted red pine might look a bit tacky though, worried that it could ruin it...ah decisions decisions, it's got to be complete by Tuesday night, so no pressure

Hello,

As advised above, the picture should not touch the glass. If you don't want a mount, to should still use a mount board slip, to create a gap between glass and picture.

Mike.