The beginning of February was dominated by mitered frames. I had three to build: one for the base, one for the film holder, and one for the ground glass. Unfortunately, the shipment of my ground glass was going to be a little delayed, so I left the frames for the film holder and the ground glass unfinished.

An example of one of those frames.

The poor negative holder still needs a mount.

The last set of mitered pieces required a little more work, as they were for the camera base. Along the inside edges, I cut a channel for the middle square that would fill out the base.

In an effort to get my frames to line up perfectly, I used the frame “guillotine” to trim the edges. Unfortunately, I got a bit absorbed and trimmed the frame a little too much. This resulted in a significantly smaller frame than I had planned for a base. Time for plan B.

But before I could get to Plan B, I needed to cut holes on the ends of the miters for the
disks that will hold the frame together with the biscuit joiner above.

The final result of the sides of the frame.

After I cut the inside square (with a tongue around all four sides that fits neatly into the inside grooves of the mitered frame) I glued all the pieces together, taking special care to “float” the middle square by gluing only the sides perpendicular to the grain, so that the wood can expand and contract without cracking. To make up for the slightly small dimensions, I put a thin mitered frame around the outside edge (plan B) so that the base and body had the same dimensions.

Posted under Camera Construction.
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