[loud drilling] [♪] If I say picture frames, and you start thinking miters and you get a little nervous, then this episode of the Woodsmith Shop is just for you.

Today, we'll be building three different frames, and there's not a miter joint in sight.

Instead, what you'll find are some great details, fun construction techniques, and some projects that you're sure to wanna build the next weekend that you have free in your shop.

So, stick around for the Woodsmith Shop .

ANNOUNCER 1: Major funding for the Woodsmith Shop has been provided by: ANNOUNCER 2: Old Masters.

Craftsman-quality stains and finishes, since 1953.

ANNOUNCER 1: Additional funding provided by: ANNOUNCER 2: Titebond wood glues, the pro's advantage.

ANNOUNCER 1: And by... ANNOUNCER 2: Kreg.

From the first cut to the final assembly, providing wood workers with products that help to simplify woodworking challenges.

Kreg.

ANNOUNCER 1: And by... [♪] You know, we had such a good time building the three versions of the smartphone app from our original plan.

I thought we could do the same thing with picture frames this time.

Now, for my picture frame, I chose a craftsman style frame.

I used white oak, and I did some craftsman style detailing.

You know, in my house, a more modern frame fits the décor a little bit better.

So, of course, I made a few changes in the plans, and decided to show you those.

My picture frame is one that's meant to sit on a desktop or on a bookcase, so it stands up.

It takes its design cues from Japanese architecture.

I changed things up by increasing the size of the parts just a little bit, just to make 'em stand out a little more visually.

And I did a lot of the shaping with hand tools, which is just plain fun.

All three of these frame styles lend themselves to change.

So, be creative, and have some fun.

But if you would like a free set of plans as a guideline, they're available on our website WoodsmithShop.com.

I'm gonna get things started, making my frame.

For the first frame that we're gonna be building, I'm taking one that's inspired by Japanese architecture.

We have a pair of long overhanging rails, covering a pair of narrow stiles.

Some curves that'll be cut later into both the rails and the stiles give it a little extra flair.

Now, for this particular frame, I'm gonna join the four pieces with short dowels.

Now, the plans called for making this frame and drilling the holes over at the drill press.

You don't need a big stationery machine to drill small holes like this.

Instead, what I'm gonna do is use a doweling jig and a hand drill to make all the holes.

What I've done already is to lay out the pieces in their final position, and then I marked centerlines where all of those holes are gonna be drilled.

So then, it's just a matter of taking one of my stiles, lining up the layout line with the guideline on the jig, and then I can clamp it in place.

And then I'll clamp this whole thing in my bench base.

Then I'm ready to drill the holes.

Drilling the holes in the top and bottom rails presents a little bit different of a challenge.

There's really not much for that to be clamped into the vice.

So, what I'll do, is I'll take the doweling jig, line up the two marks like I did before, and then clamp the jig to the rail.

And then I'm gonna set that assembly and just clamp the doweling jig now in the base.

Now I'm ready to drill the hole.

But what I don't wanna do is drill all the way through the rail where it would leave a hole on the bottom.

So instead, I've added a piece of tape to act as a depth stop, so that once the tape contacts the top of the doweling jig, I know that I can stop drilling.

And with the joinery complete, now I'm ready to start shaping the four pieces.

And I'm gonna start with the long rails.

To get the same curve on both pieces, I'm gonna attach them together using two pieces of double-sided tape.

I'm going to go light here on the double-sided tape, 'cause if you were to put a big strip on here, it'd be pretty difficult to get these two parts separated.

So, just to keep them aligned, I'll reference them on the bench here and then press them together.

You can also see that I've drawn in the arch or the curved profile along the upper and lower edges of those rails.

To do that, I marked the height of the arch and then bent a flexible steel rule, and then had a friend come and just trace it for me.

So, with that in place, I'm ready to start shaping.

Now, I could step over to the band saw and do this.

But I kind of like using hand tools.

So, I'm gonna clamp this in my vice.

And then I'm gonna shape it using a spokeshave.

I can just take long passes... and then in a relatively short amount of time, I can work right down to those layout lines.

As I get closer to my lines, I'm gonna reset the spokeshave for a finer cut to leave a smoother surface.

Then I can finish up with just some scraping and some sanding.

I'll shape the two stiles the exact same way, they will be ready to start some assembling.

[♪] Before I start gluing the pieces together, once they're shaped, what I wanna do is ease the edges on all the parts.

Now I'm not looking for a routed round over.

Something a little smaller, a little more friendly.

So, I'm just gonna do it with sandpaper.

What I'm looking for here is when I put the pieces together, that you can see that they're distinct, separate pieces.

So I've even eased the edges where the joint faces are, just to create that separation.

And I think it blends well with the overall shaping and profile of the parts.

So, now that I have all these pieces where I want them to be, I'm ready to start gluing this up.

What I'll do is take some glue and I'm gonna brush it on the ends of the dowels.

I'm gonna put those in the rail pieces first... and then on the exposed parts of the dowel, I can brush on just a little more glue to make them ready to accept the stiles.

A little bit of a squeeze with some clamps... just enough to hold the pieces together.

And once the glue sets up, we'll head over to the router table.

To create a pocket on the back of the frame, I'm gonna use a rabbeting bit here at the router table.

It creates a nice smooth rabbet that will hold the glass and the photo.

Using a rabbeting bit to create the pocket on the back of the frame is a good excuse to work on some hand skills, something I always enjoy doing.

That's because the bit can't create a square corner.

So I'll have to come back with a chisel and mallet and then square those up.

Takes a couple of seconds just for each corner and before you know it, you're all done.

The last thing that I did was to drill a couple of holes near the bottom edge of the lower rail.

And those hold couple of more dowels and work as a kickstand to hold the frame at a nice pleasing angle so you can just set it on a desktop or on a bookcase.

So, while Logan and Chris build their frames, I'm gonna be in the back, putting some finish on this one.

[♪] The second in our series of picture frames is going to be a craftsman style frame.

So, what makes for a craftsman style picture frame?

Well, first off, I've selected quarter sawn white oak so we have that wonderful flecking that's so iconic of craftsman style.

I've cut all my pieces from the same board, to ensure consistent color and consistent grain.

Next thing is, if you notice, there are two different levels happening here.

The rails are cut 5/8ths of an inch thick, while the stiles are three-quarter, and that creates a transition and a good shadow line.

The last element is going to be a pierced detail on each of the two stiles.

And so that's what makes a very simple frame, a craftsman frame.

So, I have all my parts planed to thickness, cut to width, cut to length.

My next step is to deal with these pierced details.

So, I'm now off to the drill press to get started.

The holes that begin and end each piercing are laid out with the interior dimensions in the frame.

The holes are drilled with a one-inch Forstner bit.

Well, we're ready to go ahead and connect the two holes that we previously drilled.

I've a 3/8th inch straight bit here in the router.

What we wanna do is incrementally cut our way up and through this piece of wood.

I'm going to raise the bit approximately a quarter of an inch each time, so we're not going to overfeed the bit, and we get a clean crisp cut.

The joinery for our picture frame couldn't be easier.

I'm using biscuits for the plate joiner.

I have on my parts, a mark, indicating where I need to cut the slot for the biscuits, and I've got one ready to go.

So now I'm gonna cut in my joints.

With the slots cut by the biscuit joiner, it's time to add the biscuits.

Now, I always like to put glue on both surfaces of any joint I glue up.

So, I'm going to put a little bit of glue on the slot and a little on the biscuit.

[♪] And then all that's left is to clean up the excess glue with a damp towel, and then it'll be ready to allow to dry, and go to the router table and route the rabbet that's going to hold the backer and the glass in place.

To retain the glass, the backer, and a picture of your choice, our next step is to route a rabbet around the interior back side of the frame.

So, in the router table, I've installed a one-quarter inch rabbeting bit.

I have it raised one-quarter inch above the table and I'm ready to start routing.

[♪] Router bits don't reach into corners very well.

So, to complete the rabbet, on the interior of our frame, I'm going to use a good sharp chisel and clean it up by hand.

[♪] Our construction's all finished on the craftsman style frame.

All that's left is for me to put up a piece of glass in the rabbet, my favorite picture, and the backer.

The backer, glass, picture sealant should be held in place by some turnbuckles.

I'll put a sawtooth hanger up top, and our picture frame will then be ready to hang on the wall.

For our final miterless picture frame, I'm gonna be building the one that's designated in the plans as the modern frame.

I'm gonna change it up a little bit, however, because what fun will it be to follow plans exactly.

So, as you could see here, I have my parts already cut to size.

And in the plans, the modern frame is made with cherry using a dyed black inlay.

Here, I have walnut, quite frankly 'cause I had it left over from a project already completed.

And instead of using a black inlay on walnut, which might look a little weird, I'm gonna go ultra-modern and use aluminum.

I think this will look pretty cool.

Now, the construction of this frame is pretty much identical to how Chris built the craftsman style one.

So, I'm not gonna bore you with that.

But I'm gonna show you the differences.

Instead of these rails and stiles, setting together like craftsman frame, these are arranged in a pinwheel type fashion.

That way, once we have those inlays in, they're gonna create a really interesting design as they swirl around the frame.

So, first thing we need to do is to cut a rabbet for those inlays.

Now, you can do this with a table saw or at the router table, and I'm sure that's what most of you guys are gonna do.

But, with me and straight grained walnut, that screams, grab a rabbet plane and get 'em cutting.

Let's take a look at rabbet planes, really quick, just so we know what we're looking at.

A rabbet plane is designated by the blade protruding through the sides, so the entire cut width is the width of the plane.

On a standard bench plane, like this guy, the blade doesn't go all the way to the edge.

You've about an 8th to 3/16ths on each edge that you don't actually cut.

But on the rabbet plane, that blade extends all the way to the sides.

So, it means we can cut rabbets into more pieces.

Now, there's a couple of different types of rabbet planes.

This one happens to be a rabbeting block plane.

I don't want that one.

You could use a wood rabbeting plane like this guy, hopefully one that's in a little bit better shape.

But I don't really want that either, and I'll show you why.

I've got a rabbeting block plane like this guy.

Now kind of looks like a transformer, but there's a couple of key features on here that I want, especially when I'm cutting a rabbet on the edge of a work piece that's pretty narrow like these guys.

The first, so I want a fence, and that's gonna position the blade so I can control where I'm cutting the rabbet.

Now if I was cutting the rabbet on the face of one of these pieces, sure, I can use one of these other rabbeting planes and clamp a board up against it.

But because we're cutting the rabbets on the edge here, there's no way we can clamp a board.

So, the fence is key.

The other thing, is it has a depth stop, so I'll be able to accurately control the depth of the rabbet.

So, not only can I position it with the fence but control the depth.

Then, sharp blade, and this one happens to be skewed and that's just gonna help us all-round.

So, the first thing I want to do is, I'm gonna position these where I like the grain orientation, and I'm gonna mark the edges that we're gonna rabbet.

Just to keep myself cutting the rabbets on the right spots so I don't get confused.

Okay.

Okay.

Now I know those Xs are where I want my rabbets.

So, let's get these clamped up on the bench.

All right, now there's a couple of settings on this rabbet plane that are pretty important.

The first is the width of the fence.

And I'm gonna size that so it's a hair narrower than my aluminum stock.

That's when it'll cause these inlays to sit a little proud of the service, just to be a little bit of a decorative touch.

The next thing is the depth stop, and I've set that so it is pretty close to the same size as the thickness of my bar stock.

If it's a little deeper, that's alright.

I'll come back with a hand plane after I'm done and flush it all up.

So, with that, we're gonna start cutting.

[♪] Alright, so now we have all the rabbets cut for our inlays, we're going to tackle the inlays themselves.

Now, aluminum comes from manufacturer, usually with a little bit oxidation on it and some manufacturing numbers.

So, to make it look a little better, I'm gonna hit these with some sandpaper.

Alright, I'm just going for a brushed matt look on all these.

Once we have them done, let's get them glued in place.

Now, to glue these in, you could probably use super glue.

Now, once you put the frame together, it'll hold together pretty well.

But here, this is where I like to use Two Part Epoxy.

In five minutes, it's plenty of working time, and it will dry, so we can keep building as you go along.

Now I like to have the ones that have this built-in syringe that allows you to mix as you dispense it.

Let's do a thin bead.

Okay.

I'll press the aluminum into place.

I'm gonna use a block and some clamps that hold it there while it dries.

[♪] Alright.

Now I have my frame all assembled.

And like I mentioned before, the process is exactly the same that Chris used for his.

I cut a biscuit slot into each of the joints and then I glued the biscuit in place and tightened everything down with clamps.

Now I've a little bit of cleanup work to do, once I pull the clamps off.

But at this point, it's pretty much complete.

One thing that's left to take care of is that rabbet in the back.

Now I'll do it the same way that Chris did, using a rabbeting bit on a router table.

Then once that's done, a couple of coats of finish, and I'll be ready with my favorite picture in it and hang it on the wall.

Alright, to finish up the frames, we're gonna talk a little bit about the finish and then some of the hardware that you need to do to just wrap things up.

Now one of the first things is like on the back of mine, you know, I already talked about having some dowels to use as the stand.

But then, I backed the photo with some 8-inch hardboard material, and then they're held in place with brass turn buttons.

Now to give the picture a way to hang on the wall, I used a simple sawtooth hanger.

It's held down by two brads, easy, works great.

And you know, I'm not sure if this is going to go on my wall or if it's gonna sit on a shelf yet.

I'm thinking I might mortise in a couple of aluminum feet to give it a kind of shelf presence like yours has... - Oh, that'd be so cool.

- Yeah.

And to finish mine, you know, I actually have started using an oil blend underneath a lacquer, especially for walnut.

I think it really gives it a nice rich depth.

And I really like the color.

It does.

Now for my frame, I just used a couple of coats of oil.

Now mine is, my tried and true, especially when I'm in a little bit of a hurry, so I used some shellac, wipe down three coats.

It gets a little bit of a build, a little bit of a shine, but just doesn't look too glossed over.

Was that a clear shellac or was it a colored shellac?

It was the clear shellac.

And once again, if you'd like plans for building your own frames, they're at our website WoodsmithShop.com.

So, what do you think we're gonna do next time though?

Carrom boards?

- Ooh... - Great.

That'll be fun.

Yeah.

If you're anything like me, you probably have a couple of small pieces of wood that you've been saving or collecting for just the right project.

Picture frames like this don't take a lot of material, or frankly, a lot of time to make.

If you'd like to make 'em, you can find plans at our website WoodsmithShop.com.

Once you've done building, you can join us here, next time, for another episode of the Woodsmith Shop .

[♪] NARRATOR: If you'd like to get more video tips and techniques, sign up for the free weekly Woodsmith eTip.

Every week, you'll receive an email with a video tip, to get more out of your table saw, router table and more.

Sign up at WoodsmithShop.com.

Everything in today's show comes from the newly expanded Woodsmith Guild Edition, with shop projects, plans, tips and techniques.

To get a free preview issue of the Woodsmith Guild Edition and a free Woodsmith book, go to WoodsmithShop.com.

In addition, past seasons of the Woodsmith Shop are available on DVD, or you can watch them online from your computer, tablet or mobile device.

For more information, go to WoodsmithShop.com.

ANNOUNCER 1: Major funding for the Woodsmith Shop has been provided by: ANNOUNCER 2: Old Masters.

Craftsman-quality stains and finishes, since 1953.

ANNOUNCER 1: Additional funding provided by: ANNOUNCER 2: Titebond wood glues, the pro's advantage.

ANNOUNCER 1: And by... ANNOUNCER 2: Kreg.

From the first cut to the final assembly, providing wood workers with products that help to simplify woodworking challenges.

Kreg.

ANNOUNCER 1: And by... [♪]