The Framers Forum

Just a quick hi,

I'm looking to set up my picture framing business after a local business left me with sour grapes. A landscape photographer with an interest in making things (joiner by trade), so it makes sense to get this up and running, especially with my photography contacts working in my favour. I've bought the tools to do so after being made redundant before xmas, so now going full time freelance photographer, and hoping to make a business from the framing side of it too.

Anyhow, that's enough about me, I do go off on one once started. I look forward to being a part of what looks like a great forum.

Martin.

Welcome Martin, sounds like a move you should have made ages ago!

pramsay13 wrote:Welcome Martin, sounds like a move you should have made ages ago!

Thank you pramsay13

Hello Martin and welcome to the forum,

It must be hard getting made redundant just before Christmas. I hope that things will go better for you, now that you will be working for yourself. There are other photographer/framers on the forum, so you should be able to get to know some of them and if required pick their brains a bit too!

Nice to have you on board,
Mark

Good Luck Pram

With the right mindset you can make it

ps have sent you an email

Ian

Hi Martin,

I am a full time landscape & commercial photographer myself who also does my own printing and framing. I was happily using a local guy who did both Printing and framing for around six years and then I moved house and it became uneconomical to drive over an hour to pick up a picture and then drive all the way back from my framer. For larger orders all at once this was not a problem, but I would often get the odd one or two framed orders coming through each week and it was a real pain just for those.

I tried a few of the framers who were local to me here at the new address, but they were all quoting around £60 to £70 for an A4 picture to be framed and mounted where I was currently being charged around £25 all in with the printing. With printing and packaging costs on top of the new quotes by the time I would add my mark up, no customer would be prepared to pay that for photography. I tried one online place and the picture was dispatched direct to the customer and arrived broken, they then sent a replacement which also arrived broken.

I also knew a lot of other photographers and would often be asked who I recommend for printing and framing, so in the end I decided how hard could it be. (It was a lot harder than I thought) I knew photoshop and colour management already and had an A2 printer so I then purchased a 24inch printer from a photographer I knew who was closing his gallery. I then started with the printing side before slowly buying second-hand framing gear from Ebay. I then found out a family friend was actually a retired picture framer and still had all the gear and he then volunteered to teach me. I also got a bit of one to one Training from Jan Stanlick who I believe is a member here, this was actually great as it was all in my own workshop and a lot of it was spent getting my gear properly calibrated which I had tried to do previously, but just couldn’t get my Morso or mountcutter to work consistently the way I wanted. This really was money well spent as I had ruined so much mountboard and mouldings and the costs soon adds up.

After two years of being up and running I would now say I am finally happy with the set-up and speed I can do the frames in, although I need to come up with a better way of packaging the frames as although they always get there is perfect condition they seem to take forever for me to package. In the early days I am sure I actually lost money on producing my own frames because of the mistakes and wastage, especially with matt black mouldings which would scratch just by looking at them.

I do my own printing and framing for my own orders now and also do a bit for other local photographers and artists that I know. It works quite well with the photography job too as you have lots of potential customers in other photographers and they know lots of other photographers etc. The forum is a great place for learning too and I am always learning new things from here every day.

The best of luck with your new venture

good luck Martin

being made redundant is never pleasant but it could be the best thing that has happened to you. who knows!
you'll get some good advice on here

all the best for the future.

Not your average framer wrote:Hello Martin and welcome to the forum,

It must be hard getting made redundant just before Christmas. I hope that things will go better for you, now that you will be working for yourself. There are other photographer/framers on the forum, so you should be able to get to know some of them and if required pick their brains a bit too!

Nice to have you on board,
Mark

Thank you Mark, it's been a struggle the past couple of months, but things are looking up now

silvercleave wrote:Good Luck Pram

With the right mindset you can make it

ps have sent you an email

Ian

Thanks Ian, although I think you got the wrong person? lol

Chris_h wrote:Hi Martin,

I am a full time landscape & commercial photographer myself who also does my own printing and framing. I was happily using a local guy who did both Printing and framing for around six years and then I moved house and it became uneconomical to drive over an hour to pick up a picture and then drive all the way back from my framer. For larger orders all at once this was not a problem, but I would often get the odd one or two framed orders coming through each week and it was a real pain just for those.

I tried a few of the framers who were local to me here at the new address, but they were all quoting around £60 to £70 for an A4 picture to be framed and mounted where I was currently being charged around £25 all in with the printing. With printing and packaging costs on top of the new quotes by the time I would add my mark up, no customer would be prepared to pay that for photography. I tried one online place and the picture was dispatched direct to the customer and arrived broken, they then sent a replacement which also arrived broken.

I also knew a lot of other photographers and would often be asked who I recommend for printing and framing, so in the end I decided how hard could it be. (It was a lot harder than I thought) I knew photoshop and colour management already and had an A2 printer so I then purchased a 24inch printer from a photographer I knew who was closing his gallery. I then started with the printing side before slowly buying second-hand framing gear from Ebay. I then found out a family friend was actually a retired picture framer and still had all the gear and he then volunteered to teach me. I also got a bit of one to one Training from Jan Stanlick who I believe is a member here, this was actually great as it was all in my own workshop and a lot of it was spent getting my gear properly calibrated which I had tried to do previously, but just couldn’t get my Morso or mountcutter to work consistently the way I wanted. This really was money well spent as I had ruined so much mountboard and mouldings and the costs soon adds up.

After two years of being up and running I would now say I am finally happy with the set-up and speed I can do the frames in, although I need to come up with a better way of packaging the frames as although they always get there is perfect condition they seem to take forever for me to package. In the early days I am sure I actually lost money on producing my own frames because of the mistakes and wastage, especially with matt black mouldings which would scratch just by looking at them.

I do my own printing and framing for my own orders now and also do a bit for other local photographers and artists that I know. It works quite well with the photography job too as you have lots of potential customers in other photographers and they know lots of other photographers etc. The forum is a great place for learning too and I am always learning new things from here every day.

The best of luck with your new venture

Thank you very much Chris. It's nice to know that there are success stories to be had by being a photographer and framer, and who knows, in the future, I may start my own printing too, but one step at a time

Timh wrote:good luck Martin

being made redundant is never pleasant but it could be the best thing that has happened to you. who knows!
you'll get some good advice on here

all the best for the future.

Thank you Tim, I think it's already turning out to be a blessing in disguise, although being made redundant after 11 years of doing my daily job, it was a very strange place to be in. Always looking on the bright side though