Help with my easel ...

[IloveTLRs]

So I started printing last night, and in about an hour I got two pretty good prints. They came out crooked thought, so I thought I'd ask a few questions here to see if I could clear this up.

I'm a bit confused - what is the easel for? Does it just hold the paper flat, or does it mask off the white borders on prints? Do I set the enlarger to focus the image all the way to the edge of the sliding things on the easel, or do I set the borders myself? I'd like to have small white borders and of course, a straight image.

 

[bdial]

The easel holds the paper flat, and masks off the white borders.
Set the slides according to the size paper you are using, and the size of the border you would like.
One easy way to set things is to put a scrap print in face down, then mark the paper on two adjacent sides using the inside edge of each slide as a guide. Then turn the paper 180 degrees and see if the marks line up on the other two slides. If not adjust things so they do. I'm assuming you are using a four blade easel, but the procedure works for a two blade easel too.
If things aren't straight, there should be screws that you can loosen to square it up.

 

[IloveTLRs]

Thanks! I'm using a 2 blade easel.

 

[ic-racer]

Also make sure the paper is snug up to the left hand corner if its a 2 blade easel.

 

[IloveTLRs]

Also make sure the paper is snug up to the left hand corner if its a 2 blade easel.

Thanks. I played around again last night and got much better results