How to lay a big piece of fb paper flat?

[agraveman]

Hello all. I was asked to make a print to the size of 36'' by 24'', using only a vertical enlarger. Thankfully, I found a De Vere enlarger whose baseboard is big enough for such work. The problem now becomes to lay a large piece of fb paper flat without an easel, since I can't find such a big easel? Thank you.

 

[Rick A]

If you are handy you can fab a vacuum easel. really not too awfully difficult. A piece of 19mm plywood with a series of grooves routed in it resembling the veins in a leaf. Then overlay with a piece of pegboard, and a frame around it. The hardest part to fab is the hose connection from the BB to whatever the vac source is. I have a vacuum back from a copy camera, but it is only 18x24 inches. I also have the vac motor and hose.

Rick

 

[JCJackson]

Why not try photo corners, as used for archival mounting? If you are printing a fairly wide border, you could also use weights.

 

[Mike Wilde]

A piece of ferrous metal on the baseboard, and all the annoying little plastic fridge magnets off the fridge and down to the darkroom.

 

[Shaggysk8]

Or maybe, you could paint a board the size you want in that magnetic paint, then then use long strip magnets

Paul

 

[Vaughn]

A flat piece of material sprayed with some type of light adhesive (sticky stuff) that holds down the paper -- I think some film holders do the same. Non-marking and releases easily.

 

[Janos]

The vacuum easel is the best idea, especially if you need to bleed the image to the edges. But instead of creative routing, just drill a grid of holes every inch or so, with countersinking , in a sealed frame with underneath cavity, evacuated with an old fan or small vacuum cleaner. Mark the top surface with the paper sizes.

 

[fschifano]

Why not try photo corners, as used for archival mounting? If you are printing a fairly wide border, you could also use weights.

The corners won't hold. I've had trouble with 11x14.

 

[frotog]

I'm assuming that the paper is coming off a roll. Vacuum easels will not hold a large piece of fb paper flat. Get some one inch by one-eighth hot-roll flat bar, cut two pieces two feet long, get it as clean as you can and wrap in black gaffers tape. Use like an elongated paper weight on both sides.

 

[RalphLambrecht]

I think the vacuum easel is overkill. The sticky surface proposal works well and so do magnets. I prefer the latter for simplicity. All my prints bleed to the edges, because I trim them after processing. I like my print proportions to be a result of appropriate image cropping and not to be dictated by common film or paper sizes.

 

[Bob Carnie]

As Mike W suggested, Metal Sheet on baseboard and long magnets.
this is how most horizontal murals are done as well.

Vacumn Easel is ok as well , but you need a very powerful vacumn to bring down a large sheet of fibre paper and the motar must be away from the enlarger set up due to vibration.

Most of the large printing shops, in the day used vacumn easels on the walls and on the vertical setups , but few worked as well as planned.

for small photocomp work vacumn easals were always a requirement.

 

[Shaggysk8]

Mike W long magnets....Cough Cough ME!!! hehe

Still best and cheapest option.

 

[Martin Aislabie]

I make a series of H shapes with Masking Tape

The two vertical sides of the H are Masking Tape sticky side down and the horizontal bar which is sticky side up

They take a few minutes to make, can be pealed off afterwards without leaving a mark or residue and are cheap as chips.

Quite how many you need is unknown, a matter of trial and error but I use about 12 for a 20x24 sheet of flat paper

Martin

 

[MarkL]

A metal surface with magnets is a great idea. Another possibility is a surface of homesote, which accepts thumb tacks to hold the paper in place.

If you cut strips of metal stock (hardware stores have them) to the length and width of your surface, you can position and crop your image with them, and mark their positions at the edge of your surface. Then remove them and tack your oversized paper in place and reposition the metal strips over the paper. You don't really need the metal strips unless you're cropping and want to see the image edges while dodging and burning, although they do help hold curly roll paper flat.

I could post a picture of my setup if needed..

Mark