Blodget’s Blog

How to Convert a Camera Tripod into a Painting Easel.

Necessity, who is the mother of invention.
Plato, The Republic
Greek author & philosopher in Athens (427 BC – 347 BC)

I got a set of Holbein water soluble oil paints for Christmas and after looking around the house for a bit, I realized that I didn’t have good tilt-able easel. I did have several good camera tripods. What I really needed was a device that held a canvas and screwed on a tripod. So, I searched through art supply catalogs and the Internet, but I couldn’t find anything for sale. There are paint boxes that screw on a tripod and hold a canvas, but I didn’t need a paint box. I already had a good one.

After several weeks of thinking about it and going through at least 3 different designs, I decided to build one last weekend. I had everything I needed – wood, screws, power tools and an idea. I picked the easiest one to build. It uses two 1/2 inch dowels as rails and has 3 cross pieces that slide up and down. The center one screws onto the tripod and the outer two adjust for different sized canvases.

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I just added the free Snap service to this blog. It provides a small preview of links so you can see what you’re linking to before you click the link. Check it out by pointing to any link in the blog. It was very easy to install. All you have to do is sign up on their site by providing a URL to your blog and an email address and they give you the code to embed on your web page or blog. Since this is a WordPress blog I also downloaded the free WordPress plug-in, installed it, activated it, and set my unique 32 character key in the options and it worked. The service also works with Typepad and Blogger blogs.

Snap

What is Snap Preview Anywhere? Snap Preview Anywhere enables anyone visiting your site to get a glimpse of what other sites you’re linking to, without having to leave your site. By rolling over any link, the user gets a visual preview of the site without having to go there, thus eliminating wasted “trips” to linked sites.

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