The Monarch Ultra-Portable Easel
No Compromises
Make no mistake - there are some very nicely designed and well built easels on the market already. Most portable easels, however, represent compromises between portability and usability. The most lightweight easels usually give you limited palette space, little or no additional working space, and worst of all, require you to paint miniatures, often in one size only. Whereas the easels that allow you to actually paint most comfortably are not so comfortable when it comes to carrying them around.
As a plein air painter, I used to compromise along with everyone else, using a variety of tripod easels, French easels, Russian easels, and pochade boxes, none of which quite met all my needs. I finally decided to see if I could do better. When I sat down to design my own easel, I set some pretty tough goals:
- Small enough to fit in a backpack along with my supplies
- Light enough for me to climb mountains with
- Set up in any type of terrain
- Handle painting panels of any size from 4"x6" to 16"x20"
- Hold my panel securely with minimal obstructions
- Let me adjust the vertical distance between painting and palette
- Let me adjust the vertical angle at which my painting is held
- Give me all the primed palette space I might need
- Provide me room to spread out my brushes, knives, medium, et al
- Leave both my hands free for painting
- Set up and break down in seconds
- Save my paint on the palette when through
- Also function as a table easel for indoor use
I also wanted to be able to carry wet paintings, but realized that was not necessarily something I needed my easel to do for me - instead, I designed a separate lightweight wet panel carrier that can also fit in a backpack.
Construction
I wanted The Monarch Ultra-Portable Easel to be as light as possible, but of course, also sturdy enough to stand up to years of use. That is why the easel is made with:
- Hardwood construction (poplar, birch, oak, maple)
- Baltic birch palette & wings
- Boiled linseed oil finish
- Stainless steel, brass, and aluminum fittings
- Permanent, water-resistant glues
What About ... ?
A few things that people sometimes ask about:
Painting Supplies
Storing all your supplies inside a box easel means compromising on the supplies you bring, or else it means making the easel itself bigger and hence heavier than it would otherwise need be in order to hold all those supplies. In my experience, even most people using a French easel - which has about the most internal storage of any portable easel I know - end up carrying a separate bag for their supplies. If you are going to carry a bag for supplies anyhow, why not simply put your easel in the bag with the rest of your supplies? That is why I wanted my easel to be small enough to fit in a backpack. Admittedly, though, the backpack has to be slightly larger than most. I like the rolling backpacks that many high school and college students use.
Wet Paintings
We all need a way to transport our wet paintings along with our easel. But as with painting supplies, it is not actually necessary for the storage to be part of the easel itself. Keeping the storage separate means less bulk and weight for the easel. Since the easel is designed to fit in a backpack, I have designed a separate wet panel carrier that can also be tossed in the backpack.
Tripods
While there is something to be said for portable easel designs that incorporate legs as part of the easel, the simple fact is that this adds unnecessary complexity to the design. I did not see any particular improvements I could offer over a standard camera tripod, and I doubted whether I could even do as well for the same price. So why reinvent the wheel? My only concern here was in making sure the easel was light enough to not require an unusually expensive heavy duty tripod. The Monarch Ultra-Portable Easel weighs an incredible 2.7 lbs, which is light enough to be used with just about any tripod you might already own or wish to obtain.
The main concerns in choosing a tripod are stability, portability, and cost. Of course, there are usually tradeoffs between these. The most important factor affecting stability, though, is the quality of the tripod head, as that is where the most wobble is introduced. You can get by with a surprisingly lightweight tripod if the head is good. My current favorite tripod is the Velbon Ultra Maxi SF, which weighs under 2 lbs and folds to barely over a foot long, meaning it fits in just about any bag that can hold the easel. It retails for around $100. There are comparable models from Manfrotto (Bogen) and others that look good as well, usually marketed for use with digital cameras. Any of these should be more stable than the cheaper lightweight tripods you may encounter, although they won't be as stable as more expensive tripods or heavier tripods in the same price range.
Palette
The easel is designed so that the bottom of the easel itself - primed baltic birch plywood - functions as a palette. The wings provide additional primed palette space. Wood has traditional appeal, and if it works for you, you can minimize the weight of your set up. However, if you really prefer glass or some other material, an 11x14" palette up to 1/8" thick can be affixed to the bottom of the easel.
Stretched Canvas
I believe most plein air painters prefer the convenience of panels - primed directly or covered with canvas. The mechanism that holds panels in place can handle a thickness of 1/8" to 1/4". A stretched canvas is thicker than that, however. If you wish to use stretched canvas, contact me, and I can custom build an adapter to allow this.
Other Media
I have spent much of my life as a pastel artist, and have also done a fair amount of watercolor. One thing I have realized is that each medium places a number of unique demands in an easel - it is not simply a matter of the angle at which your painting is supported. This easel is optimized for oil painting. If I were designing a pastel or watercolor easel, I would have done things differently. A good pastel easel really should have internal storage for pastels, a watercolor easel would need a palette of something besides wood, and so forth. Trying to address the issues unique to other media would likely have compromised the easel's suitability for oil painting. Of course, the easel will not complain if you do use it for pastel, watercolor, acrylic, or whatever. If you find a way to make it work for you, I would love to hear about it!
Still More Questions?
You can write me directly with any questions about The Monarch Ultra-Portable Easel at marc@outsideshore.com.
