Over the past few year's I've made many frames for my family and friends. I've developed a standard process for these frames that lets me setup the equipment once, and then run material for 10 frames through that stage. Here's the general process.
Create your frame pieces. Use the jointer, planer, and tablesaw to get your rough pieces. Here's my formula to get the rough dimensions for the pieces needed to frame an 8x10 picture with no matting.
8" + 2 * FrameWidth - 2*Overlaps + 2 * MattingWidth + ~1"
This would be 8" for the height of the picture, 2 frame widths to cover the miter joints, 2 overlaps that hold the picture and glass against the frame, and about an inch extra for error. My frames are usually 1.5" to 3" wide, with .25" overlaps, and with a 1" matting width. The extra inch is to give some room for error during the processes leading to the miter cuts.
This example frame would have 8" + 2*1.5" - 2*.25" + 2*0" + 1" = 11.5" and 13.5" pieces
Here's a link to a thorough guide on how to use the jointer and planer effectively: Jointer & Planer Website.
Create your frame pieces. Use the jointer, planer, and tablesaw to get your rough pieces. Here's my formula to get the rough dimensions for the pieces needed to frame an 8x10 picture with no matting.
8" + 2 * FrameWidth - 2*Overlaps + 2 * MattingWidth + ~1"
This would be 8" for the height of the picture, 2 frame widths to cover the miter joints, 2 overlaps that hold the picture and glass against the frame, and about an inch extra for error. My frames are usually 1.5" to 3" wide, with .25" overlaps, and with a 1" matting width. The extra inch is to give some room for error during the processes leading to the miter cuts.
This example frame would have 8" + 2*1.5" - 2*.25" + 2*0" + 1" = 11.5" and 13.5" pieces
Here's a link to a thorough guide on how to use the jointer and planer effectively: Jointer & Planer Website.
Use a miter jig to cut the miter angles on the frame pieces. This miter jig fits into the grooves of my tablesaw top, has sandpaper to keep the pieces stationary relative to the jig, and the middle piece has a precise 90 degree angle. This saves so much time and lets me focus on getting the pieces to be the exact same length without worrying about their angle. This jig does wiggle in the tablesaw grooves a bit, labeling a direction to push on the jig everytime gets consistent results.
This miter joint spline jig is used to add the grooves into the corners of the frames that accept the spline. Flipping the frame around in the jig produces a spline gap that is centered on the frame. Applying some paste wax to the inside of the jig really helps it slide along the fence.
The splines for these frames comes from a scrap of maple cut to the same thickness as the dado cut in the previous step. Cutting triangles out of the maple stock for the picture frame splines reduces the amount of wood needed for this step. Note that the bandsaw guard is raised too high. This is meant to get decent footage of the bandsaw, but the guard should close to 1/8" higher than the stock being cut.
Using a flush trimming bit in a router table is more efficient than trying to use a Japanese flush cutting saw. I have 10 frames in this January/February 2014 batch, which makes 40 different splines to trim. Efficiency is important.
The champher bit is used in the router table to bevel the tops of the frames. Champfering depth can be used to hide the splines, or to revel them. This champfer highlights the bright maple spline in the darker oak frame.