Sarah needed a "crankie box" for a workshop she's running this summer so she asked me to make her one. Basically, it's like a big film-strip machine like I had in school when I was a kid. There's a 18" x 5 yard piece of vellum between two rollers upon which you draw or paint a story. The one in the picture is still blank but it'll get painted soon enough.
I started with the two rollers. You can see from this picture (from behind) how they fit in.
The rollers are in the back and the dowels in the front are fixed and provide a little bit of tension on the vellum to keep it rolling smooth and flat. They are 1/2" dowels. The tops of the rollers have handles on them that let the person projecting turn the vellum across the rollers.
Here's an action shot of the rollers being used. This is before I put the outer face frame on it.
I added a light fixture so that whatever is being shown will be back lit. You can also see the face-frame in place.
Here's a shot of the tops of the rollers and the removable arms I used. I added a handle, too, to make it easier to carry. It's quite large. The handles slip out so that you can remove the roller to wind a new "show" on.
Overall, it's about two feet square and ten inches deep. The display area is 17 3/4" square.
I had a really nice time building this. It's been a while since I was in the shop so it felt great to get down there for a nice day of work.
Here are some other construction details.
I used blue painter's tape to mark the various holes I needed to drill as well as front, back, bottom, top. It really helped me keep things straight and I didn't have to sand off a lot of pencil marks.
This is the bottom of one of the rolls before I trimmed it off. The dowel fits in a hole in the bottom and the wheel helps keep the height where I want it and guides the vellum, too. The roller is a 1" dowel and the little one on the end is 3/8".
