How to set up a French (Jullian) Easel

If you just want to know how to set up a French Easel, here are two videos that show the way French Easels were designed to be set up.

+ Quick  visual overview of the sequence:

+ Practical instructions for setting up a French Easel in about 45 seconds:

In writing:

  1. Set the French Easel on the ground with the handle up and the single leg side away from you.
  2. Unfold, extend and tighten the single leg.
  3. Lift the easel onto the single let and support the handle end on your thigh.
  4. Extend the right leg bottom section, loosen the right leg nut, unclip the end away from you, and rotate into the recess on the case.
  5. Tighten the right leg nut.
  6. Extend the left leg bottom section, loosen the left leg nut, unclip the end away from you, and rotate into the recess on the case.
  7. Tighten the left leg nut.
Seeing a French Easel set up the way it was designed to be set up shows it is a clever and efficient design within a design envelope bounded by portability, durability, user experience, and stability.

Yet a common perception is "French Easel" means "fiddly hassle."

Most all other YouTube videos show why.

Fine art painting [1] has  a pedagogy leveraging centuries (millennia?) of tradition, convention, and oral history. This comes with a healthy)skepticism toward new ways of doing things. The skepticism is healthy because so much of painting pedagogy is directed toward physicality and the human body, gravity, and viscosity only change slowly, if at all.

[1]: House painting and decorative painting have no such skepticism.