Heavy for plein air work, and does not support a panel

The easel is solidly built but relatively heavy compared with a Stanrite easel.

Unlike the Stanrite easel, there is no top bar to support your panel so that you can get it in a vertical position. This leaves your panel open to glare from sunlight beaues of the slanting angle, and to drawing distortion from not being aligned vertically to your line of sight.

The panel holder is not designed to support thin panels such as thin mdf boards, masonite, or gator board panels, so this limits its use for plein air work. It will only support canvases mounted on a stretcher frame.