Follow 5 important criteria to choose an easel for outdoor watercolour painting

As you already know I am passionate about watercolour plein air painting. I spent some time searching for an outdoor painting set up in order to find the best available option on the market. This is how I defined my research:

Follow 5 important criteria to choose an easel for outdoor watercolour painting

1.Lightweight. As an adventurous artists we love hiking, therefore it is mega important to consider how heavy your backpack with all the add-ins will be.

2.Dimension of the easel. Make sure the easel fits into backpack that meet airplane cabin luggage restrictions. Most of the budget airlines accept size of 55x40x24 cm.

3.Must have additional features as a brush holder and shelf for palette and water bucket.

4.Must have sturdy structure. It can be rather frustrating when the wind blow your wobbly easel over or affect the painting process.

5.Easy to set up. Taste the easel and make sure that setting up process is simple and quick and takes only a couple of minutes.
    

When the important options are defined I started my research on the market. Surprisingly I found out that majority of available products do not much my list of requirements. For example, wooden easels were bulky and heavy, the aluminium ones were not appropriate for watercolour painting as had no capacity to tilt and change the angle.I came to conclusion that the best option would be a tripod based easel. It is difficult to believe but I found only one product on the market that ticked all the boxes and it was en Plein Air Pro traveler series

See all the information about the easel here:http://www.enpleinairpro.com/traveler_watercolor_easel.html
Please watch watercolour demo where Eric Michaels paints a woodland & mountain scene using the Traveler Series Easel:

Review on an Plein Air Pro traveler series

Positive feedback:
-compact all in one set up including tripod, easel, shelf, palette, water container, brush holder, backpack bag
-very light and durable and easy to set up in minutes
-quality product for reasonable price of £120

Consider:
-If you are taller than 170 cm(65 inches) you may find the shelf positioned rather too low

-if you work on big sized paper( bigger than 41×31 cm) this easel could be too small
-before ordering easel from US check shipping cost and import taxes that vary from country to country. For example postage and import tax from US to United Kingdom could easily double the prise of the easel
-is en plein air pro travel easel a “must have”? I am not sure…We all  different and some of my arty friends use a wooden board with stretched paper instead. They recon it is easier to control the painting seating and keeping board on the lap especially when it is windy weather.

So just be open minded and keep experimenting different approaches:)

If you can not afford this easel please do not get upset as you can make one yourself:) Here is how you can make plein air easel worth of £50

http://www.seamlessexpression.com/blog/2014/05/how-i-made-my-plein-air-setup.html?rq=Easel

Please let me know if you use plein air easel for your outdoor painting adventures? What is an alternative to en plein air easel?

Please share this article if you find it helpful:)
Happy outdoor painting wherever you are:)