I don’t know why people use the phrase “easy as pie” because baking a “good” pie isn’t particularly easy. Perhaps in generations past,when homemade pies were the only kind, women learned how to make yummy pies in their sleep (so-to-speak . . . which is another odd phrase) from doing it over and over . . . over a lifetime. Making pies has nothing to do with making photos-on-canvas but the phrase worked for me.
In hindsight.
I am light years behind everyone else when it comes to trying some things. I LOVE the way photo-to-canvas projects look, especially if they are highly “distressed” which I almost was when I started this project. But, the feeling didn’t last long when I saw the result.
So much depends on the choice of photographs. I did figure out that much pretty quickly. When our Family Gathering for 2012 ended, I had hundreds of photos to choose from. ( My finger gets stuck on the button ) Rather than decide on one, I decided to use three for this particular canvas print. Eight of our twelve grandchildren were at the playground this day, faithfully wearing the t-shirts I made for them for the occasion. (found on another post on this blog)
I chose three photos which showed the children in different poses with different expressions. You can look vertically to see the changes each child is expressing as they occur. I loved the way it turned out !
This is what I did:
- Cropped three photos and printed them out on 8 1/2 by 11 glossy photo paper.
- Trimmed them again to fit on the 11×14 canvas just slightly inside of the canvas edges.
- Painted the sides of the canvas with craft paint and waited for it to dry.
- Covered the front of the canvas AND the backs of the photos with Mod Podge.
- Put the photos on the canvas from top to bottom, one at a time.
- Put a kitchen towel over each photo and smoothed with my hands.
- Covered the photos with a coating of Mod Podge.
- LET EVERYTHING DRY.
- Held a Timber Brown ink pad in my hand and distressed the sides, edges and corners.
- Distressed on the edges of the photo, especially on the corners.
Grandpa couldn’t resist making a comment about the Mod Podge. He didn’t think they made it anymore. He associated it with the 1960s. I informed him that not only did they make it, they made it in a variety of ways. Antique (which is what I like), glitter, glossy, matte and more. Hum. He didn’t know what to say.
Feeling quite smug about my success with the first canvas, I printed more photos and kept going. By this time I was anything but “distressed” while my projects were more so. I have always liked the worn and tattered look of things.
The photos above are on 6×6 and 3×3 canvas. Because the canvas is wider on the sides than the larger canvases, the finished photos stack like blocks. For these photos I distressed with paint instead of ink and kept it quite thick. I love the look but a generation earlier than mine might have tried to wash off the paint.
Some things change and some things don’t.
