The ability to visualize art prints on your wall before buying is a skill that can save you headaches. Whether you are an art curator, art collector, interior designer, or purchasing fine art for the very first time you will benefit from art visualization. Some people have a natural ability to look at a piece of art and know how it will look inside a room. Others need to see some form of rendition, before they can imagine. This article discusses the benefits of wall art visualization and equips you with practical tools of how you can do that.
If you are about to purchase any sort of wall art it is important to visualize how it would come together in your home, office, or other interior space. Whether you do this in your head or with the help of a tool is less important. What matters is that you are not negatively surprised when it is all done and hanging on your wall.
The result of such a decision will not be pleasant, especially if you spent a good amount of money. High quality fine art is not cheap and if you found yourself in such a situation it would be disappointing. At that point you would have three options, and neither one is really great.
One, if the artist or gallery where you made the purchase accepts returns, you could proceed with that. However, this is often a big hassle, because you have to be very careful to package and return the expensive art piece in its original condition. Also, depending on their policy you may have to pay a restocking fee. Finally, you may be able to get a refund or you may need to choose another piece of wall art.
Two, if a return is not an option, you could try reselling it. This might be challenging though as you may not have the experience of selling fine art. Even if you succeed you may end up getting only a portion of the money you invested in the first place.
Three, the worst case scenario is that you are stuck with something you don’t really like. At that point you get to look at it every day, put it in storage, or give it away to a loved one.
Therefore, if you are not sure about the wall art you are buying, spend the effort to visualize it before the purchase. That way you can save yourself and the art seller some unnecessary headaches.
Visualizers are valuable tools that aid in displaying artwork within an interior space. These applications offer the convenience of visualizing how a particular photo or artwork will appear within your living room or any other setting. By utilizing preset photos of diverse interiors or by simply uploading a photo of your own living room, visualizers enable you to superimpose the artwork onto the walls virtually.
To create a visualization, you can download a digital print of the desired photography onto your computer, and then leverage one of these user-friendly applications / methods. Ultimately, visualizers provide an effective means of gauging the potential impact and aesthetic suitability of artwork within your chosen space.
When it is time to visualize fine art prints on your wall you need to consider two aspects.
First, ensure that the image itself will fit nicely into your interior, regardless of print size. Ensure that the art mood, style, and color scheme works well with the rest of your room. Just because you may be in love with the photograph itself does not mean it will look lovely on your wall. How it looks on a gallery wall may be different from how it will look in your home or office. Things like wall color, lighting, furniture, and room decor will all affect the final result. Therefore, you need to visualize how the art will look inside your particular wall space.
Read: Interior Design With Nature Photography: Complete Guide
The second aspect of the art print to visualize on your wall is its physical size. You may be restricted by factors such as: wall space size, wall shape, budget, etc. In either case, you want to know that you are purchasing the print size, which will look best on your wall. You don’t want it to be too small, neither too large. For this reason, whatever means of art visualization you choose, make sure that you are using a true to life size. Meaning be sure to envision how the exact art size will look on your wall.
So what are different ways to visualize your wall art prints? In the section below I discuss three different methods. Depending on your resources, skills, and time you may find one more useful than another. In some cases you may decide to use more than one method.
Using masking tape or paper is the least sophisticated way. You can simply place white masking tape on the wall in a rectangular shape that matches the real wall art size. That way you can very quickly get a rough idea of what you are looking for. Additionally, you can cut out a large piece of paper, matching the art size, and tape that on the wall. Whichever method, you can play with different sizes until you find the one that best fits your interior.
I have to mention that using tape or paper for wall art print visualization has one limitation. It allows you to only visualize the print size on your wall. That means you will not see how the image itself fits into your room. Therefore, this method might be useful if you have already selected the actual image and are firm on that choice. Then it would only be a matter of figuring out the right size. In addition, this method could be very helpful if you are thinking of combining two or more wall art prints and want to visualize their positioning.
A first choice for many is to use software such as Photoshop. Obviously if you are a Photoshop user you are most likely not in need of this article. Therefore, I will not focus on that.
There are a number of different products out there which would allow you to visualize art prints on your wall with a few simple tasks. There are two potential downsides however. One, you may need to pay for using them. Two, many of them are catered for artists. This means that in order for you to visualize the artist’s art, they need to be set up with a particular art visualization provider.
Therefore, I want to point out a really great FREE option to visualize wall art prints. It is provided by a German printmaking company and is very easy to use. This is a simple web application that you can use on your computer (NOTE: A mobile version does not seem to be available at the time of this writing).
Simply use the link above to start visualizing any photo print or wall art. The website comes with several room interiors as part of its library. The best part however is the fact that you can upload your own room picture. This gives you the perfect opportunity to see how an image will look inside your own space.
All you need to do is this:
The third option you have when you visualize art prints on a wall is to ask the seller for help. Most photographers will gladly help you out to ensure you are buying the right masterpiece for your interior. Some fine art galleries offer this option as well. Depending on the case you may have to pay a small fee. However, it never hurts to ask and see if they offer it as a complimentary service. On the other hand, even if it costs you something, it would be better than buying a wall art piece that you are not entirely happy with.
Going with this option may ensure the most accurate results. I say this because the people that do this have experience and know how to create exact and realistic art visualizations. What you have to remember is that you still have a part to play here. That is, you have to provide an image of your wall and a true point of size reference. That way the artist can create a true to life rendition.
This leads to my next point – the importance of a size measuring reference
A successful visualization of fine art will help you decide the right print size for your wall. Therefore, once you have created a rendition you like, you need a way to know how that rendition translates into the physical size of the print.
In other words, imagine that you use the free online tool I mentioned above. You can scale the art to a size that looks appealing to you. But how will you know what that size is in real life? How do you know what size print to order? Keep reading.
First you need to use a reference point. Second you need to use that reference to calculate the exact art size. In simple terms it works like this:
So, let’s repeat the above steps in more detail.
We will take the example of a bed. Let’s assume that you used a carpenter’s measure tape and found that its width was 80 inches.
After you have taken the room image with the bed in it, measure its width again on the computer screen. A pixel perfect way to do that would be by using any free pixel measuring tool, such as Online pixel ruler. If this is too much for you, simply put a school measuring ruler on your screen and measure in inches or millimeters. Let’s say, in our example, that the width is 300 pixels. Therefore, we now know that 1 inch in our room is the same as 3.75 pixels on the screen – 300/80 = 3.75.
Use the same measuring method, you used for the bed, to measure the print size on the screen. Let’s assume the print size comes to 400 pixels.
The last step is to convert the size of the print from pixels to inches. So let’s review what we know so far: a.) 1 inch = 3.75 pixels and b.) the print measures 400 pixels on the screen.
Therefore, 400/3.75 = 106.66 inches. This means that if you were to get a print 106 inches wide and hand it above that bed, it will look like what you saw in the visualization.
One last consideration to keep in mind when visualizing wall art prints in digital format is the image brightness. In other words, how bright will the art print appear on your wall?
When creating a digital visualization rendition there is no way to perfectly display the brightness of the art, as it will appear in real life. The final outcome will be largely affected by the brightness and lighting of your room. Therefore, keep in mind that there might be some variation between what you saw in a digital visualization versus what you see after hanging the print on your wall.
Buying fine art prints is an art form itself and visualizing the end result on the wall is an important aspect. Whether you are a skilled art buyer who can naturally do that in your head or you need tools, visualizing the final look is essential. Otherwise you may be creating a home decor that is not optimal.
As a landscape and nature photographer I have created visual renditions for my customers in the past. If you are considering purchasing any of my gallery prints and need help visualizing them on your wall, please contact me.
Vibrant Sunrise | Front Range, Colorado | FINE ART PHOTO PRINT – LIMITED EDITION 100
Pacific Sunset | Puerto Vallarta, Mexico | FINE ART PHOTO PRINT – LIMITED EDITION 50
Gintchin Fine Art offers exclusive limited edition fine art photography by Lazar Gintchin, a nature and landscape photographer specializing in large format size prints. Each image in Gintchin’s portfolio is a unique and limited edition print. The gallery includes high-quality wall art prints in acrylic and metal mediums, providing a luxurious fine art presentation. With a diverse range of genres to choose from, art enthusiasts can curate a collection that reflects their aesthetic preferences.
