Turn Old Black and White Photos into Art

How to Modge Podge Pictures to Canvas

The first step is to have your favorite photo enlarged. I have a scanner, so I scanned the photos to my computer and saved them as jpeg files. 
However, if you just have your old photos and cannot save them as a jpeg on your computer, you can still do this project. 

You could also use your phone camera to take a picture of the old photo. 
Or, you can take the photo to your local office supply store and have them scan and save the image for you. 

I do not recommend using regular printer paper and a home printer. You want a good quality photo on photo paper. You can easily get this when you have your images printed out at the store, but if you have a good photo printer at home, you may want to consider printing your own images and resizing your own images at home.

This can help save time and money!  

Choose the size canvas you will be using. For this project, I used an inexpensive 16″ x 20″ canvas. But really any canvas size will work as long as you have the photo printed at the correct corresponding size. 

You can get your canvas from your local craft store, online, and even some Dollar Stores are carrying art canvas that you can use for this project.

Now that you know the finished product size, you can order the appropriate size engineering print or smaller copy from the office supply store. I like to do as much at home and order my prints online from Office Max. 

Or, you can have them shipped to you or pick them up in store. Now that you have your 18″ x 24″ enlargement, pour some Modge Podge into your mini roller tray. 

Start at the top of the front of the canvas and apply an even layer of Modge Podge down about two inches from the top. 

Carefully place your print onto the Mod Podge and smooth out any air pockets. 

Once you have smoothed out any wrinkles and air bubbles and pockets all the way out to the edges of the canvas, you can apply two more inches of the Modge Podge to the canvas and continue slowly working your way down the canvas, smoothing and removing air pockets as you go. 

Pro Tip: If you are struggling to get rid of any air bubbles, you can use a credit card to scrape out any excess air trapped between the canvas and the back of the image. 

I learned by trial and error that you get way too many wrinkles and air pockets when you Modge Podge the entire canvas at once and then apply the print. It is nearly impossible to get out all the wrinkles and air pockets when you do it that way. 

Next, apply a thin layer of Mod Podge to the sides of the canvas and wrap the print up and over each side. 

For the top and bottom, I wrapped the print like a present by folding over the two sides and then wrapped the print over the canvas and used more Modge Podge to attach the wrapped print edge to the frame.
Try not to get any Modge Podge on the back of the canvas. 

Pro Tip: If you are in a hurry and need your layers of Modge Podge to dry faster, you can use a hair dryer to blow hot air over the entire thing to help it dry faster and finish your project quicker. 

 

While I have not chosen to do this to any of my own projects, I saw someone who was making their own DIY photo canvas and to give their image a textured look, they mod podged some white tissue paper to the canvas and didn’t focus too much on pushing the air bubbles out the the edge of the canvas. 

Pro Tip: If you do not want to use a mini or small foam roller for this product, you could use a foam brush.