A multiple picture picture frame question

[Dan Murphy]

Never thought I would be asking a question here on the scrapping board, but, here I am, LOL.

I have 5 GREAT pictures, the ones taken by the Disney photogs in the parks, of Natalie and myself from our trip last year. All are 5 X 7, 4 are landscape and 1 is portrait. Any recommendations on where to go if I wanted to get a single frame for those? Or am I looking at going to a frame shop and getting, or making, a custom.

Thanks so much.

Dan

 

[Twigs]

Nice to see you over here Dan! When I am looking for individual frames, I like to go to Tuesday Morning, the one by me has a large selection of frames. I did a search and they do have some stores in the Chicago area. You can look at their website here: www.tuesdaymorning.com. I also find nice frames at Michaels craft store, and go there too if I want custom framing. They usually have a coupon in their Sunday flyer for 50% off custom framing. Also ACMoore craft store does custom framing and they too have coupons, I think for 60% off, their flyer usually comes out on Wednesdays. I'm sure you will get other ideas here as well.

 

[Sandy22]

I don't think I've seen a ready-made mat with an odd number of openings. How about getting one with 6 openings and then adding something other than a picture for the 6th spot...could be journaling, your WDW tickets stubs/fastpasses, or whatever flat souvenir you can think of. I would do the journaling...a short text on your trip, what it meant to you, who was there....

 

[goofymom/pop]

What you need to do is go and pick a standard frame that would fit your 5 photos. Say at Kohls, Wal Mart, KMart etc. Make sure its big enough for the 5 of them. Then go to a framing store (preferably a small shop not the big stores) and have them cut you a mat to fit your five photos that will fit into your frame. You can lay them out in whatever order you like and they can make the mat fit the pix. Also you can consider cropping off just a little if possible to make them fit into the frame.

If you lay out your photos.....l to r....5x7 horizontal....then 5x7 vertical (drop the vertical pic down a bit to center between the four horizontal ones)....5x7 horizontal you can leave 1 1/2 inches on the outer edge and an inch in between the pics.

Your top and bottom edge will be bigger but that can be remedied by adding a little hole for pic info below each pic.....so vertically you would have mat, pic, hole, mat, pic, mat, hole, mat...this needs to be evened out to look nice. Its hard to do without the pics in hand. If you want to keep cost down tell them to leave the space with out making an additional cut in the mat and you can add the info your self by printing on paper from the computer or writing on the matt if you have a steady hand.

Hope that makes sense. You can probably easily fit it into a 20x24 frame. Plus if you buy it at a discount store you will have your glass already and backing board. Saves money.

Guess what I do for a living....

At our store it cost 2.50 per hole with the first being free with the mat plus the cost of the mat Should be around 20 bucks give or take a dollar with the five holes. Still all in all this is the least expensive way to go.

Hope this helps

 

[bananiem]

At Kohl's and Target I have seen collage frames where it's a bunch of individual frames hooked together to make one big frame to hang on a wall, if that makes sense. I think they're for 4x6's though. They usually have a few that are landscape and a couple that are portrait though. Could you get one of the landscape ones blown up and then mat it portrait-style? Then again, it's not really "legal" to re-do a photographer's picture, is it?
I've also seen "floating glass" frames that allow you to sandwich photos between the pieces of glass and arrange them however you want.
Both www.kohls.com and www.target.com have examples of the frames I'm talking about. Maybe a framer could make one in a larger size.

 

[Dan Murphy]

These are some great ideas, thanks so much. I am going to print this (and any others) and read them over to see what might work best. Not every trip I get my family going with me and wanted to give natalie a memory. Great ideas. Thanks.

So much helpful sharing of ideas here on the DIS, great place.

 

[Spinning]

what type of frame are you looking for?
The matting is going to be what kills you price wise. More openings bigger cost.
Mike's does a nice job. you can always have them cut the mat for you and then you can buy a standard frame anywhere if they don't have what you like.
But lets talk even more creative ways....HAHAHA
You could also create a shadow box! using some prized Disney memorbilia from the trip, expired tickets, spare fast passes, a cute little mickey mouse. Buy some Jolee 3D stickers of her favorite character.......
Or even better Dan, with all the pictures you take it is time to venture into the world of scrapping!
Make Natalie a wonderful scrapbook of the trip! Make it simple. Stick to a 5x7 picture size......simple color scheme! Just throwing it out there! LOL!

but seriously sounds like a wonderful gift and a great way to remember the trip! Hey maybe she now has the bug and will want to tag along more often!
Take care!
Sondra

 

[christinadei]

Honestly if it were me, I'd pick my 3 favorite. Michaels has a frame that has 3 5x7 openings. I think it 12.99. Use the 40% off coupon and it's only $7.79. A heck of a lot cheaper than custom framing I'm sure. They also have matching regular 5x7 frams, so get 2 of those to go with it and you are set. Or, if it were me, I'd frame 3 in the above mentioned frame and use the other two for scrapbooking, or take one to work, etc. They don't all have to be framed together.

 

[Dan Murphy]

More great ideas, guys, thanks so much. Amazing how good you all are with this stuff.

And no shadow boxes or scrapping in the future, this is a one time deal, I think, LOL.

I really appreciate the ideas.