Canvas Prints: How to Set Your File Up Right

Canvas is one of the loveliest ways to display a photograph or a piece of artwork. It arrives ready to hang, with no frame or glass needed, and the texture gives an image a warm, painterly feel that suits everything from a wedding portrait to a landscape. There's just one thing a canvas file needs that a flat print doesn't, and that's the wrap. Get that right and the rest is straightforward.

What our canvas prints are made of

We print on a superior coated canvas using the same archival pigment inks as our giclée fine art prints, so the colour and detail are held to the same standard. Each print is sealed with a specially formulated matte varnish that protects against UV light and guards the surface from scratching and cracking, then hand-wrapped over a solid wooden gallery frame.

You can choose from two depths: a chunky 38mm gallery frame for a bold, contemporary look, or a slimmer 18mm frame. Either way it comes ready to hang, no framing or glass required.

The wrap: the one thing to get right

A canvas stretches around the edges of its frame, so the sides of the print show something as well as the front. You have three choices for what that something is:

• Full image wrap. Your image continues around the sides, for a seamless look with no border. This is the most popular option, but it does mean the outer edge of your image folds around the sides and out of view from the front.
• Black edge or white edge. The sides are a solid colour, and your whole image stays on the front face.

If you'd like the image to wrap, set your file up at your chosen display size plus the wrap allowance: add 3.5 inches to each dimension for our 38mm frames, or 1.5 inches for the 18mm frames. That extra image is what folds around the edges.

Whichever you choose, keep anything you can't afford to lose, faces, text, a horizon, well inside the edges rather than near them. On a full wrap, the outer band disappears around the sides, and even with a coloured edge it's good practice to leave a little breathing room. If you're ever unsure, send us the file and we'll check it before anything is printed.

Resolution

Aim for 300 ppi at your final size, the same target as our paper prints. Canvas is the forgiving exception, though. The texture of the weave hides a good deal of softness, so it will tolerate a lower resolution than paper, down to around 180 ppi, if a file simply won't stretch to 300. Below that the softness starts to show even on canvas, so treat 180 as a floor rather than a target. Our guide to resolution explains how to check what your file can manage.

Colour

Colour works exactly as it does for our giclée prints: keep your file in RGB, ideally Adobe RGB (1998), with the colour profile embedded. If you send CMYK or Pantone colours we will convert them, but you'll get the truest result by sending RGB with the profile embedded. Our guide to colour explains why.

Format and sizes

Please supply your artwork as a TIFF or JPEG. We produce canvases from 8 x 8 inches up to 40 x 40 inches, in whatever proportions suit your image.

We'll proof it first

Once you order, we send a proof to your email before anything goes to print, so you can check the size, the wrap and the colour are all as you want them. Nothing is printed until you're happy. Do check the content carefully at that stage, as we reproduce your file as supplied and don't proofread spelling or details.

Ready to order

You can order Premium 38mm or Standard 18mm canvas prints straight from the website. If you'd like us to check your file first, or you want a size that isn't listed, email your artwork and the size you have in mind to info@saxonprint.com and we'll take it from there.

We're a small studio in Winchcombe, near Cheltenham, and we'd rather spend a moment getting the wrap right with you than see a favourite photograph lose its edges around the frame.