How to get your digital paintings printed to Canvas
Digital painting is a revolutionary technique where a digital artist uses digital paintbrush software to simulate the traditional bristle paintbrush of an authentic oil painting. The result is a Giclee print on artist's canvas that is very similar to an oil painting but that can be done much faster and can be reprinted instantly any number of times that you wish. These digital paintings are also more affordable than regular oil paintings that need much more time and work to be made.
If you’re going for a formal, high-end, traditional portrait look, you’ll most likely want to make the finished product look like an oil painting. The presentation here calls for framed canvas, or possibly a gallery wrap canvas. The image can be printed onto canvas, or the photographic print can be bonded to canvas. Gallery wrapped canvas looks like oil on canvas with a more contemporary feel. Most printers offer printing on canvas, and the pricing is quite competitive with printing on paper. If you’re going to use a frame, you can either have the printer (or your framer) stretch the canvas with wooden stretcher bars, or you can have the canvas mounted to foamcore. Keep in mind that stretched canvas requires a frame designed to hold a deep canvas, whereas foamcore will pop into any standard photo-type frame.
To find out more about your options for printing, start by checking out the websites of your local print houses. Based on experience (and some very unhappy clients) I would recommend that you avoid using anything described as “hand-painted brush strokes” by a printer. The reason for adding this type of texturing is, ostensibly, to make the product look more genuine. It has the opposite effect, I’m afraid, and looks very tacky. When you print a digital painting on canvas, it is going to look like an oil painting, believe me! Added texture is not needed, in my opinion.
A “giclee” (pronounced ghee-klay or jee-klay) is a made-up marketing word, from the French for “sprayed on.” It’s a word meant to help dispel the stigma surrounding digital works on paper. This is nothing more nor less than an inkjet print. Check out the lightfastness ratings for any printer you go with, and make sure they are using archival materials, no matter what they call the finished product.