Sunday, June 23, 2019

Make a 3D layered photo

I remember old photos and pictures where they used to take multiple copies of the same image and cut out parts of the image and layer them up so that it gives depth to the picture. We had done one of these back in art class in school.
I cannot remember what this is called. Searches for stacking and layering photos give much more results for manipulating digital pictures rather than working with physical images. I was able to find a few sites which gave enough of an overview to follow. It seems it might be 3D decoupage.

I was trying to see what was used between the layers. Using foam seems like it would be too thick for more than 4 layers so I was thinking about gluing the images to cardboard. This would also allow you to work with as low as two pictures (or even a single image but your cuts would have to be super precise).
When it came time to do it, I ended up using foam after all. I had concern about whether the multiple layers would still fit in the frame but when I put it on the first layer it was less puffy than it was on the roll.

You will need as many copies of the picture as you will have layers. I took a photo from our trip to Universal and got mine printed up at Walmart. You will also need something to give the layers depth. I went with the foam tape from Dollarama. I also got a deep frame from Dollarama.

In addition, you will some thing to cut the pictures into the layers. You can use small scissors but I used a craft knife and a cutting board.

You need to decide which parts of the image will be on which layers. It helps to write these out to help you decide how many prints you need to make for the layers. It also helps to keep track of what to cut off of each layer.

I was going to do five layers. I had a sixth layer that I was going to do using regular double sided tape but ended up using the foam tape for that as well. Starting with the full image, I stuck the next layer down on top of it. The I kept sticking down the smaller layers until I was done.

I used the double sided tape to stick it to a card for the backing to help keep it centered. I ended up using a comic backing board. I had picked up a couple of extra boards to use for the layers in case the tape was too thick.

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