Metal Art Photo

This Instructable shows you how to take a favorite photo or image and convert it to a large metal art hanging that can be used to decorate a wall, or used as a stencil to reproduce the image.

The first step is to find a photo you want to use for your metal art. 

Things You Will Need:

-Large sheet of aluminum 0 .090" - 0.2" thick
-Editing software (I use Gimp, it's free!)
-Vector graphics editing software (I used Inkscape...again it's free!)
-Locate someone who can provide CNC waterjet or plasma cutting services.  Many local machine shops offer this service.

Here's a good youtube tutorial for converting images to stencils.  The white parts are the parts you'll be cutting out so make sure all the black features are connected.

To get the stencil cut out of metal using CNC equipment, you'll need the image converted to a .dxf file.  This creates the path the tool will follow when cutting out the image.  To do this, open your stencil image using Inkscape and save-as: .dxf file.

Once you locate someone who provides CNC cutting services; e-mail them the .dxf file of your image.  The image of my kids I show in this Instructable was cut from a 24" x 36" sheet of .090" aluminum.  It only took 18 minutes of cutting time using an abrasive water jet.  A machine shop might charge up to $80/hr for cutting so you can expect to spend ~$20 to have your image cut.

After it's cut, sand the showing surface, spray with primer and spray paint a dark color.  When the metal art is held against a light colored wall the image can be seen clearly!

You can also use your metal art as a stencil to recreate the image.  Find a dark surface to create the image on.  Hold the metal stencil over it and spray with a light color spray paint.  I recreated the image on a piece of stretched canvas that I painted black with acrylic paint and used three coats of white spray paint to create the image on canvas.

Have fun!

-Corey