Triptych Project - Bridgers Panoramic

The Project

For the past year, my wife has been telling me that she wants a large format panoramic shot of the Bridgers (one of our local mountain ranges here in Bozeman, MT) to hang in our great room. The room has needed something since we moved in - with 20' ceilings, there's a whole lot of blank wall to work with.

Getting the Shot

My first task was to find the right location to take the shot. It took me a while, but when I finally discovered this spot earlier this spring, I knew I had a winner.

I took my first panoramic series handheld, just to verify that the shot suited my wife's vision of the finished product. I like this vantage point - it offers a great perspective of the Bridgers and as a bonus lets me capture the Gallatin river to provide foreground interest. After my wife gave the thumbs up, I decided to wait for fall to capture the final image.

I made two photo outings to the spot this fall. The shot shown here is warmer and has more fall color than the shot from my second visit, so I decided to go with it. I had to do quite a bit of post-processing, not so much to combine the

four separate shots into a single panoramic (CS4 makes pretty short work of that), but more to bring out adequate detail in the foreground, which was in heavy shadow as the sun set behind me. While HDR might have been an option with the right source images, I instead used layers to work with the foreground and mountains separately. I then used CS4 to up-rez the finished image to my final dimensions - just a hair under 9' wide by 4' tall.

You Mean There's a Budget?

With the right shot finally in hand, I now faced the harsh reality of the 'B' word: "Budget." My first thought was to print the panoramic on canvas - not as a gallery wrap, but more as a tapestry that would hang from some sort of ornamental rod. I never could find the right hanging hardware, however, and I discovered that a canvas that size is not cheap (although I still think it would be a nice treatment). My second choice was to break the image into a triptych, printing it in three separate sections. I really liked this idea because it would make mounting and hanging the image much easier. I didn't think framing would look good with the triptych treatment, plus it was outside the budget given the size of the picture. I decided dry mounting would be a better and more economical option. I also like the dimensional look provided when dry mounts stand off the wall a bit, so I decided to work that into the plan.

I contacted a local provider to see about having the image printed and mounted locally. Unfortunately, the firm was primarily focused on commercial work (vehicle wraps, POS, etc.), and the UV-ink printer they had in-house wouldn't create a print with the longevity I was looking for. They were, however, willing to provide a quote for mounting prints I intended to purchase elsewhere. We spec'ed out both gatorboard and Sintra as mounting substrates. Unfortunately, while their price was more than fair for both materials and mounting, it still landed outside my budget. I had to find a cheaper alternative.

Photo-Tex to the Rescue

It was then that I considered using Wallhogs to print the image. I've written elsewhere about Wallhogs and other printers like them who let you print your own Fathead®-like wall clings. I've previously used Wallhogs to print small Photo-Tex wall clings of my kids swimming - we affix them to the car when we're on our way to swim meets around the state. They're fun and get the kids amped for competition.

I liked the notion of using Photo-Tex because it is re-usable. Instead of the one-and-done mounting process I would face with a regular print, Photo-Tex would let me reposition the images if I screwed up on my first, second, or third attempt. Additionally, Wallhogs treats their Photo-Tex wall clings with a UV shield, an important consideration considering the west-facing wall of windows in my great room. After contacting Wallhogs customer support via email to ensure that Photo-Tex would work for my intended purpose, I decided to move forward.

I used CS4 to divide my image into the panel sizes I wanted, and then uploaded them to Wallhogs. Because my files were larger than the norm and I wanted to make sure everything was configured properly, I called customer support directly to place my order. I talked to a very helpful guy who got everything lined out, including special instructions for the printers to print full bleed with no white border. They also gave me a special photographer discount, which helped keep the price within budget.

Mounting the Triptych

Three Photo-Tex prints arrived at my door about a week and a half later. When we rolled them out on the dining room table, I was amazed at how great the color looked on the Photo-Tex material. I was ready to settle for a lower quality print just to get the re-usability and longevity advantages, but I was really impressed with the image quality on the Photo-Tex fabric.

Next, I ran to Lowe's and bought two sheets of 1/8" Masonite® board, which Lowe's cut on the spot to dimensions I provided. I then glued 1"x4" wood boards to the back of each panel using construction adhesive. After letting the boards dry overnight, I screwed Hangman metal hanging cleats (also purchased at Lowe's) to the boards. I like these cleats because they make hanging heavy or awkward pieces pretty simple.

I was finally ready to mount the prints to the Masonite® substrate. The process went very smoothly, and having the option to peel and reposition the Photo-Tex was huge. Considering the size of each piece, my wife and I knocked the job out pretty rapidly. I was quite pleased how easily the material went down with few air bubbles or wrinkling.

Perhaps the biggest challenge was mounting the panels on the great room wall. Armed with an extension ladder, tape measure, stud finder, level, dry wall anchors, and a cordless drill, we managed to get the second half of the Hangman cleats mounted successfully. After that, it was simply a matter of hoisting the panels into position.

Conclusions

I learned a good bit from this first attempt, and I suspect my next similar project would go more smoothly. I really liked working with the Photo-Tex, and I would definitely use the material again. Having said that, if I were creating a project to go in someone else's house where budget was not such a priority, I think I'd probably outsource the mounting of the prints. Gatorboard is probably easier to work with, and letting the print shop mount gardner cleats on the back of the panels would make the entire process easier.

Here's the final product - my wife is happy with it, we came in on budget, and I had a lot of fun. What more could you ask for?

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