Turn a Photograph Into a Custom Mosaic Tile Mural

Turn a photograph into a custom mosaic tile mural with the Mosaic Design Wizard. Choose mural size, tile size and palette, see pricing, and order fabrication-ready mosaic sheets.

Excerpt: See how the Mosaic Design Wizard converts a photograph into a custom tile mural, lets you adjust its size and tile resolution, provides instant fabrication pricing, and takes the finished design through ordering.

Category: Mosaic Design Wizard Tutorials

Tags: custom mosaic, mosaic mural, photo mosaic, tile mural, custom tile mural, Mosaic Design Wizard, pictorial mosaic, mosaic design

A photograph can be transformed into a custom mosaic mural made from real tile—and you can experiment with the design, dimensions, tile size and colors before deciding whether to have it fabricated.

This demonstration shows the complete process using the Mosaic Design Wizard, from uploading a photograph through pricing and ordering a finished mosaic from Becoming Tile.

Watch: Creating a Pictorial Mosaic From a Photograph

In the demonstration, we start with a photograph of a dog and convert it into a pictorial glass-tile mural.

The actual conversion takes only a few seconds.

1. Upload Your Photograph

Start by selecting the photograph you want to turn into a mosaic.

As soon as the image is opened, the Mosaic Design Wizard converts it into a tile-based mural using the currently selected tile palette and design dimensions.

In the example shown in the video, the initial design uses approximately 20 mm, or 3/4-inch, glass mosaic tile and is configured as an 8-foot-high by 11-foot-wide mural.

That would make for a rather enormous portrait of a dog, so the next step is to make the design more practical.

2. Change the Size and Tile Resolution

The example mural is resized to approximately 5 by 6 feet.

We then select a palette containing smaller mosaic tiles.

This is an important part of designing a pictorial mosaic. The individual tiles are effectively the pixels of the finished mural.

Using smaller tile gives the Mosaic Design Wizard more individual pieces with which to reproduce the original photograph. That makes it possible to preserve more image detail in a smaller physical area.

You can experiment with combinations of:

Overall mural dimensions
Tile size
Tile palette
Available tile colors

The Wizard immediately shows the effect of those choices on the finished design.

3. Download a High-Resolution Image

Once you have a design you like, you can download a high-resolution image of the mosaic.

In the video, this is done by right-clicking the displayed mural and downloading the image.

The high-resolution rendering can be useful for:

Including the proposed mosaic in a design presentation
Showing the design to a client, family member or contractor
Comparing the mosaic with other colors and materials in the room
Keeping an image of the proposed design for project planning

This means you can use the Mosaic Design Wizard as a design and visualization tool even before deciding whether to order the mural.

4. Calculate the Fabrication Price

When the design is ready, click Calculate.

The Wizard displays the price to have the custom mosaic fabricated by Becoming Tile into approximately one-square-foot sections ready for installation.

Instead of requiring an installer to reproduce the digital image by placing thousands of individual tiles one at a time, the mural is fabricated into manageable mosaic sections based on the design you created.

The individual sections can then be assembled during installation to reproduce the complete mural.

5. Create an Account

You can experiment with designs and calculate pricing before going through the complete ordering process.

When you want to create the product and proceed toward ordering, you will need an account.

The registration process includes:

Choosing a username
Creating a password
Providing an email address
Choosing whether you want to receive product and service updates
Requesting a six-digit verification code by email
Entering that code to verify the account

Once the account has been created, you can log in and continue with the mosaic you designed.

6. Review Your Custom Mosaic Product Page

Selecting View Product creates a product page for the particular mosaic you designed.

The page shows the design and provides information about:

The custom mosaic
Ordering
Sample kits
Fabrication
Deposits
Installation
Important items to review before placing an order
How to contact Becoming Tile if you need assistance

This is not simply a catalog item being selected from inventory. The product represents the particular custom mosaic design you created in the Wizard.

7. Add the Mosaic to Your Cart

Once you have reviewed the design and product information, the mosaic can be added to the shopping cart.

From there, proceed to checkout and enter the required customer and project information.

At checkout, there are several ways to proceed depending on how certain you are about the design and tile selection.

8. Order a Sample, Pay a Deposit or Pay in Full

You can choose among three basic options.

Order a Sample Kit

If you would like to examine the tile before committing to the complete mural, you can begin by ordering a sample kit.

Start Fabrication With a 50% Deposit

If you are ready to proceed with the project, you can pay 50% of the project price to begin fabrication.

Once fabrication is complete, Becoming Tile bills the remaining balance before the completed project is shipped.

Pay in Full

You can also pay the entire amount at checkout.

This eliminates the need to make a second payment when fabrication is finished, allowing the completed mosaic to proceed to shipment without waiting for the remaining balance to be paid.

From Photograph to Installation-Ready Mosaic

That is the complete process demonstrated in the video:

Upload a photograph → create the mosaic → adjust its size and tile palette → download a high-resolution preview → calculate the fabrication price → review the product → choose an ordering option → have the mosaic fabricated.

The Mosaic Design Wizard makes it possible to experiment with pictorial mosaics before committing to a design or purchase.

Try It With Your Own Photograph

You can experiment with your own photograph using the Mosaic Design Wizard:

mosaicdesignwizard.com

Try different mural dimensions and tile sizes and see how they affect the appearance and resolution of the finished mosaic.

Once you have a design you like, you can calculate the fabrication price directly in the Wizard.

Custom mosaics ordered through the Wizard are fabricated by Becoming Tile into installation-ready mosaic sections.

Landrum Middle School Lion Murals Project

Becoming Tile finished the Lion Murals for the Landrum Middle School in the Houston area, and they have been installed now with excellent results. The giant lion is 35 feet high and 19 feet wide. The three-part lion is three sections, each 19 feet tall and 12 feet wide. These pictures were taken before the face plastic had been peeled off of all of the tile and before grouting, but it shows how well the graphics came out in the tile murals.

three-part-lion-mural — Three-Part Lion Mural

Over 700 thousand 1/2 x 1/2 inch tiles in the murals and 1332 square feet in the complete set of murals.

Gradients: Bad and Boring Are Not the Only Choices!

The mosaic tile industry has gradually gotten to the point where a few outlets offer some sort of gradients. Usually a straight vertical gradient with as few, or as many as 10 or 12 colors included. Some pretty large retailers give you a gradient which is really just a series of one square foot blends. The overall effect is that of a gradient, sort of, but your eyes and brain are very well trained to pick out abrupt changes in visual color ratios, so you can easily see the stepped changes. It’s amazing the number of these that are purchased and installed.
Eight consecutive blends, kind of stepped

Some gradients are offered in a gradual change of colors without one-foot ‘stepping’ but no choice in what percentage of each color, just their one canned gradient for a pre-selected color palette. The better offerings let you pick the percentage of each tile you include, but no control of exactly where each color starts and ends, or how they fade in or out. You probably get a moderate overlap with colors ranging over most of the gradient. Not necessarily a bad thing if that is what you are happy with, but not a lot of choice or control.
Moderate overlap, OK but not a lot of choice

An ideal tool for designing vertical gradients would allow you to control for each color where it starts and ends, and what the starting, peak and ending percentages are. Here’s an example with slight overlap where a ‘stagey’ color change is desired.
‘Stagey’ color changes, slightly overlapped

This would allow you to control the amount of overlap of colors, to have more than one zone for a color, to have a uniform “sprinkling” of a color (maybe a metallic tile) over the whole gradient, or almost anything else you could think of. Here’s an example with white sprinkled lightly over a slight overlap gradient.
Slight overlap with white ‘sprinkles’

And that’s not even touching the subject of shapes, patterns, and designs.
Geometric Shaped Gradient

Our unique gradient design software can do almost anything you can imagine.

Visit becomingtile.com to see all of the possibilities.