By Tata Rossi 21 days ago, Photography Tips
Acrylic photo printing services help decorate your home with beautiful photos and manually created paintings with antiglare or matte coating and UV protection.
Additionally, some of the better services offer not only modern acrylic photo printing technologies but also a customizable approach that lets you create full-fledged collages with your own captions, meaning you don’t have to overpay for third-party photo editing software for PC.
Some of these acrylic photo printing companies provide a Dibond mount that is perfect for long-term storage of your acrylic prints while other services offer modern printing types, including transparent acrylic coating and backlit effects that ensure your photos are visible even at night.
At the same time, you can find budget services with a standard acrylic coating, which enables you to implement the most stylish photo wall ideas in your own home.
Price: from $79 to $303
Coating types: glossy, matte, transparent, backlit
Mounting options: metallic stands, mounting frame backing
Shipping: free shipping in the United States and Canada
Verdict: Pictorem offers high-quality acrylic photo prints with different coating options, including glossy or matte. Their advanced printing technology guarantees that each print is vibrant and has accurate colors.
Thanks to an array of customizable parameters, you can adjust the opacity of certain areas, and pick a unique print size and shape, including a round one. It’s also worth noting that you can coat your print with fluorescent paint to make sure your photos shine even at night.
Pictorem offers different acrylic thickness options. You can pick between 1/8″ and 3/16″. The 3/16″ option has more optical depth, which grants you more space for reflecting the light around the print.
Price: from $84 to $964
Coating types: antiglare, UV-light protection
Mounting options: holes for wall mounting, a floating frame
Shipping: Paid, depending on your region
Verdict: Big Acrylic is another fantastic option for those interested in top-tier acrylic prints. They specialize in large format printing, allowing you to print out images up to 96 inches in width, meaning you can easily combine and create unique photo collage designs for your home.
The service allows you to order prints with antiglare or UV coating to ensure the colors remain saturated for a long time even if they spend a lot of time in direct sunlight. Big Acrylic also offers unconventional sizes and different mounting options according to your exact needs. In addition to standard mounts, you can also request magnetic stands.
Moreover, similar to Pictorem, Big Acrylic can print out round versions of your photos as well as use one of the standard sizes that you can choose from 1/8″, 3/16″, 1/4″ and 3/8″. Lastly, the service allows you to determine the thickness of the acrylic layer that will be applied to your print.
Price: from $20 to $2930
Coating types: metalized, glossy, matte
Mounting options: hooks, metal stands, back rails
Shipping: from $7.95
Verdict: WhiteWall is a German company that offers a broad range of customization options for acrylic photo printouts, letting you pick between different thicknesses and coatings to create a truly unique and personalized item.
This is one of the few companies that allows receiving prints in Ultra HD quality or using lustre or metallic paper, to ensure your photo has a reflective or glossy effect after being printed out.
It’s worth mentioning that your prints will always be supplied with a stand or special mounts. In terms of sizes, WhiteWall provides the WhiteWall Masterprint option that allows you to order prints as large as 196x94 inches (500x240-centimeters).
Price: from $20
Coating types: glossy
Mounting options: metal pole, canvas, pedestal
Shipping: Paid, depending on your region
Verdict: Printique, formerly known as AdoramaPix, is a fantastic choice for people interested in a more affordable acrylic photo print. The downside is that here you can’t order prints in unconventional sizes, meaning you’ll have to manually crop images to receive the desired format.
It’s worth noting that all prints are mounted onto DiBond metallic backing while the standard acrylic layer thickness is 1 inch. You won’t be able to change these parameters but you can rest assured such prints will look great on your table or shelf.
Price: from $49
Coating types: antiglare, TruLife, with polished edges, with UV protection
Mounting options: aluminum plank, wire, or wooden stand
Shipping: from $3.92
Verdict: Bumblejax is an old company from Seattle that offers premium-class acrylic print services. All their prints are installed onto DiBond backing, ensuring they can be safely stored for years to come. You’ll also find an array of different mounting options, including stands that make your print look modern and unique.
Among the offered customization parameters, you can pick between TruLife acrylic and antiglare coating as well as order the polished edge service.
TruLife is in high demand since such coating minimizes glare and is resistant to outside influences like scratches or scuffs. Additionally, this coating type ensures you’ll never have to worry about ultraviolet lights again.
Price: from $60
Coating types: varnish
Mounting options: clear polymethyl methacrylate panel, opal polymethyl methacrylate pane
Shipping: Paid, depending on your region
Verdict: I have recently purchased acrylic prints for my home office from Pixartprinting. I especially liked the quality of the prints, how easy it was to make an order and just the general quality of customer service. I ordered 4, 5x7 prints of my favorites. The detail is clarity and vivid the color is on point with accurate reproduction. The acrylic material is thick and sturdy offering luxurious looks as well as total luxury feel to the photo print.
The process was generally very simple to undertake. I uploaded the pictures onto the Pixartprinting webpage and indicated the size, material, as well finishes requirements that were required for the prints. There was an estimate of the total cost provided, so I did a payment for the order using a credit card.The prints came well packed and in due time. They were exactly what I was expecting, so overall I'm pretty pleased.
Price: from $21
Coating types: antiglare, metalized
Mounting options: thick metallic base, DiBond or paper-backed bracket, keyhole-shaped hanging hole
Shipping: from $1 to $22.50
Verdict: Bay Photo is a Californian company that offers a broad range of printing services including acrylic glass prints. Moreover, here you’ll find an array of useful mounting and framing options that you can apply to your order.
What makes this service unique is the print customization process. Each stage lets you choose from at least 2 options, enabling you to create truly personalized items.
You can choose bright or metalized paper, standard or antiglare acrylics, add a metallic DiBond backing, and pick the desired thickness – 1/4” or 1/8”.
Price: from $8.45 to $523
Coating type: glossy
Mounting options: metal stands, wooden plank for walls, frontal mounts
Shipping: free shipping (from 3 to 9 days) for all orders over $99
Verdict: CanvasChamp is another reasonably-priced service provider that offers a minimal amount of customization. You can pick between back-based mounting (for wall hanging) or metal stands. In all other aspects, the print on acrylic process follows general industry-wide standards.
That said, the thing that makes this service unique is the built-in editor that allows you to easily create full-fledged collages out of uploaded photos, as well as split or crop them, meaning you don’t have to waste time using a third-party free photo collage maker. In terms of sizes, you can pick between 6 formats that include both square and round prints.
Price: from $45 to $349
Coating types: antiglare
Mounting options: has to be purchased separately
Shipping: free store pickup, paid delivery to different areas starting at $8
Verdict: Shutterfly lets you choose between different frames as well as wooden, metal, and magnetic bases. It also lets you create captioned collages that you can gift to your friends or family.
The customization process consists of a couple of steps that include choosing one of the 7 size options and picking the base. The printing process is standard and applies antiglare coating.
Price: from $26 to $1886
Coating types: with UV protection, antiglare, transparent, unique framing
Mounting options: backing for walls, metal stands
Shipping: paid delivery based on your region
Verdict: ArtBeat Studios Acrylic creates acrylic cast prints with full UV-light protection, which ensures the long-term durability of your photos. You can also choose antiglare coating and the paper material type when customizing your order.
Additionally, the company offers the option to use transparent acrylics to provide a 360-degree viewing angle since such images end up resembling glass photo prints and will pleasantly surprise your guests.
The customization interface lets you visualize different thickness options, and choose one of the available backings as well as the desired mounting method. As for sizes, you can pick from 6 different options as well as order professional framing for an additional fee.
Price: from $68
Coating types: antiglare
Mounting options: wooden plank with wall screws, thick metallic stands
Shipping: from $7.95
Verdict: Nations Photo Lab offers some of the best acrylic photo prints in the midrange price segment. You can order thick photo blocks or tidy wall-mounted prints All acrylic blocks have a size of 1” and are available in 5x7” and 8x8” formats. Meanwhile, wall-mounted prints have a size of ¼” and are available in 16x24”, 20x30”, and 24x46” options.
Additionally, the website has a design editor that allows you to add text and borders to your photos as well as create collages. It’s also worth noting that all wall-mounted prints are supplied with a preinstalled wooden plank for mounting.
There’s an array of parameters and modern technologies you have to know like antiglare coating, the use of metal backings, and different mounting options. Sadly, some service providers don't uphold the necessary standards related to these aspects to lower production costs.
Printing parameters. Currently, two main printing styles are used for creating acrylic prints: direct printing and frontal printing.
Direct printing involves applying the image straight to an acrylic sheet with the help of a flatbed printer. As a result, the ink is molded into the acrylic surface, which decreases production costs.
Frontal printing deals with printing the image on high-quality photo paper and later attaching it to the backside of an acrylic sheet using specialized optical glue. Since this process involves high-quality photo paper, acrylic’s light refraction properties help improve the colors and image depth.
Acrylic print types and quality levels. All companies choose different approaches to picking the acrylic type used for printing based on its quality and unique characteristics.
For instance, Tru Life Acrylic is known for its amazing transparency and vibrant color reproductions. This type is more expensive than other options because it’s resistant to UV lights and scratches.
Antiglare acrylic has a soft matte surface that diffuses the light and minimizes reflections. That said, antiglare acrylic can sometimes make the print look murky, which isn’t ideal if your photo requires maximum clarity.
Matte Acrylic allows you to receive antiglare prints but with a smoother surface and fewer distortions.
Finally, there’s the regular cast acrylic, which is the most budget-friendly option. Even though you’ll rarely encounter this type nowadays, it can still offer solid color reproduction and scratch resistance properties.
Backing options. Make sure your chosen acrylic photo printing service uses backings that will keep your photo safe in the long term.
One of the standard options is to use a light and thin substrate like Styrofoam or Sintra. It offers additional support and helps prevent deformation and bending when printing small photos.
However, for larger prints or thicker acrylic sheets, you need to use a sturdier substrate like DiBond, which has an aluminum base.
Mounting options. Another important factor is the inclusion of mounting elements for your acrylic photo prints since many companies try to lower the prices by leaving out this element.
One of the most popular mounting types is a basic mounting system that involves drilling small openings in the back and attaching the print using small screws or pins.
If you’ve ordered a thick or large acrylic print, then you need to be offered special frames or clamps. This way you’ll be able to mount the print wherever you want without having to worry about deformations or bends that might have appeared over time.
