best way to mount frame-free photos for gallery exhibition

[robert_bowring]

Thanks. I have been around for a some time but have never heard of it.

[tholte]

Thanks. I have been around for a some time but have never heard of it.[/Q

When you order a metal print from one of the online printers you get the following: A metallic photo print is bonded to a thin piece of aluminum and then coated with some kind of clear protective material so you can wipe off fingerprints etc. There are custom labs that will actually apply the ink to a sheet of aluminum but that is a whole different enchilada. The metal print has a bracket on the back for mounting and enables the image to "float" about an inch from the wall. One small nail can easily hold up a 16"x20" metal print. I have ordered many metal prints and really like them. I do the old fashioned matt, glass and frame thing when I have to and only then. A good frame, museum quality matt, museum quality glass and paying someone to do it is expensive. You can buy a frame and mat from Michaels or Hobby Lobby and cobble it together cheaply but I can't do that for various reasons. One thing to keep in mind so you don't get confused, metallic print paper is a photo paper (lustre, glossy and metallic are three types of paper) with a metallic sheen to it. A metal print is the combination of the metallic print paper bonded to the sheet of aluminum. If you really want to blow the tops off of viewers, you can get the metallic print bonded to the aluminum and then get a sheet of acrylic bonded on the print. Art Beat Studios in California and White Wall in Britain (I think) can do that and the results (assuming a good print of course) are really stunning. Landscapes and other colorful images are perfect for metal prints.

[and]

All my delusional verbiage wasted!

 

Certainly not wasted, it seems my question actually generated quite a bit of interest.

 

Thank you ALL for your comments and suggestions, they were all very helpful to me.

 

I have not made a final decision, but I'm eliminating the framing and the metal options, which probably leaves me with foam/styrene/gatorboard.

 

Framing and metal I'm eliminating both on price and esthetics basis. The suggested shop (Michel's ?) just does not have the quality frames and the sizes I desire. I was considering americanframe.com, which I used before, but with museum glass, which is the only one that really cuts reflections ($40+ a piece for 12 by 18 from most on-line sources), this would easily run over $1000 for 16 full sets of frames. Since this is an abstract/experimental work and part of a single installation, I'm reluctant to use frames at all. I never used metal, but I'm afraid that the true matte might be not realizable here. Please, correct me, if I'm wrong. I also like the prints to be as close to the wall as possible, so since metal mounts apparently "float" in the air, this is not a good option for me. The price would be lower than the quality framing I was considering, but still about $700 for the set.

 

The foam option will be close to the wall, frame-free, true matte, and cheap, but I'm afraid a bit flimsy and hard to fix in a stable and precise manner to the wall. However at present this seems like the best compromise for me.