DIY Lyric Wall Art

After creating a mantle at Christmastime that I fell in love with, I decided to play with my design skills and create a picture that I could put on our mantle. I had seen some similar ideas on Pinterest, and had wanted to overlay the lyrics of one of my favorite songs over a picture for a long time. The song these lyrics are from is called "Love is Not a Fight" by Warren Barfield. If you've never heard it, you NEED to click that link and listen to it NOW- it's seriously one of my favorites and makes me cry every time! 

 I finally decided to make the project I had dreamed of using my favorite editing program called PicMonkey. Below, I'll show you how to make a similar project using this program. The skills needed to do this project are really basic, and you can tailor it to your tastes really easily. Choose a picture and some lyrics (or perhaps a favorite quote), and let's get started! 

1. First head over to PicMonkey.com, click on "Design" at the very top and hit "Custom". I wanted my picture to be the size of a regular sheet of paper so that I could print it at home. The dimensions you'll need to enter for a regular sheet of printer paper page is 800x1050. Click "Make it" and your blank project will open up. If you want to make different size of picture (say 5x7 or 4x6) but aren't sure how many pixels you need to make it, you can use this nifty little inch-to-pixel converter! 

2. Next, you'll want to click the "Tt" on the left and then "Add text" at the top. You can use the box on the left to play with the size and color of the words you're adding. 

3. This next step is the MOST CRUCIAL step in the whole process. You must open a new PicMonkey page in your browser, click "Edit" at the top and open the picture that you are going to overlay with your text. 

On the top left sidebar there's a small little square icon. Click on that. Then at the bottom of that menu, there will be a option that says "Resize". Once you click on that, you need to enter the exact same dimensions that your other project is (in my case I resized the picture to 800x1050). 

You must resize your photo to the exact dimensions of the other project or the picture will come out skewed when you add it behind your text. If you are planning on putting your text on a color picture, you can go ahead and click "Save" at the top and head to the next step. 

I wanted to overlay my text on a black and white picture so I went ahead and changed the photo to black and white before saving it. I did this by clicking the little wand icon on the left, clicking "Black and White" and adjusting from there. 

Once again, any major edits that you are doing to your picture must be done in this step. Once you are happy with your edited picture, go ahead and save it to your computer. 

4. Now here is where the fun part starts. Go back to your original project (the one with the text), click on the little butterfly icon on the left and then click on "Your own" at the top. From here, you should be able to go into your pictures and open the picture that you just edited. It will probably open up small like mine did below. 

Go ahead and use the cursor to make your picture as big as the white background (your picture will cover your text at this point). Once your picture is the same size as your white background, right click on your mouse and click the option that says "Send to back". 

Once you do that, you should land up with your text in front like this: 

5. From here, I decided that the black and white picture with black font was too boring so I decided to play with my picture a little bit. By using the color palette and "Fade" option, I was able to adjust my picture to have a more sepia look and make the text stand out more. 

At this point, you can adjust your picture and text accordingly. You may need to use the "Fade" tool on your picture to make your text stand out more. Play with it until you're happy with your finished product and then go ahead and save that baby! I just printed my finished project on regular printer paper at home and found a cheap black frame at a thrift store to finish my masterpiece. The whole decoration only cost $2 (the cost of the frame), and took about an hour to make. I love it because it's personalized to me- lyrics and words I love with one of my favorite wedding pictures. It's gracing my mantle now and I'm well on my way to creating another part of my house that I love!

Comment with any questions you have below! Have you ever done something like this? Do you think you might try?

{Linking up with one of my new favorites- Tuesday Talk!}