Music has played a huge role in my life individually and continues to have a large impact on the life my husband and I are building together. The two of us wanted to visually represent that influence in our home and became hooked on the idea of incorporating the image of a soundwave from a meaningful song somewhere in our decor.
When I began planning our living room mini makeover a couple of months ago I noticed that the inclusion of unique and bold art was a theme that ran throughout my inspirational images. It became clear to me that I needed to add some into our main living space and what better way to do so than by creating our long desired DIY soundwave art.
I want to start by stating that this DIY was not very labor intensive and I admittedly outsourced half of the project, so perhaps it should be referred to as a “mini-DIY”.
The very fun first step of this project is to select the song you’d like to turn into art. Once you have a song picked out you need to generate an image of that song’s soundwave. This is the most challenging part of the DIY because you need to gain access to a program that can produce the image of a soundwave such as audio or video editing software.
My husband was able to create the image of our soundwave by using his video editing program, Final Cut Pro, and was therefore able to get a really high resolution image. Since I know not everyone has access to programs like that I tracked down a few alternatives available on the internet that can provide a similar end result. WavePad comes highly recommended while older programs Sonic Visualiser and Audacity are excellent options as well.
The exact process of generating the image is going to vary from program to program however the general steps are relatively the same once you have selected your song. Begin by playing your chosen song in editing software so you see the corresponding soundwave. Enlarge the screen where the soundwave is as large as you can, filling up as much of your screen as possible, and take a screen shot. Save the screen shot, crop out the unnecessary edges, and manipulate the colors and width of your image in photo editing software if you so desire.
There are many different options you can use for printing the actual piece of art and it can certainly be done as a DIY depending on what size you envision your piece being. Due to the large size we wanted our soundwave to be we knew that we would have to have a custom frame built if we had the image printed on paper as opposed to mounted canvas. The cost of a custom frame dissuaded us from going that route and we ultimately chose to have ours printed by Easy Canvas Prints on a stretched and mounted canvas.
Working with Easy Canvas Prints was an absolute breeze. We simply chose the custom size we wanted our piece to be, uploaded our image and let the professionals do the hard work for us. A mere two weeks later our perfect piece of art was delivered to us ready to hang on the wall.
If working with a printing company like Easy Canvas Prints is not an option, Costco, Fed-Ex and other stores with either photo labs or large printing capabilities can provide you with alternate options at every price point.
We could not be more pleased with how our DIY soundwave art came out and are kicking ourselves for not making it sooner. Oh, and the song we ultimately chose? It’s the song that was playing at a show we went to together as friends before we started dating. We were standing together in the crowd when the song began and I vividly remember looking up at my now husband and feeling like I had been struck with a lightning bolt. When you know, you know, and now we have a visual reminder of that moment in time and that amazing feeling to carry with us through life.
NOTE: This post was NOT sponsored by Easy Canvas Print. I simply enjoyed working with them so much from start to finish that I wanted to share them with you. Be sure to check out their services because if you order off their site now you can enjoy a 70% off discount like I did!
