Whatever you’ve been doing this summer, it will be one to remember! And photocrafting is all about memories. So how about making a beach towel with a special memory of the summer. It’s quick and easy! With luck, you’ll still have a few weeks to enjoy using it and next summer it will be a reminder of a happy time or place in the summer of 2020.
Almost all the photocrafting sites offer beach towels. Some are as large as 70″ x 35″, others are 60″x30″. Most have a polyester front (with the image) and a cotton backing. Walmart offers two sizes, 72″x36″ and 60’x30″. In addition to rectangles, the Personalization Mall has a cute round towel. Even one of the Etsy shops has a photo towel (but note that you don’t do it yourself; you send your photo in via email.) I chose to use Shutterfly because I know it’s a reliable site and they had a sale so the cost was less! Also, the towel size of 60″x30″ seemed good for me, particularly as I was making it for a 3-4 year old.
By now you know the drill for a straight-forward photocrafting project. Upload one or more images, position the images, add text if desired, preview, and purchase. It’s really that simple to make a special gift or fun article for yourself!
When I uploaded the photo, the default crop showed part of the person. 
I chose to edit and move the bounding box over to include her legs. 
But I decided I wanted more background, so I rotated the image. 
I was happy but didn’t get the shadow. Maybe the original crop was the best?
For my gift towel, I thought I wanted to use two photos and make a note about this being the covid-19 summer. Shutterfly provides text boxes in almost all layouts but I wanted larger text. I created a text image and uploaded it as the third photo. I tried the layout both in portrait and landscape modes. Finally I decided one full picture would look the best so I created that in portrait mode and added text in the provided text box. I still wasn’t totally happy so I edited the image itself (using Adobe Photoshop Elements) and added text where I wanted it. I tried it in landscape mode and in portrait mode. The preview towel on the right below is the final choice.
Custom photo beach towels make great graduation gifts as well as birthday, Mothers’ Day, and Fathers’ Day presents. What about making them for members of a summer wedding party? Or that once-in-a-lifetime family reunion?
P.S. I want to show you photocraft projects that I’ve made myself. However, when the images include family and friends, I like to protect their privacy as much as possible. Many thanks to Unsplash and photographers Tim Mossholder and Daniel Straub for providing the photos of the diver and the sand background.
Photocrafting Fun 