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The Best Way to Mat a Picture

Matting your photographs in the frame involves mounting your photo onto a mat board, which has a hole cut out that matches the size of the photograph. Matting your photographs has several purposes. It prevents your picture from touching the glass, it makes your photograph stand out from its surroundings and if you sell your pictures, it can make your art more sellable. Matting is usually done to match the standard frame sizes of 5 by 7 inches, 8 by 10 inches and 11 by 16 inches. You can purchase mats that are already the size of your frame so you only have to cut out the mat opening.

Things You'll Need

Matting
Cutting surface
Ruler
Pencil
Utility Knife
Framing or archival tape

Instructions

- 1
  Place the mat face down on a safe cutting surface.
- 2
  Measure the mat opening using a ruler and a pencil. To do this, measure your photograph and subtract ¼ of an inch to your measurements on all sides. This will allow your mat to overlap the photograph by ¼ inch. So if you had a photograph that was 5 by 7 inches, you would need an opening of 4.5 by 6.5 inches
- 3
  Subtract this measurement from the size of your mat. If your mat is 8 by 10 inches, you would get a total of 3.5 in all directions.
- 4
  Divide this number in half to determine how much of a border you will have all the way around your picture. In the above case, you would get a border of 1.75 inches.
- 5
  Measure your border on the back of the mat, drawing it in carefully with your pencil.
- 6
  Cut out the opening straight down with a sharp utility knife, using your ruler as a guide to give you a straight edge.
- 7
  Place the photograph face down onto the mat and secure with framing or archival tape. Frame the photo.

Photography