Wow, some honest assessment….
Today, I asked myself, “am I really going to be able to generate over 350 ideas in a year that are worth reading?”  I don’t think the issue is having the ability to continue, rather I think the issue is going to be those days rich with family time, where my mind is just operating differently.  My 16 year old son is aware of my project and I have shared some posts with him.  While he seems to be enthusiastic about it, (ha, as enthusiastic as a teenage lad could be about something that didn’t giggle and wear makeup), I can not allow my balance to be lost as I pursue this project.  I will do my best, and try to keep pride and delight in that knowledge.  Alright, back to it.

I was fooling about on Photoshop and came across an effect that could, in a mere click, take any picture and turn it into a tile mosaic.  Having years of tile experience, and a few dandy mosaics to my name, I immediately thought of an option for the lot of us, who don’t have a team of mosaic artists like the Vatican, and would like some custom art.  A website that would allow folks to submit pictures, decide sizes and detail levels, and order custom, “photo real”, tile mosaics that would actually be custom, made to order and the entire process would be automated.

Ok, to start with the website.  It would allow customers to upload and edit images.  Crop, color, and other Instagram type effects would all be available.  They could then pick a size and detail amount, with an automatically adjusting price.  They could see a virtual image of what the finished mosaic would look like and then submit payment and set the wheels into motion.

At the heart of the manufacturing would be various tile varieties, in various colors, and various sizes.  A computer guided robotic arm with a very small suction tip would be oriented over a 13″ by 13″ grid.  The available tiles would be oriented in an array that would allow for easy loading into bins and the tiles would be run down individual chutes to the array so that they could be easily grabbed with the suction tip, hovered over a precise portion of the grid, and dropped in an exact location.  The mechanical engineer who assisted me with the design assures me the equipment he has worked with would be able to grab and place 100 pieces in such a speed that it would look like time lapse video.

The grid would then be “tightened up” using an adjustment of the four sides and a certain amount of vibration, causing the tiles to come close together.  The system would be set up to produce whatever total size the customer wanted, in 12″x12″ sheets, typical of what you purchase at the tile yard. Next would come a gluing and the placement of a backing sheet, which allows the tile setter to easily set the mosaic in place and keep everything aligned.  The glue and backing sheet would be placed directly on top of the tiles as they are setting in the grid, so yes, the computer would have already had the design placed upside down and backwards.  The finished sheet would then be set on a drying rack.  Done.

Without the use of a computer, a custom mosaic shop can not touch a photo with any sense of realism or expectation that you will recognize a persons face, but with the computer, an adequate amount of colors and the right amount of detail this would now be possible, and with a human only required to handle oversight.  The money that folks would pay to have a proper landscape scene or portrait accurately represented in marble or glass tile, is ridiculously high. Truly, priceless.  It just can’t be done previous to a device such as I am describing.  The beautiful part is that with such a device, it would be affordable to those who don’t necessarily own their own jet.

I hope to see this happen.  Please note, I am not for a second talking about printed mosaics.  This is not a legit mosaic.  They are in every other Subway sandwich shop.  I am talking about real mosaics, using real materials.  Just for example (and because I’m not going to hijack anyone’s personal photos) just google “Vatican mosaic studio” and look at some human made stuff that truly is beyond price, taking hundreds of hours to make.