Flickr as of late has been making moves to compete with newer startups, like 500px for example, that cater to professional photographers. This summer, it announced a licensing program to get photographers’ work featured on news sites, including Yahoo’s own properties, and today it’s rolling out Flickr Wall Art. For now, this program is about allowing users to turn their own photos into wall art, but it could easily set the stage for a future marketplace where top Flickr photographers sell their work to the service’s broader consumer user base.
Previously, Flickr allowed users to turn their photos into photo books, but this new print offering involves two types of Wall Art products: Premium Photo Mounts ($59 and up) and Gallery Canvas Wraps ($49 and up).
The Premium Mounts are printed on Fujicolor Color Archive Paper with a lustre finish, says Flickr, and are mounted on a 1-inch black mounting board with wood-textured edges. These also have pre-drilled holes for easy hanging.
Meanwhile, the Canvas Wraps have a professional wood frame and resemble an artist’s canvas with 1.25-inch stretcher bars. The frame has square corners and a solid back and comes with hinged hardware for hanging.
Both products are available in a range of sizes from 8×10 up to 20×30. They currently ship either Standard or Express in the U.S. only.
On the updated Flickr.com/Create website, you can customize your Wall Art by selecting an image from your own photo collection and sets, then choosing the mount type and the size. You can also zoom in on photos and drag them around to center the part of the image you want to print before proceeding to checkout.
As noted above, the service is not yet about allowing professional photographers to sell their work to other Flickr users, but that makes sense as the next step for this sort of business – after all, many of Flickr’s users would be interested in higher-quality prints than those of their kids or dogs they took with their own smartphones. (In fact, this is already a suggestion on Yahoo’s feedback forums, as it turns out.)
You can get started with your own Wall Art creations here.