2D Crystal Heart

A heart of optical crystal 3.15 inches across and just over three quarters of an inch thick, with your photograph engraved inside it. It weighs a little over half a pound, enough to feel solid in the hand and small enough to sit on a nightstand without taking the surface over. Of the five pieces in this series it is the smallest and the plainest: no colour anywhere, nothing set around the edges, just the picture held in clear glass.

Why Flat Engraving Suits Most Photographs

The image is engraved as a single tonal layer rather than as a depth model. That sounds like the lesser option and usually is not. A depth model is built from what the file actually contains, so it needs a close, sharp subject that separates cleanly from its background. Give it a phone photograph from six years ago, a snapshot taken across a room, or a scan of a paper print, and it has to invent detail nobody ever captured. Flat engraving reproduces the tones that are there and stops. For the ordinary pictures people actually want engraved, that is the more honest result and often the better looking one.

One or Two People, Close to the Camera

Up to two figures are recommended, and at this size the recommendation matters. A heart 3.15 inches across gives each face roughly the width of a thumbnail, so a couple photographed shoulder to shoulder reads clearly while a group around a table does not. The same is true of pets: one dog filling the frame works, two dogs in a garden do not. If the picture you have in mind holds three or four people, the square frame and the vase in this series have the width for it, and the thicker red accent heart takes four as well.

Ordering and Display

Send any photo and our designers prepare it first, tightening the crop and lifting the contrast for engraving, then email you a free proof. Nothing goes to the laser until you approve it. Once engraved, the image sits inside the crystal where dust, sunlight, fingerprints and cleaning products cannot reach it. A light base can be added underneath, and in a room without much daylight that is what makes the engraving visible in the evening rather than only by a window. A larger size is made in the same shape. Gift box included, made in 1-2 business days, US delivery in 3-5.