On a limited budget but want to make a lasting impression on your boyfriend? I've got the project for you - create him a photo mosiac that will leave him speechless with your creativity and skill.

No matter how tough a guy might act, having pictures of him and his girlfriend is important. A photo mosiac creation is actually really easy to do, but when it's done looks like a million bucks!

What is it? A mosiac is a bigger picture made from smaller objects. It's a very popular art form and can be very dramatic. True hand-created mosaics are incredibly difficult to create, but thanks to the modern invention of computers, a photo mosiac can be created literally in minutes! Once you're finished with this project you can have a low-cost but high impact gift for boyfriend.

How it works:

A photo mosaic is a picture made up of pictures. In the past one would have to take pictures and understand finer points of art design like color and shading in order to create a proper mosaic. However, with digital photography - photo mosaic software can actually change the colors and shades for you. The software also chooses where each picture should go to best create the overall image.

The first thing you should do when creating the photo mosaic is gather as many pictures as you can. If you're doing one as a gift for boyfriend - download lots of photos of the two of you from your facebook, etc. Next, consider googling some images for his name and other things that are relevant to him and his life. These pictures could be of favorite sports teams logos or places you've visited together. You can make this gift for boyfriend as unique and special as you want.

When I made one for my girlfriend, I used pictures of our university campus and key places scattered about in our city. Once I gathered about 300 photos, I decided I was ready to move to the next step.

I downloaded a free program for photo mosaic creation. It was shareware and installed in minutes. Be careful here and make sure you download from a safe location, but it shouldn't be hard to find a free copy of the software.

After installing the program, I selected the image that I wanted to use for the main picture. I then directed the program to build the mosaic with the pictures from the folder I created with all our photos. I selected a few parameters - like how many times the program could use the same photo and then pressed create.

Within minutes, a high quality JPEG image was created in a photo mosaic that looked like the image I had selected. I burned the file to disk and took it to a local printer and copier store and had it blown up and printed on high quality paper.

Then I bought a simple $20 frame and matte at Michael's (the craft store in our town). I assembled the photo mosaic and voila! When I did this my girlfriend loved it! And now that we're married, it's one of the first things guests notice when they come to our house. I know the same can be true with giving this as a gift for boyfriend.

With this simple project you get a unique, one-of-a-kind gift for boyfriend that didn't cost a fortune but makes a lasting impression! It's simple to do - but looks like it took a lot of talent and work, but in fact is really quite easy.