When Greensboro couple Tracy Hayden and Michael Reinsch first met through a mutual friend in Savannah seven years ago, they had no idea that they would marry and form a business that combined both of their unique talents.

Reinsche, who has worked as a graphic designer for 35 years, and Hayden, who works as a photographer and is one of the 15 artists and owners of Art of Oconee, joined forces to create a business that produces one-of-a-kind photo reproductions that look like they that can be hung on the wall just like fine art.

Their new store, Paint Your Picture, opened its doors at Parkside Commons a little more than six weeks ago, and the couple hopes to help people preserve their own

memories.

Offering five different processing options including photo enhancement, photo retouching and restoration, photo painting, colorization and Pop art, the business can take practically any kind of image and reproduce it into a canvas masterpiece, said Hayden.

The experience, she said, has been rewarding in every way.

“It’s been overwhelming,” she said of the new business. “We did a picture for an older woman who had this old tattered picture from 1910 of her grandmother and we were able to restore it.  It just brought tears to her eyes.”

To have a canvas masterpiece created, either to make art for yourself or for a

personalized gift, potential customers need only get a photograph to the business that they would like to have recreated in some form or fashion.

The canvas masterpieces start at $59 for an 8 by 10 canvas painting in which each photo is printed on professional photographic paper that is then mounted on foam board before a canvas coating is applied to the piece that gives the piece of art the appearance of a

painting.

Although canvas portraits have been done for many years, the canvas coating process makes it possible to reproduce the image without losing image quality, which is the downside to traditional canvas portraits, a press release from the business touts.

Hayden, who says she takes photographs because she wants to capture, celebrate and immortalize the beauty around her, hopes that area residents will see the value in preserving special memories of family, places, pets and the like.

“There’s just so many touching things that people can do with this,” she said. “It really is bringing the past back and it’s something that they can hold on to and cherish for many years.”

Paint Your Picture is located in Parkside Commons at 1108 Market Street just beside Spotlight Movie Theatre and three doors down from Golf Locker.

For more information on the business, please visit www.

paintyourpicture.net.

The business is open Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. until 5 p.m.  Appointments are available upon request.