A lot of people are happy displaying their photos as wallpaper on theirlaptops, showing photos on their cell phone, or uploading them to Facebook. But what happens when you lose your phone, or your laptop crashes?

Sure, you can back your photos to an external hard drive, but what's cooler than creating your own custom artwork for your walls? There's an art (pardon the pun) to framing photos. After all, the framing should enhance your art, and make it look better, not detract from it.

First, you want to use an acid-free matte to protect your art; and make sure there is enough air so that any moisture inside doesn't condense. We don't want mold and mildew in there.

In general, the wider the mat, the better and neutral in color. The bottom matting can be used to enhance the colors in the image. For example, if you have an ornate frame, a gold or silver matte dresses the photo up even more.

Cool tones are enhanced with silver frames or a simple, thin black frame with a thin edge, while colors can be warmed up with gold, or golden-toned wood.

The most traditional combination that works with any type of décor is a neutral colored frame with white mat. You'll see this a lot in galleries.

Shadow box frames emphasize your artwork, but if you have a black-and-white image, you can't go wrong with a thin black frame.

Most picture frame glass is non-glare, but look for ultra-violet filtering glass to help reduce fading.

You don't need to limit your wall space to just one photo either. You can group a series of smaller photos together.  See the example posted above.