Sign Builder Illustrated: June 2012 Issue

How-To

Design

Painting On Glass

www.signshop.com

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S ig n B u i l d er I l lustr ated

Mellow Signage

> One-piece ADA

june 20 12

> Extreme Makeover

Guiding your way in customized ADA signage.

Count on Johnson Plastics for the Rowmark materials you need to create quality ADA compliant signage for the blind and visually impaired. Johnson Plastics offers the widest selection of Rowmark materials for tactile signage applications, including ADA Alternative®, Ultra-Mattes Reverse, ColorHues™ and more… all available in a full spectrum of colors to fit any architectural environment. Johnson Plastics is proud to offer all of the tools and technical support to make your job go smoothly.

That’s the Johnson Plastics advantage.

Why would you settle for less?

Your Blue Chip Distributorship 1-800-869-7800 www.johnsonplastics.com Offices in Minnesota, Arizona, California, Georgia, Illinois, North Carolina, Ohio and Texas

June 2012

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A Mellow Sign Package

BY JEFF WOOTEN

The deep dish behind colorful custom architectural signage.

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Thermoforming ADA

BY SHARON TOJI

The answer to the search for a one-piece ADA sign.

Extreme Wall Makeover

BY JEFF WOOTEN

TV cameras capture an inspirational wallcovering project.

Sign Builder Illustrated (Print ISSN 895-0555, Digital ISSN 2161-4709) (USPS#0015-805) (Canada Post Cust. #7204564) (Bluechip Int’l, Po Box 25542, London, ON N6C 6B2, Agreement # 41094515) is published monthly

by Simmons-Boardman Publ. Corp, 345 Hudson Street, 12th Floor, New York, NY 10014. Printed in the U.S.A. Periodicals postage paid at New York, NY and Additional mailing offices.

Pricing, Qualified individual working in the sign industry may request a free subscription. Non-qualified subscriptions printed or digital version: 1 year US $105.00; foreign $197.00; foreign, air mail $297.00. 2 years US $149.00; foreign $267.00; foreign, air mail $497.00. BOTH Print & Digital Versions: 1 year US $158.00; foreign $296.00; foreign, air mail $396.00. 2 years US $224.00; foreign $400.00; foreign, air mail $600.00. Single copies are $36.00 ea. Subscriptions must be paid for in U.S. funds only.

Copyright © Simmons-Boardman Publishing Corporation 2012. All rights reserved. Contents may not be

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Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

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photo courtesy of elliott equipment.

46

No Install Out of Reach

BY MIKE ANTONIAK

A service truck can help lift profits for sign shops.

Salvaging Signage

BY ASHLEY BRAY

Reclaimed wood gets a second life as an identity sign.

66

A Hospital Finds Its Way

BY LORI SHRIDHARE

One firm develops the cure for a healthcare facility’s wayfinding ills.

reproduced without permission. For reprint information contact: Art Sutley, Publisher 212-620-7247 or asutley@sbpub.com.

For Subscriptions, & address changes, please call (800) 895-4389, (402) 346-4740, Fax (402) 346-3670, e-mail circulation@sbpub.com or write to: Sign Builder Illustrated, Simmons-Boardman Publ. Corp, PO Box 10, Omaha, NE 68101-0010.

POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Sign Builder Illustrated, PO Box 10, Omaha, NE 68101-0010.

Instructional information provided in this magazine should only be performed by skilled crafts people with the proper equipment. The pub­lisher and authors of information provided herein advise all readers to exercise care when engaging in any of the how-to activities pub­lished in the magazine. Further, the publisher and authors assume no liability for damages or injuries resulting from projects contained herein.

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How-To Columns

18

The Art of Banderoles

Agenda JUNE 2012 June 7-9: The 2012 SEGD Conference and NEXPO (nextgeneration Expo series of events integrated throughout the main conference proceedings) will be spread across Manhattan and Brooklyn, New York. For more information and a schedule, go to thebridge.segd.org.

JULY 2012

24

Reverse Painting on Glass

Departments

18 The Art of Banderoles!

BY PETER PERSZYK

Adding a little flourish to your sign design.

24 Reverse Painting on Glass

BY JIM HINGST

The backwards art of reverse painting.

6 UpFront

Are sign distractions spinning out of control? Jeff Wooten checks out the commerce view of the argument.

8 Dispatches

The latest news from around the industry.

12 Sign Show

The newest products and services from sign manufacturers.

70 SBI Marketplace

Advertisements and announcements from the sign trade.

HOW-TO

DESIGN

PAINTING On Glass

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Graphics or signage? No need to choose!

I VE R SA RY

Mellow Signage

On the Cover > One-piece ADA

JU N E 20 12

4

> Extreme Makeover

A colorful architectural sign sprouts above the entrance of a Mellow Mushroom in this photo by Rite Lite Signs of Concord, North Carolina.

Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

July 26-28: The Mid South Sign Association (MSSA) Convention & Trade Show is scheduled to take place at the Riverview Plaza Hotel in Mobile, Alabama. For further details, click on the “Calendar of Events” link at www. midsouthsign.org.

SEPTEMBER 2012 September 5-6: IMI’s Ink Jet Technology Showcase at the Rosemont Hyatt in Rosemont (Chicago), Illnois, is open to anyone who wants to learn more about inkjet technology and its growing applications from key technology suppliers. For additional information, visit www.imiconf.com.

September 21-22: CONSACImagemakers, the Sign Association of Canda’s national tradeshow, will be held in Mississauga, Ontario.

To learn more, log on to www.sac-ace.ca/consac. signshop.com

Up

by jeff wooten

June 2012, Vol. 26, No. 204

Signs are People Too?

Sign Builder Illustrated (ISSN 0895-0555) print, (ISSN 2161-0709) digital is published by Simmons-Boardman Publishing Corporation executive offices

President and Chairman Arthur J. McGinnis, Jr. Publisher arthur j. sutley

Are signage distractions spinning out of control? Or into better focus?

I

t appeared to be one of those onceevery-blue-moon convergences where a locale recently factored into a series of news items that came across my desk.

This time, it was Oceanside, California, a coastal city of 160,000-plus near San Diego.

Starting off on a sad note, I read that this is the community where deceased former NFL player Junior Seau was remembered last month via a surfboards-on-the-water floating memorial that sounded quite beautiful and harmonious. Moving to the brighter end of the spectrum, this was also the city that recently, with the help of the sign industry, rejected efforts to turn off all electronic signs during late night hours and, at the same time, even agreed to increase the changeable messages on these EMCs to four seconds.

However Oceanside, like other cities and towns, is turning its attention toward sign spinners—those people hired by businesses to hold placards in the air and wave ’em around like they just don’t care. In some talented cases, I haven’t seen moves like those on display since the Curly Neal heyday of the Harlem Globetrotters. But the city is currently reviewing whether to allow sign spinners to remain on public properties.

The complaint brought up against them is the same dreaded “D-word” that creeps up in digital billboards and electronic signage arguments: distraction. Do these tricks of the sign trade actually cause traffic accidents?

At first glance, sign spinners would seem to be ideal for membership in the Justice League of

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Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

345 Hudson Street, 12th floor New York, NY 10014 212/620-7247; fax: 212/633-1863 editorial editor

Jeff Wooten

323 Clifton Street, Suite #7 Greenville, NC 27858 252/355-5806; fax: 252/355-5690 jwooten@sbpub.com associate editor

Ashley Bray

“Distracting” Outdoor Advertising, twisting and contorting their signage into all different directions at lightning-quick speeds alongside their fellow commerce crusaders of hand-waving, taxsaving Statues of Liberty, the doomsday prognosticators now using their stick signs to hawk liquidation sales, and inflatable King Kongs threatening to crush the competition with their deals and specials. And just to throw more fuel onto the fire, we’ll of course have them advertise meeting times on their EMCs. (Hey we might as well go for the “distraction” grand slam, right?)

I’ll literally be “upfront” here and admit that I used to negatively diagnose these street standers as persons in desperate need for attention. But after reading about a recent town board meeting, where a group of them showed up and relayed to officials how this was the only month-to-month work they could find in our economy and how special it made them feel, well this Grinch’s heart may have grown three sizes. I even found myself sympathizing with these amazing maestros of hand-eye sign coordination.

It’s a fine line communities must tread here because local business owners also argued about how good these people were for attracting business (and in a time when many cities and towns are actively trying to pump up their economies).

As they told the city council, if people want to argue over the distraction of sign types or types of sign people, this solution still looks much better than the alternative—boarded up stores and tumbleweeds rolling along downtown streets.

Now that’s a distraction!

345 Hudson Street, 12th Floor New York, NY 10014 401/722-5919; fax: 212/633-1863 abray@sbpub.com contributing writers

Butch “Superfrog” Anton, Mike Antoniak, Jim Hingst, Peter Perszyk, Mark Roberts, Lori Shridhare, Sharon Toji, Randy Wright art

Corporate Art Director Wendy Williams Associate Art Director Phil Desiere production

Corporate Production Director Mary Conyers circulation

Circulation Director Maureen Cooney advertising sales east coast regional sales director

Jeff Sutley 212/620-7233; fax: 212/633-1863 jeffsutley@sbpub.com west & midwest regional sales manager

Kim Noa

212/620-7221; fax: 212/633-1863 knoa@sbpub.com

For reprint information contact Art Sutley 345 Hudson St 12 Floor New York, NY 10014 212/620-7247; fax: 212/633-1863 Circulation Dept. 800/895-4389

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Dispatches

catch of the day:

Baltimore, Maryland—It’s the irresistible force meeting the immovable object—signmaking style! Phillips Seafood restaurant, one of the Mid-Atlantic states' leading seafood chain, was moving to space at the highly visible Power Plant complex at Inner Harbor in Baltimore. This meant a need for new channel letter signage. The building’s owner required open-face neon letters, but the Phillips family was looking to get away from neon.

Carl Myers, design and construction rep for the Phillips family, enlisted John Lutz at worldwide identity specialists Selbert/ Perkins to design the sigange. Lutz researched lighting possibilities and arrived at SloanLED’s FlexiBRITE LED tubing for these letters (usually employed for border/accent lighting).

Lutz contacted Mark Cutler, owner/ consultant of client-based project development company Cutler Identification Systems in Fort Washington, PA, to find the resources to put the project together and to supervise it.

So Cutler enlisted George Winn, president of IPG in Charlotte, NC, to build the channel letters and McKenzie Services of Fulton, MD to handle the 8

Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

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photos by ron nowak/davis marketing (SloanLED Territory Manager).

LED!

Two “Brite” Winners

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because it wants to wander on you as you’re trying to make the rolls and the bends with that much metal,” says Cutler.

One reason FlexiBRITE was selected is because there sometimes isn’t enough room for neon placement away from the returns in a thick-andthin font or a narrow stroke. “But you can put the LED right up against the metal, and you can follow very extreme contours,” says Cutler.

Plus the completely exposed letters resemble red neon!

Cutler says, “9-3/4 out of 10 people probably couldn’t tell we used LED.” After seven weeks of build and install, everyone involved is thrilled with the results.

“It’s become the new icon for the Baltimore skyline,” says Cutler. “It’s visible from blocks and blocks away.”

—JeffWooten

June 2012 // Sign Builder Illustrated

photo courtesy of N. Glantz & Son, LLC.

installation.

There are two sets of “Phillips” letters: Eighteen-foot-tall letters at the top of the building and eight-foot-tall letters set in the already existing arch. The letters are pretty big—the “P” alone weighs about 1,200 pounds. Cranes and bucket trucks guided the letters to the grid left behind by the previous tenant.

The IPG team attached a series of clips engineered with the FlexiBRITE system onto the aluminum letters and snapped the LED lighting into them when they did the wiring.

Since the principals requested a very deep, dimensional look to these channel letters, the eighteen-foot-tall letters are actually twenty inches deep (deeper than needed to house the FlexiBRITE). “It was hard to handle the shape accurately,

Orlando, Florida—The Best Green and the Best New Products were crowned at the 2012 ISA International Sign Expo in Orlando, Florida this past March.

N. Glantz & Son’s BeBrite® Brand Induction Sign Lighter was named the greenest of them all.

Designed to replace 400-Watt Metal Halide units, it saves about 40 to 50 percent energy. The induction lamps also last five times longer than the Metal Halide and offer instant re-strike.

The product is ideal for large, double-facing outdoor signage and is part of a new BeBrite electrical signage product line powered by Fulham. (Pictured below: Fulham COO Dennis Wells, right, with N.Glantz & Son President Davey Glantz.)

Meanwhile Optiva®’s SpellBrite™ Signage System earned the title of the best new product at the show. SpellBrite offers interlocking letters that allow changeable messaging in LED lights.

“This competition is just one of the ways that ISA International Sign Expo continues to introduce tens of thousands of sign professionals to the latest products,” said ISA President and CEO Lori Anderson.

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Dispatches +

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Window Display Breathes Life into Passers-by New York, New York—The LUNGevity Foundation hoped to inspire people to breathe a little easier with a 115-square foot window display at 10 Rockefeller Plaza. The display was on view from April 3-30 and showcased the message: “Moments can take your breath away, lung cancer shouldn’t.” The message was meant to highlight the LUNGevity Foundation and its work to improve lung cancer survival rates, ensure a higher quality of life for lung cancer patients, and provide a community for those impacted by the disease.

The display was created in-house and

features a digital display inset into static images. The display plays a series of images mixed with various statistics and facts about lung cancer in an effort to better educate the public.

The window space for the display was donated by America’s oldest and largest p re ve n t i ve h e a l t h co m p a n y, E H E International. “We are very grateful to EHE International for the opportunity to share this message of hope with so many people,” said LUNGevity Foundation President Andrea Stern Ferris.

For more information about LUNGevity, visit www.lungevity.org.

Rowmark Celebrates 25!

Findlay, Ohio—Engravable sheet plastics manufacturer Rowmark (www.rowmark.com) is celebrating twenty-five years of customer loyalty, quality products, dedicated customer service, and giving back to the community.

President and CEO Duane Jebbett said, “As the Rowmark family celebrates this milestone, we would like to thank our customers for honoring us with their business for twenty-five incredible and rewarding years. Through their support and that of our incredible distributors, we have been able to grow over the years. We hope to enjoy another twenty-five great years, [as] we are just getting started!”

Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

Rowmark was founded by the late Fred K r e m e r, C E O o f d r a i n a g e p i p e manufacturer Hancor Inc., who saw a growing need for extruded sheet materials in the engraving market and established a working relationship with Don and Audrey Morrison of Rowland, Inc. in New Berlin, Connecticut.

signshop.com

photo courtesy of rowmark.

photo courtesy of sign spec, inc.

Perryville, Maryland—Sign Spec, Inc. (www. signspec.com) was recently contracted to help build a pylon sign big enough for the glitz and glamour of “Hollywood.”

The pylon was designed and constructed by Sign Spec for Hollywood Casino in Perryville.

Standing 175 feet tall, it is the second largest pylon in the Northeast. The structure supports the Casino’s 62,000-pound sign (also designed by Sign Spec), which spreads 60 feet wide and 30 feet in height.

The sign features 3,000 bolted connections, 3,500 square feet of aluminum sheet metal, 4,700 linear feet of rebar, and over 1,600 hours of engineering time.

To help plan for the sign’s construction, Sign Spec. Inc., hired a hot-air balloon company to hover over the proposed install location.

“The hot air balloon served as a great visual for size and actual build-out specs,” says Chuck Jacques, president of Sign Spec.

“This was very helpful on all levels.”

photo courtesy of Randy Elles.

A View from the Top

SignSHOW A D H E S I V E / TA P E S Tesa Tape Sticks its Landing into the Sign Market The pressure-sensitive adhesive tapes company tesa tape, inc., has introduced a new product line of acrylic core tapes designed for sign builders: tesa® ACXplus. This new line includes four products. Tesa® 7054 ACXplus and tesa® 7055 ACXplus are crystal-clear products that offer extreme transparency between the two materials being bonded. The products maintain their clarity over time, even after exposure to ultraviolet light or environmental elements.

Meanwhile Tesa® 7063 ACXplus and tesa® 7065 ACXplus are ideal for bonding applications that involve surfaces that are difficult to adhere to. The black coloring leaves no visible gray edges, and the thickness affords easy handling and gap filling if needed. 800/426-2181; www.tesatape.com/industry/signage

B A N N E R S /M AT E R I A L S / E Q U I PM E N T Fisher Textiles’ Opak Poplin Returns Fisher Textiles’ Opak Poplin for dye-sublimation and UV printing is back in stock and now produced in-house. Opak Poplin is a three-layer material consisting of two pieces of Style 6248 Poly Poplin bonded to a 100 percent lamination film that is sandwiched in the middle. The film makes the product 100 percent opaque, waterproof, and windresistant. At 12.8 oz./yd.2, it is available at 57 inches wide and can come with finished edges. Custom production runs are available with any Fisher fabric choice on either side (including black). The material is ideal for double-sided banners, roll-up banner stands, and street pole banners. 800/554-8886; www.fishertextiles.com

CHANNEL LETTERS World Wide Sign Systems and The Channel Letter Factory Open Southern Division World Wide Sign Systems, Inc., is pleased to announce not only the acquisition of Ad-Tech International, Inc.’s sign product division but also the opening of its brand-new Southern Division! (Note: The Channel Letter Factory is a wholly owned division of World Wide Sign Systems, Inc.) Located in Atlanta, Georgia, this new Southern Division (the companies’ fourth wholesale manufacturing location) will provide wholesale electric sign cabinets, formed and flexible faces, and channel letters for your sign projects and programs and help to have the majority of the company’s wholesale sign products delivered the next day or second day freight delivery. 800/874-3334; www.wwsign.com

D I G I TA L P R I N T I N G E Q U I PM E N T/ S U P P L I E S EFI Blazes New Trails with its “Fiery” Digital Print Solution EFI has launched Fiery® Dashboard, a cloud-based service that enables owners and production managers to easily and quickly analyze their operations to make better business decisions. With 24/7 access to real-time production data from any Internet browser, customers can take better control of their operation without having to be in the shop. The dashboard view can be customized to focus on specific printers or groups of printers, define targets for engine utilization, or choose different date ranges to measure daily, weekly, quarterly, or even annual growth. Fiery Dashboard allows managers to see a variety of metrics and compare them between any or all Fiery Driven™ printers in the shop to understand relative engine productivity and more efficiently leverage resources. 800/875-7117; www.efi.com

Mutoh’s ValueJet 1638: The Fastest Ever!

Increase your productivity today with the new ValueJet 1638 four-color, high-speed printer from Mutoh. With its staggered dual-head print technology, you can now print the jobs of two or three printers using a single Valuejet 1638. With print speeds of over 1,000 sq. ft./hr., the production capability can’t be beat. You can print durable graphics on coated and uncoated substrates up to sixty-four inches wide to produce posters, backlit display panels, directional signage, point-of-purchase displays, floor graphics, vehicle graphics, and decals. Other features include: Mutoh’s Smart Printing technology; Intelligent Interweave (i2) print technique that eliminates banding; ColorVerify for process control; ValueJet Status Monitor (VSM) for remote printer management from your smart phone; and an optional on-printer SpectroVue VM-10 spectrophotometer. 800/996-8864; www.mutoh.com

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Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

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bend me, shape me any way you want me.

ImagInatIon comes In a wIld array of colors, styles and thIcknesses If you can imagine it, you can create it with LuciteLux® acrylic.

10% brIghter 110% InnovatIve

Made by designers for designers, LuciteLux lets you express your inspirations in vivid color with style and flair.

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©2012 Lucite International, Inc. LuciteLux® is a registered trademark of Lucite International, Inc.

SignSHOW LED MODULES/TUBES/STRIPS AgiLight Launches “LITE” and “BOLD” Solutions for Cabinet Signs AgiLight’s new BoxRayz LED system includes high-output BOLD and LITE LED modules, mounting hardware, and Class 2 power supplies providing a cost-effective LED lighting solution for both single- and double-faced cabinet signs.

BoxRayz BOLD and LITE deliver unmatched brightness, while the mounting system uses off-the-shelf hardware and mounting brackets for quick, easy installation in cabinet signs. This total system approach offers flexibility, lower material costs, and lower labor costs in both new and retrofit projects. AgiLight’s BoxRayz LITE is available today at 150 lumens/foot per side, while BoxRayz BOLD will be available at the beginning of this year’s third quarter at 300 lumens/foot per side. Backed by the AgiLight five-year limited warranty, the BoxRayz products are available in both 12-volt and 24-volt power configurations. Ruggedly built, the BoxRayz LED Systems feature the durable over-mold d e s i g n a n d a r e I P 6 8 w a t e r p r o o f- r a t e d . w w w.G e n L E D L i g h t i n g . c o m ; w w w. A g i L i g h t . c o m

LETTERS/LETTERING Gemini Introduces New Chrome Finish for Formed and GemLite Letters Brilliant chrome by day, dazzling glow by night—that’s just one of the terrific aspects of a new Chrome finish for Formed Plastic and GemLite letters offered by Gemini Incorporated. Available in either opaque or translucent, Gemini’s Silver Chrome letters are made using actual chrome film laminated to the company’s in-house-manufactured sheets of recyclable CAB plastic. Letters are available in standard Formed typestyles or can be manufactured to customer specifications for the ultimate chrome finish in a deep dimensional letter. (Note: The maximum single piece available is 21-by-32-inch.) The addition of LED lighting in Gemini’s GemLite products made with translucent Silver Chrome gives them a different day/night appearance. By day, they have a Silver Chrome look; at night (when the letters are illuminated), they take on a white “halo” look with a partially shaded face. 800/538-8377; www.signletters.com

Latex Unleashed

Introducing the new JV400LX Series of wide-format latex printers.

X I N N O VAT I V E Utilizes the latest in latex ink formulation and offers a wider range of media choices with the use of WHITE ink and lower operating temperatures.

X ECONOMICAL Requires only standard 110 volt electrical connections for operation. It saves you money due to lower power consumption and installation costs. Realize lower production costs with long lasting piezo print heads that output at a speedy 194 sq.ft/hr.

X E C O - F R I E N D LY With low VOC latex inks, these printers can operate anywhere and the 600ml ink cartridges are reusable.

53” MAX. PRINT WIDTH

63” MAX. PRINT WIDTH

EMAIL INFO ATL

888-530-3988

BOS

888-530-3986

CHI

info9@mimakiusa.com

888-530-3985

LA

888-530-3987

www.mimakiusa.com © 2012 Mimaki USA, Inc.

JV400_H_SBI0612.indd 1 14 MimakiSign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

5/8/12 1:17 PM signshop.com

ROUTERS/ENGR AVERS Five Axes Broaden MultiCam® 8000 Series CNC Router Applications MultiCam® Inc., unveils the versatile 8000 Series Five-Axis Router as the ultimate, high-performance CNC machining solution. Five-axis CNC machining opens up a world of new capabilities: Edge trimming of molded wood, plastic, and composite parts; deep-cavity mold making; and machining of spiral staircase components. In addition to the standard X, Y, and Z axes, the end of the Z-axis features a 440-degree rotational axis and a 150-degree swing axis. Visualize a hemispherical work envelope (the lower half of a basketball) on the end of the Z-axis. MultiCam can put the tool at any point on this surface under full CNC program control. The operator may program all five axes to move simultaneously or program the fourth and fifth axes separately or locked in the vertical position to run the 8000 Series as a standard three-axis machine. Using all five axes of movement isn’t always necessary. 972/929-4070; www.multicam.com

SIGN CABINETS/LIGHT BOXES Outwater’s Tri-Mod LED Backlighting Panels Evenly Illuminate Without any Hot Spots

Sign Builder

signshop.com

Ideally suited for use in tight applications with less than one-inch of installation depth, Outwater Plastics' 1/16-inchthick Tri-Mod LED Backlighting Panels are a great way to backlight your graphics, posters, and promotional messages.

Comprising recently introduced second-generation LED lighting with incorporated “LED Diamond Light Technology,” these panels generate the purest, brightest, white LED lighting available on the market with a Color Rendering Index of 80. They are offered as solder-free, interlocking, and fully connectable prewired panels in six sizes and can be arranged in many different configurations to accommodate almost any type of application. Constructed of virtually shatterproof fiberglass, each panel uses dimmable SMD3528 LED chips and is manufactured with constant current technology (allowing for an approximate life expectancy of 50,000 hours, with minimal to no light degradation).

Moreover each LED chip has a beam spread of 120° and provides 720 Lumens or 5500 LUX per square foot at an installation depth of 1-1/2-inches. www.outwater.com Illustrated 1_2 page Ad.ai 1 5/15/12 11:24 AM

June 2012 // Sign Builder Illustrated

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SignSHOW S O F T WA R E - P R I N T/C U T/ R I P/ R O U T E / E N G R AV E / E ST I M AT I N G SignVOX Business Management Software Does It All! TechVOX Inc., has introduced sign business management software SignVOX, which gives any owner or manager the capability to manage their sign and graphic business via a desktop or any Web-enabled device. Designed to be completely mobile, it puts your business in the palm of your hand, as it is fully functional on any tablet or mobile device. It handles estimating, invoicing, billing, production control, and email, as well as lead and customer management. Included with SignVOX is its online proofing system and electronic job board. Proofs can be sent through email, and customers can approve or send comments through a simple interface that moves jobs directly into production. In addition, invoices, payments, and customer information can be exported to Quickbooks. The software allows for unlimited users with a low monthly fee and no contract. www.signvox.com

New ONYX Plug-in Simplifies and Accelerates Vehicle Wrap Set-up ONYX Graphics, Inc., announces the availability of its SmartApps™ VehicleWraps plug-in for Adobe Illustrator software. Designed to help those who prepare files for wide format printing, this new plug-in gives users the ability to combine design and paneling of vehicle wraps within one application to streamline print production and finishing. The software allows designers to specify necessary set-up items (such as tiles and bleeds), so no additional preparation is required when the print production staff receives the file. The SmartApps VehicleWraps plug-in also reduces the time spent prepping vehicle wraps for print. Reduced media costs can also be realized with the ability to individually edit bleeds and overlaps for each panel. The SmartApps VehicleWraps plug-ins are application-specific, operating system-independent (can be used on Mac® or Windows® platforms), easy to use, and complementary to any wide format RIP software. www.onyxgfx.com

Relax. It’s Easy to Print Magnets™ Discover Inkjet Printable Magnetic Media • Save Time & Money by Printing Directly on Magnet • Use with RubberSteel™ to Make Interchangeable Graphics • Easy to Use — Die-cut, Shear or Punch It • Works With a Variety of Solvent, Eco-Solvent and Latex Inkjet Printers • Available in Matte and Gloss Finishes • Perfect for Car Signs • Download Printer Profiles From Our Website

800.258.0991 magnummagnetics.com sales@magnummagnetics.com

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Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

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VINYL/VINYL FILMS/SUPPLIES New 35-mil G-Floor Graphic Ultra™ G-Floor Graphic™ is a one-of-a-kind, grand format print media that creates graphic floors. The material is designed for second surface printing using both UV and solvent inks. And for those sign makers and graphics professionals without a printer large enough to print G-Floor’s 75-mil material, the company also now introduces a new 35-mil material in a thinner 0.035-inch format. With the same longevity and “drive-on” durability, the new G-Floor Graphic Ultra is ideal for short-term applications such as floor graphics, counter mats, and more. G-Floor Graphic Ultra can be used with or without adhesives; it is repositionable, reusable, and recyclable, as well as slip- and tear-resistant.

877/810-6444; www.gfloorgraphic.com

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June 2012 // Sign Builder Illustrated

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HOW-TO

By Peter Perszyk

Design

Banderoles!

Add a little flourish to your sign design.

W

hile one may choose to get out the dictionary or check Wikipedia before reading on, it won’t be necessary. This month’s topic is the banderole (French for “little banner”), which is a design shape you’ve seen before in signage from different countries and time periods (Photo 1).

The banderole is a narrow, flag-like object with a cleft end. It was often seen flown at a masthead, as the ornamental streamer on a knight’s lance, or as a ribbon-like scroll bearing an inscription.

On signage, banderoles are used as a flourish and a backdrop for text. Most frequently, they appear as a 2D illustration rather than the real thing.

Cartoons Originally a banderole appeared as a device that defined verbalization in static illustrations or paintings. (Note: Revolutionary War political cartoons often used a banderole.) Also called a “speech scroll,” it was akin to the classic cartoon balloon.

Today the banderole can be a simple accent incorporated into the design as backing for a logo (Photo 2). It may also become an integral element that isn’t considered separable (Photo 3).

Like a ribbon from the fair, a banderole plays a part in defining the establishment (Photo 4). This can be either as a mark of quality, longevity, or a defining name tagged to a leading brand (Photo 5).

(1)

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(2)

(3)

(4) Banner symmetry is key, but it’s not mandatory. Even as the wind waves a flag, we’re still able to identify the image. So additional curls or wisps on a banner tend to boost the elegance factor.

On a banderole, text tends to follow these smooth, flowing curves. The folds on a banderole actually make an ideal canvas to tie together singular words (Photo 6). We read them in order based on their location—foreground versus background.

Text is easily created on a banderole with sign design software, but it can easily be goofed up. It’s best to think of the banner as a flat linear item and then map the text accordingly.

(5) 20

Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

If the process stays in the 2D world, then the text will be easier to visually control.

However in 3D software, the image would actually be wrapped on the banner as a texture. When the design allows, a real 3D flowing ribbon makes for an excellent accent in a sign design.

In Photo 7, a ribbon rolled from aluminum strips is a simple, yet elegant addition to a set of letters. Note that the ribbon is a simplified design (no doubt to allow for fabrication). The dimensional word “CAFE” on the ribbon is all caps, which keeps the flow easy to align for the installer and easy to read for the intended viewer.

(6) signshop.com

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(7) The banderole design form is from the French for “little banner.�

(9)

Ribbon The concept of a ribbon on or acting as a sign can play to a variety of designs.

A simplified version of the classic shape with limited copy provides an underline to a primary name (Photo 8). Or an entire sign may appear as a waving pennant providing a place for copy and visual direction (Photo 9).

Most CAS software programs now have built-in designs for banderoles, banners, and pennants. There are also a variety of templates and vector clip art options that are available online.

Some layouts use text only as linear 2D, while others will flow the text.

You may need to play with initial caps for each word or use a script font to get the right fit to the banner’s curve. But remember that simplicity may be best for design and readability.

(8) 22

Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

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HOW-TO

By Jim Hingst

Customization

Reverse Painting on Glass

Being backwards is a requirement for reverse painting.

P

ainting a scene is a challenge for most people. Now imagine painting everything in reverse. It can be mind-boggling.

As I struggled with the learning curve, I soon realized that I needed help.

I was fortunate to have some veteran sign painters coach me through the process of reverse painting on glass. If you are up for the challenge, read on as I chronicle what I learned.

Prep Before you begin, clean the surface. Clean glass is critical for good paint adhesion.

When you’re painting on the inside of a window in a restaurant or bar, you may want to take extra care before painting. Some sign painters will prep the glass with PrepSol ® or a wax-and-grease remover, followed by a final wipe with isopropyl alcohol. Still others clean the surface with acetic acid (white distilled vinegar).

Make sure that you have a reference to follow for your painting, as well. This can be a photo or a sketch.

Keep in mind that, even if using a photo, it can’t hurt to sketch the composition first.

Drawing can help contemplate light direction and the arrangement of the basic planes and shapes

Glass fusing with paints is one form of decoration—and one that isn’t quite as challenging as reverse painting.

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When painting on glass, begin with the very fine, small details that are normally painted last in a composition.

that comprise your composition.

The direction of the light source determines the highlights and shadows in the painting. Consistency is critical. Make sure that the light source illuminates the subject matter from the same direction.

If you do a preliminary drawing, a good practice is to draw an arrow indicating the light direction right on the sketch.

If you’re painting first surface, you can sketch directly on the substrate. But you typically won’t do this when painting on the back of a glass panel.

The next best thing is to tape the reverse image on the first surface or front of the glass. The thickness of the glass can distort your perception of the drawing and throw you off a bit as you’re trying to duplicate the image. (Note: This error in lining up the image accurately is commonly referred to as “parallax view.”)

Mixing Colors Much of your time should be devoted to mixing colors before the paintbrush 26

touches the substrate. It’s always better to mix colors on your palette rather than trying to modify the hue and value of a color on the painting itself (especially true if you’re painting in reverse on glass).

Make sure that the surface of the palette that you use is large enough to mix all of the colors that you’ll need. Then mix your colors with a palette knife. Don’t use one of your brushes to do this. A brush can contain residual paint that might dirty the paint color in the mixing process.

(Note: Arrange your primar y and secondary colors at the top of your palette from the warmest to the coolest.

Also include white in this arrangement.)

Refer to your color wheel when mixing.

Generally artists won’t use black in mixing a shade for the shadow areas. Instead pick the opposite or complementary color on the color wheel for the darker shade.

Contrast in color and value also creates more visual interest.

After you mix your colors, do a little thumbnail test painting by laying one color next to another. That way, you can

Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

tell if you’ve achieved the desired color contrast. A color thumbnail will also reveal how the various colors interact with one another in achieving the overall effect.

For painting on glass, typically the medium is mixed in on the palette. The medium accelerates the drying process and acts as a thinner. If you still need to lower the viscosity of the paint, add a little turpentine. (Note: For more on the subject of mediums, be sure to visit www.signshop.com).

Painting Sequence Normally painters begin with bold, broad strokes, blocking in the primary subject matter with the background elements and building the shadow areas. But when painting in reverse on glass, begin painting the very small highlights—the fine details and the darkest shadows—which you’d normally paint last in a composition.

The next step is to gradually add in the mid-tones—working from the light areas to the darker ones and building the values signshop.com

that model the subject and create its three-dimensional form. The final step is to add in the remaining shadows and background elements.

In painting one layer over another, each coating should be thicker so they will dry more slowly. That way, the first layer of paint will dry first. If the top layers dry before the bottom layer cures, the bottom layer won’t cure properly; this could result in cracking.

Once you’ve painted on glass, you’ll see that, while it requires concentration, it’s not impossible. The major challenge is getting started and overcoming the fear of failure.

The good news is that you’re painting on glass. If you mess up, don’t worry about it; it’s only paint—just scrape it off and start over.

R Ta p e B u s i n e s s D e ve l o p m e n t Manager Jim Hingst has over thirtyf i ve ye a rs o f ex p e r i e n c e i n t h e Graphics Arts industry. Jim has also launched a blog filled with additional how-to advice and techniques, l o c at e d at w w w. h i n g s t s s i g n p o s t . blogspot.com.

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//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Mellow Sign Package The deep dish behind colorful, custom architectural signage.

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Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

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/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////Architectural / By Jeff Wooten

A match made in pie-baking, sign-making Heaven!

all photos courtesy of rite lite signs.

R

ite Lite Signs in Concord, North Carolina loves doing custom work. “We’re very interested in projects that give us a little bit of a challenge,” explains Sales Manager David Cornelius.

Previously this full-service sign company had generated some standout sign work for franchisees Marc and Leann Kieffer at their Mellow Mushroom location in the Myers Park neighborhood of nearby Charlotte. Mellow Mushroom is a national pizza bakery/restaurant franchise that avoids the “cookie-cutter” feel of other sameold-same-old chains by actively encouraging each of its eateries to tailor their locale to their own vision. They only ask for an “immersive experience of color, art, music, and light” to “escape from the mundane.” signshop.com

June 2012 // Sign Builder Illustrated

29

Well one thing you’d never call Rite Lite Signs is “mundane,” so the Kieffers brought them to the attention of Mellow Mushroom corporate, which in turn led to work at another of its restaurants in Anderson, South Carolina.

So when the Kieffers decided to open a new Mellow Mushroom at an upscale outdoor shopping center in the Ballantyne neighborhood of Charlotte, they invited Rite Lite onboard.

Cornelius took photos and measurements of the then-vacant, two-story building for sign design ideas. For additional inspiration, he also looked at the Villa Antonio Restaurant’s illuminated sign at the same complex they’d worked on a few years earlier.

Since this Mellow Mushroom was located on the corner of a busy intersec-

TOP — The letters are made from Sign•Foam HDU. BOTTOM — The front-entrance sign is colorful and multi-layered.

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Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

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TOP — The aluminum background panel was painted with Akzo Nobel Black.

ABOVE — Bromo Purple and Noviol Gold neon outline the sign panel, while Red neon borders the interior letters.

LEFT — The channels had to be tall enough to keep the colors independent of one another to avoid bleed.

tion, this meant the need for two signs!

Rite Lite Designer Jim Jenkins customdesigned a 4-foot-tall-by-15-foot-long identity sign illuminated with LEDs to be placed over the 29¼-foot-long curved front entrance. He also drew up a set of contoured panels featuring exposed neon and open-face channel letters for placement along the side elevation of the restaurant. One measured nearly 17 feet in

length and the other 23 feet, 3½ inches.

Interestingly Mellow Mushroom has no corporate specs regulating its restaurant’s sign designs. (Note: Signage only needs corporate approval before buildand-install.) This freedom allowed Rite Lite to get even more creative “Mellow Mushroom corporate wants something cool, something interesting, and something that sticks out,” says

Fast Facts About Rite Lite Signs Location Concord, North Carolina (just outside of Charlotte)

Employees 30 (including designers, fabricators, and installers)

Background Full-service custom sign company

Clients Retail shops, restaurants, cinemas, theaters, shopping centers, colleges & universities

Opened 1989 Facility 55,000 square feet

32

Web Site www.ritelitesigns.com

Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

Cornelius, “so [Jenkins] had free rein.”

Today’s Special: Front Entrance Sign The colorful front entrance sign was actually crafted in two sections: top (the mushroom cap and stem) and bottom (letters, rocks, and grass).

The mushroom cap and stem, grass, and rocks are all carved from Sign•Foam HDU. Carving was accomplished via CNC routers, hand files, and saws.

The underside of the mushroom is a clear acrylic lens decorated with a vinyl digital print.

The “Mellow Mushroom” copy is a combination of Sign•Foam HDU and ½-inch acrylic, push-thru channel letters. Second surface 3M 3630-43 Light Tomato Red vinyl was added to the push-thrus.

The sign is multi-layered. The purple grass and yellow-green stones are on top of a black pan that crosses the entire background of the sign letters, while a secondary pan works in conjunction with that one to create the mushroom itself.

“We made the mushroom cap more than just a hump,” explains Vice Presisignshop.com

dent of Operations John Sullivan. “We carved dimensional creases into it and, through the use of stand-offs, it comes out eight inches off the panel. This makes it look bigger than it really is.”

Lead Fabricator/Structural Designer Eric Wray envisioned a pyramid when creating these rough shapes and carvings. He began by using a CNC router to fabricate the outside shape in a tiered format. He started with the base of the cap, then came in a couple of inches and created the next layer and then the next layer. Later he came back and started carving. Wray was able to quickly fab everything so that all the layers and pieces would be able to line up properly in construction and installation.

Rite Lite Signs spray-painted the mushroom cap using Akzo Nobel Magenta Pearl with Purple Pearl Accents and the stem with Akzo Nobel Light Yellow Pearl with Yellow Pearl Accents.

The yellowish-greenish warts on the mushroom appear courtesy of Akzo Nobel Green Pearl.

For the grass, Rite Lite used Akzo Nobel Purple Pearl with Light Purple

Pearl Accents. They painted the rocks with Akzo Nobel Green Pearl with Light Green Pearl Accents.

The letters were spray-painted using Akzo Nobel Black and Yellow Pearl and the background Akzo Nobel Black.

“We used pearlescents to create a little more depth and a little more character,” details Sullivan. “Combined with the clearcoats, this gives a nice sheen to the sign when the sun hits it.”

Side Order: Side Elevation Sign The side elevation sign is a just-ascolorful combination of neon, spherical shapes, and “Mellow Mushroom” copy. It features a two-inch pan, fourinch open-face channel letters, five-inch open-face border channels, and an aluminum background panel.

One reason for the use of bright, bold neon was simply to be noticed. “We wanted this sign to be a landmark,” says Cornelius, “so when people ask, ‘Where’s such-and-such a place?’ then someone can respond, ‘When you see the Mellow Mushroom sign...’” mellow sign

Project Roll Call Rite Lite Signs personnel involved with this sign project: > John Sullivan Vice President of Operations > David Cornelius Sales Manager/ Account Executive > Jim Jenkins Designer > Eric Wray Lead Fabricator/Structural Designer > Tim Shaffer Lead Installer > Robert “Boomer” Frazier Prod./Install Manager > Renae Hartsell Senior Project Manager

C

M

continues on page 38

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Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

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Front Entrance Sign: Installation T

“The sign is flat, but its raceway is curved,” says Cornelius. “We were able to make it ‘jump out’ a bit this way than if we’d made it curved.”

To give the sign a bit more of a curved appearance, the carved letters are thicker in the center while they taper off in depth to the outer edges.

diagram courtesy of rite lite signs.

his multi-layer sign had to be placed center on a 29¼-foot exterior space of curved concrete between the first- and second-floor, so Rite Lite attached the sign to a radius panel via three-inch standoffs. This panel was then adhered to a four-inch radius mounting cabinet then attached to the building.

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Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

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mellow sign

continues from page 34

Here Rite Lite Signs had to carefully determine how to lay out the loads for the transformers. “We had to get creative as to where to start and stop units, in order to match up footage for achieving the best efficiency on the load,” remarks Sullivan. “A five-foot circle has a fifteenfoot circumference, which adds up glass real quick.”

Rite Lite painted the face of the twoinch pan with Akzo Nobel Silver with Yellow Border and its returns with Akzo Nobel Yellow. For the open-faced channel, they painted its channel and returns with Akzo Nobel Purple and the letters with Akzo Nobel Red.

Order Pick-up: Reaction!

The straightforward installation took about a week (and very close to the grand opening date). Installer Tim Shaffer and his team used cranes and boom trucks to guide the side elevation sign to the wall. The bottom of the sign is situated nearly fifteen feet off the ground just underneath the second floor deck.

Shaffer aligned the left edge of the sign with the left-most window mullion.

Since the front entrance sign faced a courtyard area, Rite Lite employed cranes and a scissor lift to put it in place.

Reaction has been phenomenal—and not just from corporate and the Kieffers.

“Several of the neighbor tenants have even made comments about this new sign and how it’s drawing attention to them as well,” says Cornelius.

The mushroom cap shows off some of the carving done.

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Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

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Wilkie Turns the Big 4-0 Oklahoma City, Oklahoma— Wilkie Mfg. L.L.C. (www. wilkiemfg.com) is celebrating forty years in business. What Daniel and Nadine Wilkerson started as a custom metal fabrication shop in 1972 has now grown into a business that helps the sign industry get that extra reach through a service truck.

The company’s first unit was a thirty-five-foot manually operated crane. In 1973, the firm produced and patented the first electric/hydraulic aerial ladder.

Now its cranes and ladders reach heights of fifty-two, sixty, and ninety-four feet (and can be custom built and rigged to fit individual customer needs).

Wilkie has even provided service equipment for custom jobs. When Oklahoma University, Texas Tech, Texas A&M, and the National Severe Storm Laboratory needed help in fabricating a mobile radar truck to track wind patterns and storms (including hurricanes and tornados), Wilkie provided the technical assistance the program needed.

Today the second-generation of Wilkersons manages daily operations of the business. Sons Darrel Jr., Bruce, and Bryan have lead roles in sales, service, and technical support, while daughterin-law Rena is office manager.

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ADA / By Sharon Toji//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

ThermoForming

ADA

The Answer to the Search for a One-piece ADA Sign.

I

f you have been a serious producer or promoter of ADA signs over the last twenty years, you probably understand what I’m talking about when I speak of the “Holy Grail of Braille signs.” It’s the search for that wonderful sign that won’t be picked apart, fall apart, disintegrate in water, warp or delaminate in the sun, have the color scratched off or wear away, take too long to make, or cost too much money.

This signage must not only be compliant with standards but actually be usable and readable by people with vision impairments, no vision, or normal vision.

And wouldn’t it be wonderful if it actually looked great, too?

Whew! I’m out of breath just thinking about what we’ve all gone through trying to find the answer since 1992—when some of us woke up to find that, from now on, many of our signs had to have Braille and raised letters.

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Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

When it was determined that Braille really did have to be rounded to be easily read, people figured out how to do that using all sorts of methods. Raster Braille was born to give us the perfectly rounded dot. And when it became clear to some of us that letters with a soft edge rather than a sharp, straight angle were much more readable by touch, you could even find etched metal signs with a shoulder that provided that needed bevel.

In the end though, some of the signs that we thought of as “one piece” started to come apart. It was also clear that a gel layer used to create raised graphics on a sign might not stay protected with surface paint forever. Moisture in the atmosphere would begin to destroy that sign just as easily as surfaceapplied characters could be picked off a carelessly

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all photos: Design by Ullrich Hepperlin, H Toji Design Associates. Signs by H Toji and Company, with ThermoForm tactile elements by AccuBraille.

////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Thermoforming uses heat and pressure

to compress off-the-shelf sheet plastic into a prepared mold and create a sign with raised characters, Braille, and other decorative elements. signshop.com

June 2012 // Sign Builder Illustrated

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About Sharon Toji

Author Sharon Toji is president of Access Communications (www.4adasigns.com), a company devoted to accessible signage and wayfinding design and education.

In 1992, Toji was the first representative of the International Sign Association to the ANSI A117.1 Committee, which writes the standards used for access in the built environment.

Currently she is preparing for her fourth ANSI cycle, as the voting delegate of the Hearing Loss Association of America.

Toji is also a member of the California State Architect’s Access Committee and the Committee on Evacuation for Persons with Disabilities of the California State Fire Marshal.

She has also completed two terms on the Access Advisory Committee of the California Building Standards Commission.

In late 2011, Toji released a complete update of her popular manual, “Signs and the ADA/ABA,” in time for the March 15, 2012 legal enforcement of the 2010 ADA Design Standards.

• • • •

manufactured acrylic sign.

For people who are blind, there are problems with even well made tactile signs. If the letters are large and bold enough for your partially sighted friends to see, they’re hard to read by touch.

You need fairly small characters (with big spaces in-between and very thin, rounded tops). You have to have all upper-case, sans serif letters, but people with some vision really benefit from upper- and lower-case and perhaps even a non-decorative serif typeface. Signs that are made for both touch and visual readers may satisfy neither group.

Since we’ve barely mentioned Braille, let’s answer the question that even some sign makers still ask. Why raised characters? People who are blind read Braille, don’t they? Actually only a small percentage of people who are legally blind read Braille.

So you see the need for no-problem raised characters and Braille. Enter thermoforming.

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The “A” is digitally printed on the surface, and has a matte coating applied. Even the sides of the letter can be colored for excellent visual impact.

above

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Thermoforming uses heat and pressure to compress off-the-shelf sheet plastic into a prepared mold and create a sign with raised characters, Braille, and other decorative elements. Molds for standard signs can be used many times and are made with a computerized router/engraver. The size, height, and shape of the characters and Braille can be tightly controlled, and fine detail isn’t a problem. A true one-piece sign is produced.

Thermoforming is not a new technique. What is new is its introduction to the ADA sign industry.

Shops that own thermoforming equipment can learn to make their own molds. You can probably decorate the signs with methods you use now.

You may not have the time or money to invest in thermoforming, but you can buy any part of the fabrication out and do the rest in your own shop.

The advantages of thermoforming for raised characters transfer right over to Braille. Just like rasters (but with the advantages of being completely in-

June 2012 // Sign Builder Illustrated

43

tegral with the sign rather than inserted separately), thermoformed Braille can have a perfect rounded shape and height.

The first step, obviously, in using the advantages of thermoforming to comply with the latest ADA rules for signs (which are now legally enforceable throughout the United States) is to design the signs correctly. That’s where the new rules provide you with a completely new design choice that’s particularly easy to achieve with thermoforming.

The rules allow you to have two completely separate signs, as long as they both identify the room or space (one with raised characters and Braille and the other with strictly visual text).

You can also divide one sign into two sections: one raised and one flat. Of course, you can continue with the usual type of sign and make the room identification so that one set of characters is both raised and uses a contrasting color to make it stand out visually from the background.

With thermoforming, design the layout and prepare the production files as usual (but with more choices for the character shapes, as well as for decorating the signs). The new rules will apply for your usual ADA sign layouts, as well as to signs with separate visual/tactile messages.

To start, the raised characters must use a sans serif font. For signs where the same characters are both tactile and visual, you’ll no longer be able to use serif fonts at all for room identification. However if you use the new rules to make separate visual and raised characters, you can retain most of the serif fonts you

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left A classic hotel room ADA/PermaSign™ places easy-to-read, rounded characters on bolder visual subsurface text for an indestructible one-piece sign. opposite bottom Though the thermoform tactile element on this sign is small, rounded raised characters can meet the new 15 percent stroke rule and appear bolder for easy visual reading.

use for the visual sign portion—and even use some bolder styles.

Although height of characters stays the same for the combined visual/tactile characters, if you’re making separate tactile characters, they can be as small as 1/2-inch in height.

For Braille, dot size, shape, height, and position are now regulated. There are other new rules, including spacing between characters. Visual characters are allowed to have less space between them, than are the top surfaces of tactile characters.

Thermoforming is a method where you can control all these things precisely.

You can get the benefits usually associated with integrally colored characters by printing the raised characters on the surface using a version of your font that is slightly larger, so the sides of the character will also be printed. If you do that, visual readers will see a bolder character, while touch readers will feel the slender spine of the raised character.

With thermoforming, you can even use a subsurface character behind a raised character of the same font, but you can raise only the rounded spine of the character (so it appears bold but feels rounded and slender).

Completely separating the raised and visual portions of the sign gives you still more design advantages. Use a metallic finish for the molded tactile section, for instance, or a vivid digital print. Only the visual portion needs high contrast and a non-glare surface.

With thermoformed signs, the design possibilities are endless, and you’ll never get a complaint about the signs falling apart.

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June 2012 // Sign Builder Illustrated

45

Vinyl / By Jeff Wooten ////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Extreme Wall

make

over TV cameras capture an inspirational wallcovering project.

T 46

he wallcovering revolution is being televised!

A print provider became involved with the interior redo of a family’s two-story home on an episode of ABC-TV’s Extreme Home Makeover that aired last year, but thanks to some tighter-than-tightest deadlines, one could forgive them if they felt like they were on an episode of Mission: Impossible instead.

Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

signshop.com

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

all photos courtesy of image is everything.

Image is Everything found out why it’s called “‘Extreme’ Home Makeover” when it was faced with a tighter-than-tightest deadline to design, print, and install a wide variety of vinyl graphics.

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June 2012 // Sign Builder Illustrated

47

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Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

Image is Everything (www.imageiseverything.net) is located in Savannah, Georgia and, since its inception in 1998, has grown into one of the largest design and print companies in the area—producing and installing everything from brochures to posters to banners to large wraps. So when the producers of Extreme Home Makeover selected a local family for one of the series’ typical “dream home remodel” projects, they auditioned the company’s help.

“We’re one of the very few printers in the Southeast that could actually produce the scope of the work needed,” explains Heath Moore, vice-president of Image is Everything, about why his company was selected.

The project started with a request for wrapped skateboards and Xbox video game consoles but soon grew into the need for stunning wall graphics for full rooms, bedrooms, kitchens, and bathrooms throughout the house. There would also be floor and ceiling graphics and appliqués.

In other words, “If vinyl could stick to it…”

For example, a baby’s bedroom is now decked out floor-to-ceiling in vinyl graphics of flowing colors and paintbrushes inspired by “pop artist” Roy Lichtenstein; a little girl’s “storybook” bedroom comes complete with a carriage-inspired bed, the countryside and castles on the walls, and cobblestone-path floor graphics; and a little boy’s bedroom is inspired by snowboarder Shaun White’s video game. “The art there was more urban, modern illustrations with blues and greens,” explains Moore. “This child had an impairment, so the producers wanted to use colors that would stimulate and soothe him.”

The centerpiece room would have to be the “Savannah Therapy Room,” which features photographs of the city on all its walls. “This turned out to be a pretty cool visual,” says Moore. “The artist took pictures of Savannah and then made it a sepia tone for a classic, timeless look. We then turned them into 14-by-20-foot images.”

Even though Image is Everything is a decent-sized company, their involvement amounted to unpaid volunteer work.

After listening to the producers’ eversignshop.com

The project started with a request for wrapped skateboards and Xbox video game consoles but soon grew to encompass anything that vinyl would stick to—including floors, walls, and ceilings.

expanding ideas, Moore began to realize that the amount of material needed to produce all these graphics was going to cost more than they could possibly donate, so he asked nearby vinyl manufacturer Oracal (www.oracal.com) if they’d also like to get involved. “They donated twelve rolls of temporary and permanent vinyl and laminate, and we signshop.com

provided the printing and installing,” says Moore. “Oracal also sent some great employees to help us put up the graphics.”

The compressed deadline proved a challenge as well. Exteme Home Makeover producers contacted Moore on a Friday and told him they needed everything finished by the next Friday.

On Monday, Moore reached out to departments at the nearby Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD) to conceptualize the themes that would transform these rooms. (Note: Producers collaborated with SCAD on the designs as well and turned to another designer in Atlanta for the Shaun White room.)

But after waiting for art files to be approved and sent to his company, Moore called the producers and told them that if he didn’t receive the art files by Wednesday, then his company wouldn’t be able

June 2012 // Sign Builder Illustrated

49

The floor graphics, wall coverings, and props placed in the little girl’s redesigned bedroom represent a theme straight from a storybook.

The room’s appearance is meant to invoke life in a fairy tale castle.

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Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

to print and install the graphics in time. “So of course, I ended up receiving the art around eight o’clock on Wednesday night,” he says.

The art files were created in Adobe® Illustrator® and Photoshop® and uploaded to Moore’s Web site, where his staff output them using their Roland SC-545 EX SOLJET PRO II printer/cutter and SOLJET PRO II SJ-1045 wide format inkjet printer at 720-dpi.

“We ran everything at a great dpi range, because the homeowners will be looking at the wraps for years,” explains Moore. “We didn’t want to run it faster at 360dpi and have [the graphics] look grainy.” (Note: The floor graphics feature non-skid lamination, while the wall graphics feature a matte finish laminate.)

Even with the rush to get everything done on schedule, Moore still took the time to make sure that the room dimensions would match up with the artwork created. Fortunately he noticed some of the measurements were off and corrected them. “We’ve learned from past experiences to always double-check everybody else’s measurements and specs.”

Due to the fact that there aren’t twenty-five hours in a day, nor four days in a weekend, Image is Everything and Oracal didn’t get much (if any) sleep during installation. In fact, Moore credits coffee and energy drinks, as much as he does their squeegees.

“We started the first install around nine o’clock Thursday night,” explains Moore. “We left at six o’clock in the morning and

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The Roy Lichtenstein-inspired bedroom was for the family’s youngest child and features full wraps of large, flowing colors and a massive paint brush in the middle of the ceiling. returned four hours later to work until five o’clock the next morning. We were all running back-andforth to the office through the night to retrieve the material as it came off the printer.”

Ever with the pressure-packed schedule, Moore and his team refused to cut corners on the install.

“It was important the vinyl went down smoothly,” he says, “and that it overlapped correctly.” (Note: Panels were applied with 1/2-inch overlaps.)

The graphics installers had to learn how to work around others that were also brought on to fix up the house. “We’re placing a graphic on a wall, while working next to an electrician installing electrical sockets and guys setting up cables to HDTVs,” says Moore.

The installers worked up to the last millisecond—and beyond, but that’s some behind-the-scenes magic you wouldn’t see in the finished, edited episode.

“We were in the middle of laying down the last floor graphics when we suddenly heard the host outside yell, ‘Move that bus!’ [the signal to let the family in],” recalls Moore. “A few minutes later, the producers were shutting the doors to hide us from the cameras.”

Despite the slightly maddening schedule, Moore reveals the install ended up being pretty straightforward. “Sometimes people think that Extreme Home Makeover is fake, but I can tell you that it’s not,” he says.

“They do everything in one week— and it’s the longest week of your life.

“It was all for a good cause, but it was truly extreme work!”

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June 2012 // Sign Builder Illustrated

51

see more phot os

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In the Shaun White-inspired bedroom, blues and greens were used throughout to soothe and stimulate.

Looking to catch some more business?

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52

Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

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//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// Service Vehicles / By Mike Antoniak

No Install

Out of Reach A service truck can help lift profits for sign shops.

A

new or used service truck can be a strategic investment for the sign shop owner—one of those purchases that can help boost productivity while pushing the business to new “heights.”

Those who have made the move already know the advantages of having their own truck.

photo courtesy of wilkie manufacturing .

ADVICE from the pros “ Having a truck can let a sign company grow in many ways.”

— david phillips, international sales and communications manager at elliott equipment company (www.elliottequip.com)

signshop.com

June 2012 // Sign Builder Illustrated

55

Your Direct Source for Sign Information 3 Easy Steps

Receive vital product and service information from manufacturers and distributors by completing the adjacent card or visiting www.signshop.com/infodirect

1. Choose up to 10 categories of interest and check off on card.

2. Select up to 28 suppliers and record InfoDirect # on card.

3. Mail card to start getting info!

InfoDirect # Company

Page

InfoDirect # Company

Page

1 Ability Plastics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 2 ADA Wholesale. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70

38 Ornamental Post Panel. . . . . . . . . . 71 39 Outwater Plastics Industries . . . . . 65

3 AgiLight. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 4 Alpina Manufacturing. . . . . . . . . . . 70

40 Parker Davis Inc.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70 41 Pizazz Display Systems. . . . . . . . . . 15

5 Alpina Manufacturing. . . . . . . . . . . 70 6 A.R.K. Ramos . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70

42 Post Coats. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38 43 SGIA. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53

7 A.R.K. Ramos . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 8 Arlon Graphics LLC. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

44 Sign America. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51 45 Sign Brackett Store By

9 ASE Inc.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 10 Bitro Group Inc.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

46 Hooks and Lattice. . . . . . . . . . . . 45 47 Sign Fab. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . C2

11 CAO Group, Inc.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37 12 Chemetal. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68

48 Sign-Mojo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42 49 Sign-Mart inc.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

13 Clearpath/Rowmark Inc.. . . . . . . . . . 1 14 Coastal Enterprises. . . . . . . . . . . . . 50

50 Sign-Mart inc.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70 51 Signs By Tomorrow. . . . . . . . . . . . . 70

15 Duxbury Systems Inc.. . . . . . . . . . . 71 16 Formetco Powered By Adtech. . . . . . 5

52 SloanLED. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35 53 Small Balls .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70

17 Gemini, Inc.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 18 Graphic House. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70

54 Southern Stud Weld . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 55 Stimpson Company Inc. . . . . . . . . . 17

19 GravoTech Inc/Gravograph. . . . . . . 48 20 Gyford Standoff Systems . . . . . . . . 38

56 Superbright LEDS.Com . . . . . . . . . . 52 57 Syntech Of Burlington Inc. . . . . . . . 48

21 JKL Components Corporation. . . . . 36 22 L&L Industries. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

58 Tehan & Company. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71 59 TriVantage. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

23 Ledtronics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33 24 Lucite International.. . . . . . . . . . . . 13

60 US LED. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31 61 USSC. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69

25 Magnum Magnetics Corp. . . . . . . . . 16 26 Manitex. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54

62 Wilkie Mfg., LLC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

InfoDirect # Company

Page

Companies in the Sign Show 63 Ad-Tech International. . . . . . . . . . . 12 64 AgiLight. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 65 Channel Letter Factory, The. . . . . . 12 66 EFI. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 67 Fisher Textiles. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 68 G-Floor Graphic. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 69 Gemini. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 70 MACtac . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 71 MultiCam. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 72 Mutoh America . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 73 ONYX Graphics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 74 Outwater Plastics Industries . . . . . 15 75 TechVOX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 76 tesa tape. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 77 World Wide Sign Systems . . . . . . . 12

27 Marabu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34 28 Matthews Paint Company. . . . . . . . 11 29 Metomic. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 30 Mimaki USA. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 31 Mimaki USA. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71 32 Nixalite Of America. . . . . . . . . . . . . 71 33 Nova Polymers.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23 34 Oracal USA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . C4 35 Orbus Inc. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 36 Orbus Inc. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70 37 Orbus Inc. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

56

Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

signshop.com

An Easier Way to get Your Message Across Advertise In

Contact Jeff Sutley (East Coast) at jeffsutley@sbpub.com or 212-620-7233 or Kim Noa (West, Central U.S.) at knoa@sbpub.com or 212-620-7221 Follow Us On: Sign Builder Illustrated @SBIMag Sign Builder Illustrated

In Print, In Person and Online Log on to www.signshop.com

photos (top to bottom) courtesy of elliott equipment; dave forrest.

Shop owners also need to evaluate their current staff.

If you don’t already have someone who can drive and operate the truck, hiring, training, and licensing new employees can be a hidden cost of adding a service truck.

“If you’re in the sign business and don’t have a truck, you need to look at how much of your jobs you’re giving away for installation,” says Johnny Stamm, president and CEO of Stamm Manufacturing (www.stamm-mfg.com).

“A truck is like any other tool. It should pay its way, as it helps you make more profit.”

To decide if it’s time to buy, Stamm recommends doing an analysis on the cost of subcontracting installations versus the revenue that could be generated by handling that work in-house.

Many Benefits Phillips points out that there are several ways the right truck will help a sign company: n Delivering greater control over work while making a shop less dependent on subcontractors for installations and maintenance; n Allowing owners to take on new business and projects referred elsewhere in the past; and 58

n Generating more flexibility on how jobs are handled and scheduled, to make the business more competitive.

“The unit can also serve as an advertising tool for the company, making it easier to attract new clients,” he says.

Bryan Wilkerson, vice president of Wilkie Manufacturing (www.wilkiemfg.

Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

com) comments that adding a service truck can help set the business in new directions. “A truck provides new service opportunities like hanging Christmas lights, banners for store openings, pennants, or installing more efficient lighting,” he says.

Owners need to ask themselves how signshop.com

much they want to expand their current market and in what areas.

“Do you want to reach higher, lift more weight, or cater to specific markets like retrofitting conventional lighting to LED?” asks Wilkerson of his customers. “Or do you want to do things outside the normal work scope like setting trusses or AC units?”

The more thoroughly owners assess where business is now and where they want to take it, then the easier it will be to identify the best match.

photo courtesy of american work platform training.

Sizing Up Amenities When that’s a requirement, Phillips recommends a service aerial truck with tool outlets in the platform to eliminate dangling wires. Shops taking on larger sign projects should also consider total payload capacity, bed space, and fuel consumption.

“Measure where you expect to need the truck most to make sure you get the right height and side reach,” advises Stamm. “Your truck should handle between 85 and 95 percent of your service trucks

New or Used?

In today’s economy, budget certainly comes into play when deciding to purchase a service truck, and shop owners may find their choice coming down to a newly outfitted service truck or used equipment.

“My main competition right now is in used equipment,” says David Peterson, president of Van Ladder Aerial Equipment (www.vanladder.com), which focuses on the special needs of small- or medium-sized sign shops by outfitting trucks and vans with its aerial lifts. “[These don’t] sit around long.”

Bryan Wilkerson of Wilkie Manufacturing, a maker of truck-mounted ladders and cranes, notes some are turning toward used systems to avoid the newest maintenance-intensive emissions standards. “Plus a large majority require special emissions fuel,” he says. new or used

continued on page 60

continued on page 60

Wait!

Don’t break into that piggy bank just yet.

You can keep up with the latest news, products, and projects at no cost!

Sign shop owners qualify for a

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Go to www.signshop.com/subscribe to request a new subscription or to update your address.

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@SBIMag Sign Builder Illustrated

June 2012 // Sign Builder Illustrated

59

service trucks

continued from page 59

typical daily work.

“For the occasional projects outside that realm, it’s more cost-effective to rent equipment or sub-contract that work.”

Sign shop owners who already own a service truck and are pondering an upgrade or a replacement should evaluate a current truck in terms of whether it can adequately handle all installations; whether it provides sufficient space for

transporting all required equipment to jobs; and how often it is unavailable due to necessary repairs or maintenance. “Ask: ‘Do I want to expand into an untapped market for my area with a higher reach, more capacity, or more truck storage?’” suggests Wilkerson.

“It all comes down to cost savings through efficiency,” says Phillips. “If you can get more done with a single truck and reduce the costs of operating your business, then you’ll see more

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52 feet of working height, 34 feet of side reach, 2 man power level power rotating basket and basket mounted jib winch standard. PTO power, remote engine start and stop. Meets and exceeds all the new OSHA and CSA requirements with a load capacity under the new OSHA crane operator certifications.

Call Wilkie Mfg., L.L.C. today at 405-235-0920 to get yours. www.wilkiemfg.com 60

Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

profits in the long run.”

Another consideration is the actual cost of the truck. Owners should realize that a lower price does not always equal a better deal.

“In many cases, what may appear to be a lower up-front cost is actually an inferior investment,” cautions Phillips.

“As the efficiency and tax savings of a resale from a more elaborate machine may actually make it cost less in the long run.”

New or Used? cont. from p. 59 Used trucks can be a good option, provided the purchaser thoroughly evaluates all aspects of the vehicle— including its lift and chassis.

“Increased maintenance for a poorly-cared-for unit can potentially reduce any savings from buying used,” says Phillips.

“You never want to buy a used truck if you don’t know where it’s been and how it was maintained,” adds Johnny Stamm of Stamm Manufacturing, maker of the Signalier line of trucks.

For those buying new, several factors determine price: make and model of the truck itself; the cab and chassis; engine and transmission size; the gross vehicle weight rating; type of lift; its capacity and height; the paint job; and extras like tool boxes, outriggers, power connections, etc.

“As a rule of thumb for estimating the base price without the extras, figure it will cost twice the lift height, in thousands of dollars,” says Stamm.

“The great thing about all-new equipment is the lack of hassles,” says Wilkerson. “They come with a warranty, so downtime will be nonexistent and you don’t have to worry about how the equipment was treated by previous operators.”

All vendors work with finance companies to make the purchase a manageable expense for those who qualify and decide now is the time to invest in their business.

signshop.com

Looking to catch some more business?

89% of our surveyed readers have contacted an advertiser after seeing their ad in Sign Builder Illustrated.*

See what they have to say: “I use Sign Builder Illustrated as a purchasing tool constantly!”

“Sign Builder is our first choice for finding new products and services to offer to our clients.”

“I use Sign Builder Illustrated as a continual reference for suppliers and products.”

“Sign Builder is a great source for new vendors and opportunities to expand my product line.” *According to the 2009 Readership Survey of our July issue.

Follow Us On: Sign Builder Illustrated @SBIMag Sign Builder Illustrated

Log on to www.signshop.com

Identity Signage / By Ashley bray ////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Salvaging Signage Reclaimed wood gets a second life as an identity sign.

1

62

Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

Leafing Through Echogen Power Systems, an Akron, Ohio start-up company, had just moved into a building previously occupied by a steel company. The advanced energy business was in the process of demolishing and renovating part of the building to suit its needs when it approached Central Graphics about a new identity sign.

Central Graphics suggested using some of the wood from the old building—it would keep a bit of the building’s history and provide a green solution. Echogen views sustainability as an important priority, so it was immediately onboard with the idea.

Having worked on a previous project that used reclaimed barn floorboards for a boutique sign, Central Graphics sifted through the demolition rubble with a trained eye in search of the perfect piece of wood. “We looked at doors, and we looked at roofing material,” says Dave Soulsby, owner & president of Central Graphics, “knowing, if we found a beam, that would be the best.”

Eventually the search paid off, and Central Graphics found a few beams to work with. Jeff Loofboro, managing director at Central Graphics, works often with wood materials. Based on his experience, he estimated that the tree the wood came

2

3

signshop.com

all photos courtesy of central graphics.

T

he buzz in the industry surrounding “greener” practices often centers around numbers and percentages: How much of a product was made from recycled goods? Is the material fully or partially biodegradable? How many LEED credits will the project earn?

But what if a project’s foundation was completely reclaimed?

No numbers would be needed to figure out the green aspect of the job then.

Central Graphics (www.centralgraphicsgroup.com) in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio recently completed a job in which this was the case— the sign blank was entirely reclaimed wood.

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

The finished sign

1. Central Graphics started the job with beams leftover from the client’s renovation.

4. C entral Graphics chose three now-like-new wood pieces to create the sign blank.

2. The shop purchased a large circular saw to make straight cuts in the beams.

5. T he wood was stained with Cabot Wood Stain in Ebony and a marine top coat was added for extra protection.

3. The shop rough-cut the beams, milled them with a planar, ran them through a joiner, and sanded them.

4

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6. A luminum Gemini letters were stud-mounted to the sign blank.

5

June 2012 // Sign Builder Illustrated

6

63

7 from was probably a seedling when the pilgrims arrived.

Trimming & Finishing It may seem that a sign using found materials would be cheaper to produce because the cost of the sign blank is eliminated. But in fact, quite the opposite is true.

This project was very labor-intensive; in fact, Central Graphics spent two days just preparing the wood. “The client thought we were going to take a beam from the rubble, put some letters on it, and put it up. But you can’t do that,” says Soulsby. “Once they see it leaving the rubble in our truck and then coming back as a new sign, they don’t really understand all of the hours that we’re

7. The new idenity sign was mounted to the outside of the Echogen building.

8. The 275-pound sign required a crane to lift it into place.

9. Two installers on ladders helped guide the sign into position.

10. Central Graphics created a powder-coated steel U-shaped bracket out of 1/8-inch plate steel to secure the sign.

9 64

Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

8 putting into it.”

Central Graphics began the hours of prep work by securing the proper tooling. “The beams were twisted, so we had to come up with ways of getting straight cuts on them,” says Loofboro.

At the outset, the sheer size of the beams—10 inches-by-10 inches-by-14 feet long—caused a problem because the shop didn’t have the necessary tools on hand to make the cuts. As a solution, the shop purchased a large circular saw to make the straight cuts in the beams.

After cutting the beams down to size, Central Graphics rough-cut them, milled them with a planer, and ran them through a joiner to get the edges straight. The shop then

10 signshop.com

sanded the wood and stained it with ebony Cabot® Wood Stain. It also applied a marine topcoat for added protection against the elements.

With three cut-and-stained wood pieces ready for fabrication, Central Graphics used allthread rods in three locations to bind the three wood pieces together and create the sign blank.

Next Central Graphics mounted flat-cut, brushed finish, aluminum Gemini letters and a PMS colormatched logo (also from Gemini) onto the sign blank. “We studmounted those with about a half-inch clearance between the letters and the sign,” says Loofboro. “We stood them off a little bit.”

It took about a day to bind the sign blank and attach the letters. The finished sign measures three inches thick, twenty-seven inches tall, and one hundred inches wide.

After drilling the necessary holes into the building, the 275-pound sign was lifted into position with a crane while two installers on a ladder guided it into place. Using large, galvanized bolts fed through the bracket, the sign was thru-bolted to the building.

The CEO of Echogen was very pleased with the final product. And throughout the entire job, Soulsby kept him in the loop with pictures of the fabrication process.

The benefits here were two-fold.

For one, this demonstrated the value the client was getting. “Value is important when you’re talking about reclaimed,” says Soulsby, ‘because in the mind of the client it’s, ‘Well you just picked it up and put it on the side of my building.’”

Second the pictures helped to tell the story behind the sign. “Now they can talk about it more. So when their Board [of Directors] or employees come in, they can say, ‘Look here’s, from the ground up, how we tried to preserve,” says Soulsby.

The value and the story behind the sign were what set the project apart for Central Graphics, as well. “It was more of a labor of love for us,” says Soulsby. “Rather than just cranking out another sign, it was something we put our heart and soul into. We really enjoyed doing it.”

To read more about Central Graphics, check out

“Shop Talk” on page 72.

Planting a Sign Central Graphics installers worked over an hour-and-a-half to mount the sign onto the outside of the Echogen building.

The shop created a powder-coated steel, U-shaped bracket out of 1/8-inch plate steel to secure the sign.

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June 2012 // Sign Builder Illustrated

65

Wayfinding / By Lori Shridhare //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

A Hospital

Finds its Way

L

ike all other sign media, wayfinding is a growing area for industry professionals. Richard Lang, principal of St. Paul-based Visual Communications (www.visualcomm.com), has seen an explosive growth in this field over the last twenty years. His clients include architects, marketers, city planners, designers, and project managers in the education, entertainment, financial, government, healthcare, library, office, campus, and retail industries.

The common thread all these fields have in common: Wayfinding.

“In today’s competitive marketplace, it’s apparent that wayfinding and signage is the signature of the enterprise, creating a first impression of the organization and its concern for its clientele and the client experience,” says Lang.

66

Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

all Photos courtesy of visual communications.

One firm develops the cure for a hospital’s wayfinding ills.

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THE MANY MOODS OF METAL.

As an additional wayfinding aid, the exterior identification sign system includes aluminum-curved surfaces with building color accents.

Visual Communications is called upon for a variety of reasons: Creating new or refurbished sign systems; revamping tired and outdated dysfunctional systems; reaching broader audiences (including multilingual and multicultural clientele); and designing and implementing well-planned, cost-effective, and low-maintenance systems.

The company recently worked on the design and creation of a new wayfinding system for Hennepin County Medical Center, Minnesota’s premier Level 1 Adult Trauma Center and Level 1 Pediatric Trauma Center.

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The 477-bed hospital is located in downtown Minneapolis and occupies six city blocks (linked by skyways and walkways). The current buildings are the combination of three historic hospitals, which made wayfinding difficult, due to its history and the architectural constraints.

The new wayfinding program included a team approach. Visual Communications had to work with a private and a public task force. All major changes would require consensus and approvals. “The first step was to recommend a simple color code system for each building that would be unique and recogniz-

Challenges with the existing wayfinding system F irst-time users could park or enter the building at any entrance and walk up to five blocks to their destination.

n

n Each building had its own numbering system, room numbers were

redundant, and upper floor access was limited mainly to the elevator within each building.

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n Where floors joined other buildings, floor numbers changed due to

architectural differences (Level 3 met 4, and so forth.) n

68

Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

Many non-English speaking clients utilize the hospital. signshop.com

able and would override all old building names,” says Lang.

A new room numbering system was also created to flow from the southernmost point of each building (across skyways to adjacent city blocks) with larger numbers to the north.

“Within each building, areas are plotted into pods with assigned numbers for continued growth and flexibility within the numbering system,” says Lang.

“Floor levels were changed to flow from one building to the next.

“Due to the architecture of one building, in particular, the floors are numbered B, 1, 2, 4, 5, and 7 to meet with adjoining, older-style buildings.”

Key public elevators within each building were named for the building color to provide simple direction and geographic locations (Red Elevator, Blue Elevator, Green Elevator, etc.). A standard suite sign was designed to include the letter of the building color, the floor, and the room number. International and ‘Hablamos Juntos’ pictograms were included on all the signage, as well.

Overhead signs were designed to easily communicate the directions to adjoining buildings, along with pertinent building suite number directions, restrooms, elevator directions, and so forth.

“We prefer to create overhead signs with a solid surface—glass or acrylic— finished with map acrylic polyurethane.

We’ll add applied vinyl directional graphics for flexibility,” says Lang. “Suite and wall signs can be similar.”

At each building’s entrance and exit, overhead signage provides the transition notification. In addition, wall signage with location maps orient the users and provide reassurance of the distance to their location.

“It was determined early on that the most effective wayfinding plan would foster the use of the skyway level as the public route,” says Lang. “All guests are instructed to travel from building to building on the skyway and utilize key elevators to reach higher floors.”

Exterior entrances were evaluated for public access, parking availability, and safety. As a result, some were closed to the public and employees. Patients and visitors are instructed to enter at three major entrances clearly marked with effective signage (Purple, Red, and Blue).

Exterior signage provides direction to signshop.com

each of these entrances, which is consistent with the interior graphics design. As additional wayfinding aid, the new exterior identification sign system includes contemporary, aluminum-curved surfaces with building color accents.

“The system was competitively bid,” says Lang. “The fabricating sign company provided all key overhead signage within two weeks and all temporary, color-coded signage for each suite door within forty-eight hours.

“The hospital even provided in-house training [about the system] for personnel. The transition was very smooth.”

Due to budget constraints, the interior signage was completed first, with the exterior system completed three years later.

“We pride ourselves in tight specifications and details that clearly specify our client’s needs, are universally understandable in the sign industry, and achieve apples-to-apples bids and quality products,” says Lang.

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June 2012 // Sign Builder Illustrated

71

“

SHOP TALK

B y A s h l e y B r ay

The Best of Both Worlds: Central Graphics

Dave Soulsby: Graphics or Signage?

No Need to Choose!

C

entral Graphics in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio (www.centralgraphicsgroup.com) is a bit of a chameleon. Established in 1995 as Sign Central with only a vinyl cutter and some ready-to-apply vinyl, the shop has made many changes over the years. As it developed into a larger graphics and signs shop, it added new equipment like digital printers and, in 2006, changed its name to Central Graphics.

“We struggle back and forth with, are we a graphics company or are we a sign company?” says Owner and President Dave Soulsby (pictured, left, with Managing Director Jeff Loofboro, far left).

But no matter which side of the spectrum Central Graphics falls on any given day, there is no doubt that the company has a strong presence in both graphics and signage.

On the graphics end of things, the shop has found its back up against the wall—the wall wrap, that is. Using a variety of MACtac vinyls, the shop has wrapped everything from office, lobby, and

A shop strikes a balance between changing with the times and staying true to its roots.

72

residential walls to even the walls in its own shop.

As profitable as these wraps have been, Central Graphics does enjoy getting back to its roots with handmade signs. “It’s nice to go back and do a real sign,” says Soulsby, “not just something cranked out from a printer.” (Note: For an example of Central Graphics’ handmade work, see page 62.)

Whether working on a graphic or custom signage project, one thing has been a constant— the client’s interest in sustainable materials. “We have to educate all day long on what is reusable,” says Soulsby, who ensures the shop incorporates green practices into its signage.

Today the shop’s growing client list includes big names and Fortune 500 companies. But even with this burgeoning list, Central Graphics continues to specialize in smaller, more custom quantities of signage. It’s this attention to detail that has kept the shop in the “center” of things for almost twenty years.

Central Graphics even wraps the walls in its shop, as seen in this tranquil beach scene for the office manager.

Sign Builder Illustrated // June 2012

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M A R C H 2011

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Contact Jeff Sutley (East Coast only) at jeffsutley@sbpub.com or call 212-620-7233; or Kim Noa (West, Central U.S.) at knoa@sbpub.com or 212-620-7221.

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