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(April 2010) posted on Wed Mar 17, 2010

Design and graphic-production tips

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By Rob Ivers

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Rob Ivers owns Rob Ivers Inc. (Raymore, MO), a vehicle graphics and installation company. He’s installed vinyl since 1978 and taught vinyl-graphics installation since 1993. For more information, visit www.robivers.com

I needed a new sign for my shop’s storefront. The old sign, which stood for seven years, had started to fade. Although many of you have been making vinyl signage for years, others may be new to the business. In this article, I’ll explain the steps I used to design and create a multi-color, computer-cut, vinyl-clad sign to hang over my front door. If you’re new to the sign business, my explanation of the process should prove quite helpful. I hope that even veteran signmakers will discover a tip or two.

 

Design

I wanted a simple, yet attractive sign that uses an effective layout and color scheme. A well-designed sign draws the viewer’s eye to the most important information first, then to secondary components. In my case, I emphasize the name of my business first, and then the work I do.

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Clutter overloads many signs with too much information. Empty space amplifies your message. My rule of thumb calls for devoting half of a sign’s height to content, and the other half to negative space. I strongly suggest situating your sign’s primary focus towards the center, and making it larger than other components.

Avoid using too many different typefaces; it looks unprofessional. I chose Helvetica Black Italic Con-densed and Helvetica Bold Con-densed. The heavier, italic typeface helps emphasize the name. The condensed version allows me to make the name taller without appearing too wide.

Heavier fonts also work better for chiseled effects. Using the same font family for descriptive text main- tains good design. The lack of italics helps distinguish it as a separate component, and a lighter text weight clearly indicates secondary importance.
I used such graphic elements as the chiseled font, the border and the gold diamond bullets between the services to enhance the eye appeal. Whatever design you choose, make it memorable. People are inundated with so many visual stimuli; they tend to ignore the ordinary.

I chose a black background to contrast with the building and differentiated it from the majority of signs with white backgrounds. I used silver (instead of white and gold), to add some class. For the chiseled text’s accent color, I used a mirror-finish gold to add some pop.