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finally did my own van….
I’d like to thank everyone for their advice last year with regards to my van sign writing, following some wise words from JC i eventually scrapped the idea of the interweb style icons and went back to having a dragon, i couldn’t find one i wanted or liked so took a photo of a tattoo i have and vectorised it! I had plans for this dragon and had one printed and fitted it as a test piece (for effect and to check how it lasted non laminated (not poss to lam.. you’ll see)
dragon sorted… i’ve had this van for almost 6mnths now, no matter what i did i was never happy with it, not enough to actually fit it anyways. then again about three weeks ago i looked at it again, and again, and again,
then with about five minutes i’d found two fonts which (i think) worked together and fitted well on the van, only the dragon was kept (and updated with colour), everything else deleted.
the dragon itself has been a long standing idea i’ve had, I work a lot with reflective films and love this stuff, i’m always experimenting with it and trying to offer customers new ideas for it’s uses, the van needed to reflect that (no pun intended). this is a black reflective which glows white, after a bit of discussion with Steve McAdie -who would ultimately print it for me-; I decided to just go for it and hope the results were as hoped,
because my van is black, the hope was that by printing onto the black film i would get a subtle iridescent / transparent looking design which would ‘colour up’ nicely when people either view it from their cars at night or when the sunlight is shining on the van from directly behind the viewer, well, it works a treat!
the main sign is visible from over 100yrds by day, the reflective the same at night. the only addition i have yet to do is some kind of bevel effect with some green reflective so as to highlight the name which is poorly visible at night compared to the dragon. my van is often parked on the main road so why waste the opportunity to advertise at night too!!
it’s only been finished a week and i’ve had three jobs off it already!
the small dragon is to be removed, that was the prototype – we didn’t know if we could print well on it before we did it! laminating was also an issue, because it’s contour cut it would have to be loaded back into the machine but, how would it see registration marks on a black film? lol. the only answer will be to do it by hand in sections, i’ll decide on whether to do that shortly.
any crit welcome btw,
Hughps, sorry for the crappy pics,
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35 Replies
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a few more pics,
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Looks good Hugh
So If I understand correctly youve printed onto black reflective -yes? is there a special type for accepting print or did you use a standard reflective if so what type and what profile I would be interested to know.
John 😀
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Well done – simple but effective
john
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Really nice Hugh, I would have done the "Dragon Signs" in reflective as well as it looks great illuminated.
Nice job
Warren
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Looks good mate well done, worked out very well ! 😀 😀 😀 😀
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quote John Harding:Looks good Hugh
So If I understand correctly youve printed onto black reflective -yes? is there a special type for accepting print or did you use a standard reflective if so what type and what profile I would be interested to know.
John 😀
what’s a profile? lol. Steve printed it so you’d need to ask him but, i never told him what the film was, i’m not even sure there would be a profile for it as i’m not sure it’s meant to be printed on, i’ll look it up.
but otherwise, yes, the dragon is colours printed onto a black reflective.
Warren,
my original plan was to use reflective on the lettering as well but, i just couldn’t find the right green, all too dark which i why i plan to bevel them and use a darker reflective green for the bevel, that should make it more than readable then by night.cheers,
Hugh -
Hugh, the dragon is really impressive, experimental technique. Just an idea could you print green onto white reflective for the company name then it would light up at night but stil show up in the day, liam.
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quote Liam Pattison:Hugh, the dragon is really impressive, experimental technique. Just an idea could you print green onto white reflective for the company name then it would light up at night but stil show up in the day, liam.
Experimental it was! don’t think i’ve seen it done before, we’ll call it Stealth signage" !! it’ll only work with coloured vinyls and closely matching colours though i think. it took a bit of thinking about, ie, where to leave white, where to colour black etc.
I could print onto green Liam, yes, it occurred to me afterwards to do that, though it would be a lot easier to find a limey green reflective. the other option is to put white on top of the green and then a suitably coloured green gel / transparent film over the top. unsure yet.
Hugh
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Very nice, it shows you can do well balanced work as well as really cool stuff. Just what you need to get customers, couldn’t be better.
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Like it a lot hugh! Nice and subtle but turns heads at the same time!
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Looks great Hugh, very effective and reflective 😕
I like the fonts you’ve chosen, they have a grungy look.
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cheers Nick!
quote Neil Davey:Looks great Hugh, very effective and reflective 😕I like the fonts you’ve chosen, they have a grungy look.
HI Neil, i can’t even think what the fonts are called, one is ‘crud’, the broken looking one. kind of gives an old / weathered look to the wording, as if been there for years, then the other looks like it’s just being done, so an element of the new too, quite accidental really, i just liked the two together and within an hour of playing with sizes and measurements, I was cutting it to fit later that day!
it really has been a case of having too many clever toys that you don’t know what to play with… so you go back to trusty old lego!
ah, the other font… rough draft, no idea where they came from 😳
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Hi Hugh,
The van looks cool, bet its turning a few heads.John: No special profile used just the standard vinyl profile that came with the wasatch rip.
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Looks really go Hugh.
You could have just printed onto normal white reflective for the green lettering, I do this all the time and gives letters a glow even in daytime.
Steve
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quote Stephen Morriss:Looks really go Hugh.
You could have just printed onto normal white reflective for the green lettering, I do this all the time and gives letters a glow even in daytime.
Steve
Hi Steve,
I think that’ll be on the cards for when i got a few spare quids again!
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Sorry that should have been good not go 🙄
Steve
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quote Stephen Morriss:Looks really go Hugh.You could have just printed onto normal white reflective for the green lettering, I do this all the time and gives letters a glow even in daytime.
Steve
Which reflective do you use Stephen. Have some going through the printer now. Using Oracal 5600 but would be interested to know what others use.
Cheers
Gary
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quote :Which reflective do you use Stephen
already asked – its a trade secret 😀 :shutup:
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I use the one from Grafityp, engineering grade I think, also used the mactac one.
Steve
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quote Stephen Morriss:I use the one from Grafityp, engineering grade I think, also used the mactac one.
Steve
Thanks for the info Stephen. I only ask as I did try the Metamark but found a massive difference in reflectivity between batches. So far the Oracal is doing it for me but it’s good to know what alternatives are available.
Cheers
Gary
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quote John Harding:quote :Which reflective do you use Stephen
already asked – its a trade secret 😀 :shutup:
What’s this the North/South divide I keep hearing about :lol1: 😉
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Like it a lot hugh!!! Very effective mate
Matt
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Hugh, looks good but is it legal??
I know your not suppose to use white reflective on the back of a van but that’s because it says no white light should be displayed, surely this is the same thing??
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I like it Hugh, dont worry about the legality,
nobody has been fined yet for using reflective vinyl.(well I never heard of it)
Peter
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quote Martin:Hugh, looks good but is it legal??
I know your not suppose to use white reflective on the back of a van but that’s because it says no white light should be displayed, surely this is the same thing??
I’ve no idea Martin, I wouldn’t use a white reflective on the rear i know, this probably isn’t much brighter than shining headlights onto a clean white car at night.
quote Peter Normington:I like it Hugh, dont worry about the legality,
nobody has been fined yet for using reflective vinyl.(well I never heard of it)
Peter
thanks Peter, I’m pleased with the end result!
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It was an observation more than anything Hugh, still think it looks very effective. Like Peter I don’t know anyone who has been done. In fact I had a customer who provided escort vehicles for wide and abnormal loads who insisted the chevrons on the back of his vehicles were done in Red and white despite being told that white could not be used on the back of a van.
His vans went all over the UK and they always worked very closely with the police and apparently he never had any problems despite the spec for escort vehicles stating Red & yellow for chevrons. -
Thats Brilliant Hugh….cool and clevva!!
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Very Nice Hugh
from one dragon to another!!!
Ade
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Hi Ade,
thanks dude, just had a looky round your site, some cracking work their dude! next time i’m in Cardiff i’ll see if I can’t look you up! seems to be quite a few dragon signs around now, some established, some less so. a few years ago when i googled it there were only three, you, one in north wales (llandudno perhaps) and me! now loads come up if i recall!I like what you’ve done with your dragon logo. Being only half perfect I decided against the Welsh Draig as it seems kind of outta place down here, i did try to use it or part of it but, it just didn;t want to happen!
Hugh
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Very nice Hugh, onwards and upwards my man
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Hugh, it seems to happen a lot if the other companies using the same name are any good so maybe you should be patting yourself on the back for inspiring others :lol1: :lol1:
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Like it :thumbsup:
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quote Martin:Hugh, it seems to happen a lot if the other companies using the same name are any good so maybe you should be patting yourself on the back for inspiring others :lol1: :lol1:
oh i don’t know about that Martin, there were probably a good few that were about but with no web presence. the first time i googled it i came up with only one, as a phone entry in north Wales. that was about 4yrs ago i think. maybe search engines not so hot then?
Hugh
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Hugh it was a complement about not just yours but Ade’s work as well, don’t spoil it with what may be the truth :lol1: :lol1:
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quote Martin:Hugh it was a complement about not just yours but Ade’s work as well, don’t spoil it with what may be the truth :lol1: :lol1:
lol, had enough spoilers this past few days so hey, why not, you;re dead right Martin!!
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