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Month: October 2011

Who Regulates Custom Traffic Signs?

Customized Traffic Signs

A customized signage that is non-standard. Standard signs, as discussed in the previous post, are the ones like Stop, School Zone signs, or Speed Limit guide markers. Custom traffic signs are used in private communities and military bases. They are even used on the interstate.

In the previous article I discussed standards for reflective road signs which are set nationally by the US Department of Transportation (USDOT), or by local states conforming to the USDOT’s Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD). This manual gives all the regulations for various aluminum traffic signs, but doesn’t address a non-standard or personalized one.

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USDOT Standards for Reflective Traffic and Road Signs

large format Reflective Signage

As you drive down the various roads and highways, you’d certainly be lost frequently, especially at night, if you didn’t have reflective traffic signs.

Back when I was a young man in my early 20’s, I spent a few winters in the Southern U.S. and was amazed at the lack of such signposts! Even more, I was amazed at how people knew how to get around without them.

One conversation I remember having with a Southern gentleman, an old-timer in Mississippi, went something like this…”ya’ll just travel yonda up Hwy. 357 and you’ll see a big old oak tree standin’

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How to Make a Dye Sublimated Cloth Banner

Personalized Printed Fabrics

It might be a misnomer in some ways to title this article “How To Make A Cloth Banner” because honestly, I don’t even know how to make a one! Well, that’s not exactly true, but I don’t really know how to make a cloth banner from scratch.

I am not a seamster, although I did sew a shirt with my Mom’s help when I was 14, and I still put buttons back on my shirts when they pop off (no jokes here please). But I have seen it done before when I used to have a sub-contractor who was amazing at making appliquéd banners for our client,

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How Sublimation Fabric Printing Makes Beautiful Prints

Sublimation fabric printing

If you did a Google or Yahoo! query for the term sublimation fabric printing, in all likelihood you are looking for a company that does it for banners, trade show graphics, cloth posters, or flags.

You also may have been looking for textile print company that does it, although more than likely, with its increasing popularity as an advertising medium, you are looking for the former.

Why Sublimation Printed Cloth Fabric Banners Will Always Impress Your Clientele

I have penned several articles regarding this method of printing, also known as dye sublimation,

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A Simple Explanation of Fabric Sublimation Printing

Dye sub banner printer

If you did a search for fabric sublimation printing, you were looking for textile company that does banners, posters, or flags. While this has been around for decades, this particular term has become most closely associated with the large format printing industry, specifically banners and trade show graphics.

I’ve mentioned in other articles on this topic that dye sub printing is a relative newcomer in the sign and banner industry, and that in the past decades, vinyl banners were the main advertising medium for inexpensive temporary advertising. Vinyl items are still a huge industry, and everything from billboards to the sides of buildings and even truck trailers have vinyl displays advertising on them.

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Sign and Banner Shops May Be Fabric Printing Companies

Sign Shop

If you did a search engine query for fabric printing companies, you would come up with a variety of reasons for pressing on cloth material, but our purpose in talking about this will be for the purpose of producing advertising banners, since that is what I’m familiar with. Another reason might include if you’re a clothing designer and have a specific pattern you need imprinted.

However, as I don’t know much about that type of cloth printing (it isn’t apropos to our business), what I’m talking about are the companies that print on cloth using dye-sublimation or digital printing.

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Dye Sublimation Printing Services, Chemistry and Materials

Wide Format Printer

Vinyl banners are “passe.” “Boring.” “Dull.” Useful, but everybody’s got at least one. OK, they are cheap…I’ll give you that, but what does that say about your company. Your customer service. Your products. Your services.

Dye sublimation printing services offer a welcome breath of fresh air to the banner market. There are more companies offering these now than last year, and more than the year before, so the pricing is pretty reasonable.  The printed fabric displays help your business say “classy.” “Expensive” (even though they’re really not that costly now). That you care about how you look. Your clients.

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Dye-sublimation Fabric Printing for Displays and Tradeshows: Why It’s Superior to Any Other Printing in 2011

dye sublimation printing

One of my favorite industry topics lately has been dye-sublimation fabric printing. Of all the developments I’ve witnessed in my 20 years in the graphic advertising, this is the one that has improved the quality of advertising graphics the most.

Consider that in the past 150 years, signs went from being art – carved and hand-painted wood signs – to neon, metal, plastic, and vinyl graphics. The art aspect of the advertising sign or banner went out the window in favor of more, cheaper, and faster. Now I’m not advocating a return to the stone age.

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Dye Sublimation Inkjet Printers and Printing Methods

Wide Format Dye Sublimation Printing

While we don’t sell printing machines, nor do we ever plan to, we have purchased a few. This article is about dye sublimation inkjet printers and how they work and how they changed the banner and poster business in the past decade, and why I think they are the bomb!

The first sublimation printers used in the sign industry were not inkjets, but those that used a ribbon technology that was more akin to a thermal transfer 4-color process print cloth/fabric. They were and are great little print devices for short run decals and small signs,

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Cloth Banners Printing Methods – Dye Sublimation Printing

Digital Printing

Now that title got your attention, didn’t it! Is it scandalous? A) Are companies that do cloth banners printing hiding something from you, the customer? B) Should it be done differently but “they” just aren’t telling us? C) Or do I have lots of direct marketing friends who love catchy headlines? Or D), all of the above.

The answer for the above is “C.” Direct marketers like Perry Marshall, Rich Schefren, and Dan Kennedy love a good headline with a hook, and the word “exposed” is one of the best. Why? Everybody loves a good scandal. We love to expose other people as frauds.

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