Blockout Material

[300mphGraphics]

Our local communities have a dark skies ordinance and we are not allowed to have white glowing backgrounds on our illuminated signs. Normally we can reverse the colors and come up with a nice looking project but I have a corporation that needs (wants) the white background. I bought some blockout material that I thought would be the ticket, but I'm not happy with it. I was trying to use the blockout 1st surface and the translucent lettering 2nd, but it is extremely hard to line up and looks fuzzy. Should I be applying everything 2nd surface? Help please.

Thanks!

 

[300mphGraphics]

Anyone have any suggestions this morning?

Thank you.

 

[BigfishDM]

Our local communities have a dark skies ordinance and we are not allowed to have white glowing backgrounds on our illuminated signs. Normally we can reverse the colors and come up with a nice looking project but I have a corporation that needs (wants) the white background. I bought some blockout material that I thought would be the ticket, but I'm not happy with it. I was trying to use the blockout 1st surface and the translucent lettering 2nd, but it is extremely hard to line up and looks fuzzy. Should I be applying everything 2nd surface? Help please.

Thanks!

Do you have an example picture you can show? I am not quite understanding the application.

 

[Bigdawg]

I think I'd put the blockout second surface and the lettering on top. Is this cut vinyl or a printed piece? We regularly do lit signs with the main print on the front and a clear layer of the same print on second surface. I'm not sure why you are getting fuzziness - a picture would help a lot.

 

[300mphGraphics]

Picture attached. The black backwards picture on the bottom is the first surface with blockout. The top picture there is a white halo around the lettering even though we put a 1/4" inside contour stroke for overlap. Fortunately I've only done a small test on this, the finished faces are 36x144". Should I use white blockout on the same surface as the blue translucent?

Thanks all!

 

[NateF]

We've normally put the white blockout on the face of the sign. If the customer wants the letters to be a little more visible at night, we will sometimes leave a white translucent stroke around the letters. During the day the stroke isn't even visible, but at night it helps make some colors more legible.