Boat Transom Distortion?

[sportycliff]

How do you deal with it?

I've recently opened a new to me market in boat lettering.
As is usually the case there is more to it than just cutting, and slapping.

My big question is, are there specific formulas/software to compensate for
the angle/compound curves found especially on sailboat transoms?

I'm sure some of you boat specialists have figured it out, care to share?

TIA
Cliff

Fred, I'm cross posting to find the right area. Feel free to move/delete as necessary.

 

[Typestries]

Hey cliff-hope all is well! You still have your 1224?

Quick and easy way to do this-transfer tape the entire transom, sharpie out the outline of the gunwales, keel, rubrail, rudder, etc. Then peel the tape, attach it to a wall, take a photo of it, scale the photo out, and layout over the photo. You have essentially transferred the 3d aspect of the transom into 2d.

And remember, blowboaters get the wind for free and want everything else to be. Charge accordingly.

 

[Bigdawg]

I deleted the posts in the premium section - you'll get more visibility in the open forum for your question...

Edited to add: See! Rick gotchya on this one before I could type this

 

[sportycliff]

Thanks Rick!
I was kind of hoping for a longer distance approach.
This particular boat builder, and yard is 1 1/2 hours from me. Adding the travel, fuel, etc., kinda blows it out of the water price wise. This yard really wants to work with me, but I'm leery of the added expense. (and as you said the owners are frugal)
The yard master can take photos(with a yard stick) and measure (including angles) for me, but my problem is the visual distortion. They all want an arc to follow the rise, but the "back angle?" throws the whole thing off.

RE: 1224 PM Sent...

Thanks Stacy!!

 

[SightLine]

Go there one time - show them how to tape the transom up with app tape. Make them buy a roll of app tape and tell them you can do the work but they will need to do the tracing on app tape for you, photograph it (properly) and email you the photo with a few measurment points.

On photographing something like this, same as with making a pattern this way for a vehicle or anything else - when photographing the application tape (or even a vehicle) stand a good ways back from the peice and do not zoom in. You do not want it to fill the full frame of the camera. Camera lenses are round - the closer something is to the edges of the picture the more barrel distortion there will be. Much better to crop a lot of background out....

 

[John Butto]

this?

Just to be clear, is this what you are talking about. You do not want it to be A but more with B.

 

[sportycliff]

Just to be clear, is this what you are talking about. You do not want it to be A but more with B.

Yes, exactly. The problem I'm having is not the rise curve, that's easy to figure out, it's the angle in/out of the transom. More of a perspective thing. Easily adjustable in Illy or Corel, but how flatten it? I'm not sure I'm making myself clear. Here is a transom,(stolen from someones website just for an example) with what I'll call an "outie". From the rear of the boat on the water, with normal lettering you'd see a perspective gift due to the bottom of the transom begin closer to you than the top. Adding a compound curve just make it worse.

 

[Jillbeans]

Man I got called last week to "letter" an antique sailboat transom.
The guy said his buddy had already applied "real gold leaf" vinyl to it.
The boat had a very sexy indented curved transom.
The "real gold" vinyl letters which had been hand cut and haphazardly adhered on this thing (an an arch) were cut for a straight surface and would have probably looked like **** even on a flat sign.
Guy wanted me to outline them in paint.
The problem is that the outline only accentuated the flaws in the lettering and how they did not flow with the curve of the transom.
After outlining twice and wiping it off twice because the guy was not satisfied, I told him I could not help him and walked away.
This template idea with the transfer tape would be a good solution.
I could have hand-lettered the thing from the start with just eyeballing it and compensating, but it was too late in this instance.
Love....Jill

 

[John Butto]

From your pic it looks like the lettering does not follow the top curve, looks like he just has a standard curve to look pleasing to the eye. If you make a simple paper (8.5x11) template for the boat yard of a back transom with room for them to put measurements and with a photo attached you can lay it out to see fit at your shop and adjust on the job if need be.

 

[letterman7]

I think you're making this way harder than it needs to be. Letter it like anything else and match the arc horizontally of the transom if there is one. The photo in #7 does just that - the letters are not distorted to read "correct" when viewed - why would you do that anyway? Once the boat is in the water most transoms are at eye level anyway or slightly below.
If you're doing a layout in Corel for a customers approval, only then would you add a perspective to show the customer what the copy will look like actually applied.

 

[omgsideburns]

It's done like a windshield.. you need a straight line, and measurements of the difference from the edges and the middle..

 

[sportycliff]

I think you're making this way harder than it needs to be. Letter it like anything else and match the arc horizontally of the transom if there is one. The photo in #7 does just that - the letters are not distorted to read "correct" when viewed - why would you do that anyway? Once the boat is in the water most transoms are at eye level anyway or slightly below.
If you're doing a layout in Corel for a customers approval, only then would you add a perspective to show the customer what the copy will look like actually applied.

While I'll probably end up going that way, I was hoping there was a definitive solution to the problem. It's noticeable on certain exaggerated transom angles enough that my customer mentioned it. I fail to see how the transfer tape solution could work on the front to back angle issue. (although I can be short sighted and thick headed :Big Laugh)

 

[John Butto]

If you were at a boatyard 40 years ago and someone wanted their boat lettered right away because it was going back in the water the next day. You would take a wooden yardstick with a piece of charcoal and run it across while having your hand and yardstick as a guide to the top of the transom and draw your guide lines and proceed to layout the letters and spacing on the transom. Paint it and put outlines on, collect money and move on. You are looking for a sage at the top of a mountain for a formula that does not exist.

 

[Billct2]

I'm with John. There is no simple long distance solution for this that I know of.