gabagoo
New Member
I have no idea where to post this. It is somewhat sign related but it is more about my sons college course he is taking.
He is taking a digital media arts program at a community college and gets some assignment wherby each student has to buy a skateboard body (no wheels) and design a graphic for the underside and from what I can guess apply it, although they have had no formal training in doing such work. In any case the teacher sets it up wherby he has a digital printing company downtown that will print each piece for each student for $30.00 each ( I wonder what his kickback was?)
I told my son that I can print it for him and not to bother going downtown to do it, but he was worried that he may get a failing grade if he did that.
He finally texts me 2 days before it is due and asks if I can do it for him. I told him he is just like all my customers!!!! rush rush rush.
He sends me the file and I print 4 copies for him just in case he has trouble applying it. He then calls me the next day and asks me if I can print 2 more for his friends as they dont want to go all the way downtown to get them. I told him $20.00 each...heck I may as well make something on this..right?
My son had ordered one from this downtown place before getting me to do it for him unknown to me and I looked at it and it was printed quite nice on a matte material that I have never seen before.
Tonight I am informed that he wants my help to put it down on my drive home, so naturally being in the sign business I have nothing at home for applying vinyl short of an old beat up squeegee.
He tells me he wants to use the one he paid for from downtown so I said OK and I had to cut it as these guys just printed it as a rectangle. He had a keyline around it for cutting and I used my sons exacto knife and cut it out. When I went to peel away the excess I must have miss hit a cut and the freakin thing ripped about an inch into the graphic. No worries I say, when I put it down I can put it back together.
Now I toiled with trying to get the backing paper off. I could not get it to release and then finally I caught an edge and this clear plastic backing peeled off. We fiddled with this thing working blindly trying to line it up on the wavy skateboard and finally I get it lined up ( not sure how these other students could have possibly done this) At this point as I squeegee the graphic down it becomes apparent that this thing is paper!!! It can't follow compound curves and that tiny rip wont heal up like vinyl would as it is fixed and cant be stretched at all.
Now I lose it, and rip the POS off and tell him to get me one of my decals and I go through it all again and I apply it near perfect within minutes.
I would love to see the other students that bought this paper prints final work. That stuff is not designed to be curved at all.
He is taking a digital media arts program at a community college and gets some assignment wherby each student has to buy a skateboard body (no wheels) and design a graphic for the underside and from what I can guess apply it, although they have had no formal training in doing such work. In any case the teacher sets it up wherby he has a digital printing company downtown that will print each piece for each student for $30.00 each ( I wonder what his kickback was?)
I told my son that I can print it for him and not to bother going downtown to do it, but he was worried that he may get a failing grade if he did that.
He finally texts me 2 days before it is due and asks if I can do it for him. I told him he is just like all my customers!!!! rush rush rush.
He sends me the file and I print 4 copies for him just in case he has trouble applying it. He then calls me the next day and asks me if I can print 2 more for his friends as they dont want to go all the way downtown to get them. I told him $20.00 each...heck I may as well make something on this..right?
My son had ordered one from this downtown place before getting me to do it for him unknown to me and I looked at it and it was printed quite nice on a matte material that I have never seen before.
Tonight I am informed that he wants my help to put it down on my drive home, so naturally being in the sign business I have nothing at home for applying vinyl short of an old beat up squeegee.
He tells me he wants to use the one he paid for from downtown so I said OK and I had to cut it as these guys just printed it as a rectangle. He had a keyline around it for cutting and I used my sons exacto knife and cut it out. When I went to peel away the excess I must have miss hit a cut and the freakin thing ripped about an inch into the graphic. No worries I say, when I put it down I can put it back together.
Now I toiled with trying to get the backing paper off. I could not get it to release and then finally I caught an edge and this clear plastic backing peeled off. We fiddled with this thing working blindly trying to line it up on the wavy skateboard and finally I get it lined up ( not sure how these other students could have possibly done this) At this point as I squeegee the graphic down it becomes apparent that this thing is paper!!! It can't follow compound curves and that tiny rip wont heal up like vinyl would as it is fixed and cant be stretched at all.
Now I lose it, and rip the POS off and tell him to get me one of my decals and I go through it all again and I apply it near perfect within minutes.
I would love to see the other students that bought this paper prints final work. That stuff is not designed to be curved at all.
