Illustrator can't fit my design

[TheSnowman]

I'm trying to make a layout that is 5' tall, by 28' long. Illustrator just takes a dump all over itself when I tell it to go that big, and tells me it doesn't know how. It's CS2, but I've never had to make anything that big before...any ideas on a way around this? It's just going to be some vectored lines that I'll be cutting on the plotter.

 

[Shovelhead]

Lay it out at 25% and send it to the plotter at 400%??

 

[TheSnowman]

I considered that, I was just annoyed that I had to scale it. Just wondered if there was an easy way around it...not that scaling it will kill me.

 

[Shovelhead]

I apologize for being sarcastic!

 

[Fred Weiss]

Although Adobe Illustrator is an excellent design application, its authors do not gear it to accommodate larger sign sizes. Scaling is the solution.

 

[Rick]

I do all mine to scale using Cadtools.....but for simple stuff, CadTools is overkill.

www.hotdoor.com

 

[GK]

CS3 was supposed to allow larger art board sizes but that obviously fell through =/. CADTools or Scaling will be your only solutions.

 

[thewood]

That's always been a drawback (in my mind) with Illy and PS--the inability to accomodate large layouts. Of course, you can scale things up, but should one have to? This is one area where Flexi blows Adobe products away.

 

[Replicator]

CS3 only scales up to 18.9618 FT . . . Definite drawback . . . !

 

[iSign]

hint: try 10% instead of 25%. Just move the decimal & every measurement you enter, or every measurement you read takes absolutely no time to calculate, only the nano second to remember that you are scaling at all.

this is one area where Flexi blows Adobe products away.

I love both products, but after 15 years of scaling signs in Illustrator, this comment makes me laugh...

...to me this extra 5 seconds of scaling represents one tiny chink in Adobe's armor, not significant enough to contribute one iota to who blows who away

There Foz... hope I gave back the right words

 

[GK]

That's always been a drawback (in my mind) with Illy and PS--the inability to accomodate large layouts. Of course, you can scale things up, but should one have to? This is one area where Flexi blows Adobe products away.

Keep in mind, Flexi was designed primarily to do decal/sign work so if Flexi was designed to do this and couldn't make graphics this size...what use would it have at all compared to any of the Adobe products. Adobe wasn't created to cut decals, design wraps, make signs so there was absolutely no need for anything like this for them to make changes, hence all the 3rd party stuff out to do the stuff it originally wasn't intended to do.

 

[fozzyber]

Isigns, give me my words back you friggen thief, you stole them from my mouth....

 

[Techman]

OR use Corel. I makes whopper siez panels.

 

[iSign]

CS3 only scales up to 18.9618 FT . . . Definite drawback . . . !

bummer... mine only goes to 18.9583 :

 

[TheSnowman]

Don't ya love the things ya learn by accident?

 

[iSign]

ummmm... let's see...

don't fill 22 shells with firecracker powder and torch in moms wreckroom

don't jump of 40' rope swings at scout jamboree

don't ride with friends driving on qualudes

don't freeze up in the impact zone in high surf advisory conditions & let the lip drive your ribs into your board

don't catch an edge boarding down the treeline

without further ado ...guess I'm gonna say no

 

[thewood]

Adobe wasn't created to cut decals, design wraps, make signs.

Exactly.

CS3 only scales up to 18.9618 FT

And, somtimes, that just isn't big enough!

I use both Illy and PS on a daily basis, so I'm not bashing them. However, Flexi is still my go-to vector based drawing app. I think it's geared more towards the precise measurements involved in signcrafting than Illustrator.

 

[Rick]

Scaling in any program has its advantages...like sending a proof and using the scaled drawings to measure your lettering placement...that is the majority of my work. I have not had too many issues with precision when scaling up. When I was a production monkey I saw the same mistakes when getting Corel, Flexi, Quark and other files. By the way, printing out in scale from Flexi blows. Since I design for multple uses and CadTools has more options, Illustrator has more advantages for me....if I was cutting vinyl all day or had no reason to use scale then I would think it sucks too. I have the scale thing down in my head...8.333 for getting it into Architects scale 10's for metric...then fit in a page..no biggie

 

[OldPaint]

corel version 7.0 and up have a work page of 150 FEET X 150 FEET now thats all you ever need....

 

[Deaton Design]

I do just about every single layout in illustrator in a scale size. If its for a 4' by 8', I design it in 4" by 8". I import the file into vinylmasterpro, resize it and cut everything from there. I hardly do any design work in my cut program.