Time for my morning rant. Terminology!

[kcollinsdesign]

man, I've even had someone say depth x length. That was mind-boggling. I've had people try to correct me on the arrangement i.e. I say a 3x8 banner (pointing to a 3ft H x 8ft W banner on the wall) and they say "oh you mean 8ft x 3ft?" No, I mean, look at the banner on the wall pal.

I have never heard of a piece of paper being referred to as "eleven by eight and a half." Everybody always names the horizontal measurement first (8 1/2 x 11). Why should it be different for signs?

 

[Billct2]

So if someone asks for a 4'x8' site sign from you they get a 8' tall sign? The best solution is to always confirm the orientation.

 

[kcollinsdesign]

If someone orders a 4x8 sign, it is most likely they will want a horizontal orientation. I always confirm.

In specifications and on contracts, I go W x H x L. When I go to the store to pick up a piece of plywood, I refer to it as a 4 x 8. To make sense of it in my own mind, I figure a raw plywood sheet has no orientation until I decide what it is going to be when I make the sign.

 

[Gino]

It's the same thing with architects. We don't understand their language, they don't understand ours.

And NOBODY understands you. I know, I know...... you're not paying attention. So what else is new ??

 

[JWitkowski]

When I lived and worked in Ireland, a piece of lumber that is called a 2x4 (2 by 4) in North America is called a 4x2 there. Same with our 2x6, called 6x2 in Ireland, etc. A sheet of 4x8 plywood here is an 8x4 sheet over there. But, when you go to the lumber store to buy, all the sizes of lumber and fasteners are actually listed in metric, millimeters or centimeters. I'm Canadian and grew up using both systems (I guess that makes me measurement bilingual?) so it wasn't a problem, just interesting to see the differences.

 

[ams]

And NOBODY understands you. I know, I know...... you're not paying attention. So what else is new ??

I only pay attention to professional sign people.

 

[Gino]

and how would Y O U know what that is ??

C'mon sam, stop acting like you know what's going on....... in the world, let alone the sign industry.

 

[visual800]

I always do HxL. I say 4x8, 3x10, 5x10, coro 18x24 height and length I never say width

 

[myront]

This is exactly why the US military writes the date as 4 Mar 1965. Because someone may misinterpret 3/4/65 st April 3? Always best to make it "dummy proof".
24x18, 18x24? Still leaves out the most important information as to eliminate any confusion. Portrait or Landscape OR 18h x 24w

 

[MI Bearcat]

I have never heard of a piece of paper being referred to as "eleven by eight and a half." Everybody always names the horizontal measurement first (8 1/2 x 11). Why should it be different for signs?

Paper is always listed with the second dimension being the grain direction.

 

[Gino]

I knew there was a reason for that, but I had forgotten about the grain information. Many years ago, had a guy working for me that could tell the front or back side of ANY piece of paper, simply by touching it. Felt side and web side. I never really got the knack to do it successfully, but someone trained in that can everytime.

 

[McDonald Signs]

This is not an answer to the question, but I've got to where I always add dimensions to my proofs (like alot of other people do) I send to my customer to clarify the height and width they will be getting.

I work in CorelDraw and just made a file named measuring lines and saved it with the lines with hairlines that stay the width same no matter the size I make them and with editable numbers.

I copy and paste the file into my design each time and scale the lines to fit and change the numbers.

It saves alot of confusion when the customer can see the actual Height and Width around the sign or decal design itself.

It's hard for them to come back and say I got the measurements wrong after approving the design.

 

[myront]

This is not an answer to the question, but I've got to where I always add dimensions to my proofs (like alot of other people do) I send to my customer to clarify the height and width they will be getting.

I work in CorelDraw and just made a file named measuring lines and saved it with the lines with hairlines that stay the width same no matter the size I make them and with editable numbers.

I copy and paste the file into my design each time and scale the lines to fit and change the numbers.

It saves alot of confusion when the customer can see the actual Height and Width around the sign or decal design itself.

It's hard for them to come back and say I got the measurements wrong after approving the design.

I use a Corel Macro to drop in the dimension lines. Select my sign blank then hit the letter d and bam.

 

[myront]

Macro works for X4 - 2020
You can customize the code to suit your taste. Color, mm,etc.

Sub QuickDimensions()
Dim srSelection As ShapeRange
Dim x As Double, y As Double, w As Double, h As Double
Dim sPt1 As SnapPoint, sPt2 As SnapPoint
Dim s As Shape

Optimization = True
ActiveDocument.BeginCommandGroup "Quick Dimensions"
EventsEnabled = False
ActiveDocument.SaveSettings
ActiveDocument.PreserveSelection = False
On Error GoTo ErrHandler

Set srSelection = ActiveSelectionRange
srSelection.GetBoundingBox x, y, w, h
Set sPt1 = CreateSnapPoint(x, y + h)
Set sPt2 = CreateSnapPoint(x + w, y + h)
Set s = ActiveLayer.CreateLinearDimension(cdrDimensionHorizontal, sPt1, sPt2, True, , , cdrDimensionStyleFractional, Units:=cdrDimensionUnitIN)
s.Dimension.TextShape.SetPosition x + w / 2, y + h + 1

s.Dimension.TextShape.Text.Story.Size = 54
s.Dimension.TextShape.Fill.UniformColor.CMYKAssign 45, 45, 45, 100

Set sPt1 = CreateSnapPoint(x, y)
Set sPt2 = CreateSnapPoint(x, y + h)
Set s = ActiveLayer.CreateLinearDimension(cdrDimensionVertical, sPt1, sPt2, True, , , cdrDimensionStyleFractional, Units:=cdrDimensionUnitIN)

s.Dimension.TextShape.SetPosition x - 1, y + sx / 2

s.Dimension.TextShape.Text.Story.Size = 54
s.Dimension.TextShape.Fill.UniformColor.CMYKAssign 45, 45, 45, 100

ExitSub:
ActiveDocument.PreserveSelection = True
ActiveDocument.RestoreSettings
EventsEnabled = True
Optimization = False
ActiveDocument.ClearSelection
ActiveWindow.Refresh
Application.Refresh
ActiveDocument.EndCommandGroup
Exit Sub

ErrHandler:
MsgBox "Error occured: " & Err.Description
Resume ExitSub
End Sub

 

[Big Rice Field]

You can really stump them by describing the aspect ratio.

 

[bannertime]

You can really stump them by describing the aspect ratio.

Not sure if you're on reddit, but someone posted in r/commercialprinting the other day saying their customer sent this

"Demands are as follows (delivery of data ready for production will not be prooved): Resolution 70 dpi | open layout | document CMYK | indesign (pdf) | photoshop (tiff) | file size: 530x230 bleed included scale 1:1 / 1:10 *"

 

[Vinyl slayer]

I learned years ago that the industry standard for graphic design is WxH (width x height). I learned that from building a lot of print ads for magazines and newspapers. Many times I was given size specs, and they didn't refer to which dimension was which - so after having to ask a few times, I learned that it's ALWAYS WxH. I've found this to be true for this industry as well. Weather it's a magazine ad, or a banner or a wall of window graphics. Will customers obey this - not necessarily. I've trained a few and they have learned well.