Speaking from Experience: Sign invitational Challenge 2017

WELCOME!

It is hard to believe that it was almost ten years ago I witnessed a CNC router in action for the very first time. I was fascinated and simply had to have one! Although I had been in the creative end of the three dimensional sign business for most of my life I didn't really know what I would do with one of these machines - but I just knew it could do fantastic stuff.

Along with the CNC router I discovered the wonderful material called Precision Board and the glues, primers and other companion products they offer. Since then we have gone through many tons of the material using it in most signs and projects we tackle. This journal will chronicle our many adventures both past, present and future. I'll talk from the perspective of someone who pushes these products to the creative limit on a daily basis. I'll be adding to the stories two or three times each week. -dan

Tuesday, December 20, 2016

Sign invitational Challenge 2017 - Part Two

I started by clipping the train section from the sketch I posted last time. I saved this as a JGP file and imported this into EnRoute. I then sized it up to how it would be in the final piece. This drawing was then used as a reference to get the sizes right on the routing files.

I then recreated the various parts in scale, inside EnRoute. One of each size wheel was created and then duplicated to make things fast.

The train will be busting out of the sign face and so needed to have that feel of movement. To do this I used the distort/warp function to do all of the pieces at once, and keeping them in proportion.

In the next session I'll begin creating meshes and building the reliefs needed to build the bulk of this piece on the MultiCam CNC machine. Stay tuned...