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Thanks mate, yeah i see the dry app will give it a pro finnish and quicker job, just seems it would take alot more to position the black into its designated position without messing things up lol ! i will surely give this a go on a smaller section How would i position the 2400mm x 600mm into place without it stuffing up? Obviuosly leave one side with backing paper on,and the other dont leave on and dummy the backing side paper into position and the rest should line up i assume ?

You have a point, laying the black over the orange is quicker, but wont look very professional, as when you look at the window you may realise the lump behind the orange and it wouldnt sit flat in and around the lettering wouldnt it? and secondly it may darken the orange up a bit, Applying dry? A big 2400mm x 600mm black vinyl would take way longer wouldnt it, and you would really get only one chance at it? The hinge method do you mean tape the middle down and do one half at a time? it should be fine from inside shop, i mean the shop has a massive awning, coverig the whole front with a shade, besides how to alot of shops go around these days with all the vinyl from the inside.? i would put the vinyl from the outside anyway however some idiots are good at damaging this type of stuff... The vinyl i am using is M7 Metamark, high performance 7 year calandered, i thought it would be popular on this site too? metamark.co.uk big brand here in australia Thanks again for the tips aswell mate

Ok as some of you may know i had posted up here a few days ago about a shop front im doing, was going to make artwork to stick on front bottom half of winow then paint black behind the stickering 1 meter from ground up, plans have changed, i an now going to use black vinyl to do this, why you ask, as ths is where the bench will be going in the shop for customers to eat, if they hit the window with feet, it may damage paint. Peice of mind the artwork will all be layed on from inside shop, so it will be mirror cut ! FIrst of all in flexisign i have designed my black layer of vinyl 2400mm wide, 1 meter higher, although i will probably use the 600mm roll and make a 400mm join up top to complete the 1000mm. I have put my text in flexisign over the black vinyl, and then compounded the text through, so it will be see through when plotted on the black, once ive layed the black vinyl over the window i will then stick on my text in the clear sections corresponding to the text As for the black vinyl at bottom of window, it will be layed on wet. Here are my questions: 1- I will be cutting the strip of 2400mm black (I am using Metamark M7 Vinyl), Should i wet spray the whole window and do one half at a time, start from middle out to the left, then out to the right? Any tips on this to make it easier? 2- I will be application taping the black strip vinyl prior to application. Should i use a low tack application tape or will it not matter? Use clear or paper tape? 3- Take off application take straight away? or after some time? 4- The lettering going inside the compound will also be Metamark M7 in orange, should i apply this wet too, slide into position and squeegee soapy water out? 5- Should i make the orange vinyl letters slightly (1mm or so) bigger or smaller than the compound that's cut through the black? Or make/leave it EXACT same size? Have attached example images of the signs im doing. Any other tips you know of would be very highly appreciated!! Thanks again

Thanks for this mate cheers!

Ok so i have a job, basically the shop front window is 2500mm wide and 1800mm high and i am to do some sign work in the bottom quarter of it.. After this customer wants from bottom up of window painted up in black 1 meter high behind the vinyl as this is where the bench will sit up to around the shop. Originally i was going to use vinyl to black it out but since theres going to be an additional layer sitting in front of the black it will probabably look a bit ugly and not dead flat, and will take longer. What sort of paint is best to use for this application? Both the vinyl and paint will be applied from inside of the shop and to be viewed from outsite of shop Cheers

ok cheers i will probably do that then sounds like the way to go

the items in the pdf are vectors yes, but are all in many peices and layers, it just needs a massive cleanup and organizing so to say, this is only when it is imported into flexi. Even when imported it all looks fine as is, all is vectorized and is perfectly straight smooth curves, it is when you select the objects you see all these layers being selected, and think to yourself, why on earth does one solid object or a letter for instance have so many layers when it is just 1 solid color!? lol..... does not need any vectorizing at all..... I could try the screen print trick, but the artwork is rather long and would not come out that good once i stretch it only to width of screen.. drakesis, could you explain more on send to printer that can take take pdf and then print cut.. I didn't quite understand . Thanks

Well here's my issue what I am trying to do: I have imported a pdf with basic graffiti text, and after importing to flexi it appears there's hours of fiddling around to do to compound and unmask etc, weld and join stuff, basically each letter has 10 peices of crap that need to be unmasked and uncompounded and ordering the layers around and re welding to do, so i figured I could export it from flexisign as a image and then re import it and vectorize it quicker as each text and color would be it's own custom solid item. Thing is, after trying to export it as bmp high quality 600dpi, the text in the picture has so many jaggered edges, i usually export vectors to bmp and usually remains straight curves in the image. How can i get it to export as a real high quality image file and remain straight and smooth as possible? Thanks and much appreciated.

thanks for the tips guys much appreciated, yeah will upgrade soon hopefuly, although i don't do very highly complex jobs, but $40 or so doesnt hurt to give the memory a upgrade and if that sorts it out then that will clear out a big issue for a while Thanks again.

Ok what is a good format to export to image file? Ive used high quality bmp and tif, but both inexported image have lots and lots of jaggered edges where as in the flexisign import it is all smooth and straight curves, any good ideas for exportation format via flexi? Cheers

Hi So the client sends me their logo in a 'pdf' document ! Looks fine, it is all pretty much custom like bright green graffiti style text, with a nice grey shadow in rear, all text is selectable in adobe reader like you would on a webpage with your cursor I import this pdf into my flexi sign 8.6 and and the amount of work it actually requires is a pain so much unmasking, uncompounding, separating, welding etc to be done for each shadow and letter ! Honestly it would be quicker to export that as an image and re import for vectorizing.. Each letter has almost 3 peices of layers and outlines in it and they are not even joined. Where in the PDF they are just a text, and just a shadow, can't it be imported just like that? Has anyone ever come across an issue like this and what is the best way to sort it all out? Cheers

Cheers, yeah packet size was already 1000 so that's a bummer, so im buying memory now. im sure that will sort it out as the data i am cutting is very very complex and only happens after buffering to plotter and only on that job, anyhow i might just get the keyspan while im at it you never know, it may be needed in the future. Thanks for your help again mate

Thanks mate What if i stuck to LPT and just upgrade memory, or does this usb/serial adaptor help with major stability issues? My plotter is pretty well set on LPT at the moment thats why, never have major issues unlike the one in my initial post. Cheers

Thanks mate for that ! I knew it was a memory problem. Is there DIY instructions attached with this chip? So i can do it all myself? I am pretty cluey with tools and pc's and that so i don't mind giving all that a hack. Also what is a keyspan adaptor?

Hey guys I am wondering if there is such a way to limit what it sends to plotter via production manager, sometimes when i am cutting a VERY BIG detailed job, with lots and lots of lines and texture in it, somewhere halfway the plotter goes crazy during the cut and draws spastic lines, I have a feeling it is the memory of plotter overloading is this right? I want to try reduce the buffer it sends so it doesnt send to plotter in very big memory buffers. Cutter is a Us Cutter mh 1351 Everything else works fine on flexi, i am on flexi 8.5 on windows 7 32bit running via a pci lpt adaptor via a 1 meter lpt cable to plotter.