Posted by Dave Jensen on Wednesday, June 04, 2003 at 4:50PM :
In Reply to: Here's My Plan...What Do You Think? posted by Marty on Wednesday, June 04, 2003 at 12:36PM :
I think it's great you're going for the hand painted signs. My dad's a retired sign painter, my brother's taken over the business. They are known in this area (southern WA) for lettering logging trucks, often with a pictorial. Couple of companies figured out that drivers took better care of their trucks if the trucks looked good. If anybody's travelling through the area, you'll probably notice all the trucks with wild lettering. You can also see some of my dad's mural work at the Washington side visitors' center of Bonneville Dam (on the Columbia River, off HWY 14 w of Stevenson, WA).
You see some cool designs in vinyl now that the computers are better, but it's still just a decal, in my opinion. I've always had stuff lettered on my trucks...usually "Institute of Archeaology," just for the helluvit.
I've worked with my dad and brother a little, and and a couple of sign companies when I was in college, but I'm no artist, always ended up coating out panels and welding structures. Lettering is a dying art, it takes some artistic talent to get a really nice sign, but there's also a great deal of technical skill to handling the brush. Takes years to learn it all. Not all the old sign guys were that great anyway, and between old age, alcoholism, and computer graphics there aren't that many guys doing hand-lettering anymore. Luckily there's enough rural fire-departments and truck co's in this area to keep my bro going.
My dad and brother would give you a bunch of crap about the sign, they like the old stuff but with more pizazz. But for your business and an old Power Wagon, it has an authentic, industrial, we-ain't-trying-to-be-pretty look. Very blue-collar, eh?. Remember, the first rule with dealing with sign guys is don't believe anything they say, ever. And by the way, you don't want to wax the truck prior to painting the sign. Usually they say to wait a couple of months for the paint to cure before you finally do wax it. Then of course the wax helps the sign last a lot longer. As I understand it, the lettering enamels actually cure over a very long period of time.
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