Blogs
Never Stop Learning!
This past week was a great week here at Synergy. I travelled to East Texas, PA to visit Smooth-On with my friends Derek & Sarah. We spent two days learning casting and mold making techniques with their products. Some of these new skills will undoubtedly end up in our signs. It is amazing to see how to accomplish the same thing from many different angles
Runaway Mine Train sign part 3
Once I had the parts all routed it was a simple matter of gluing up the three layers with the welded steel framework encased inside. Two tubular arms stuck out the back for mounting to the building structure. I used the die grinder to even out the edges, purposely leaving a little texture of course. This same texture was done to the back of the sign as well.
Our CNC Machine Finally Arrived…
Xpressive graphiX has created another stunning sign and has been chosen to be “Today’s Guest Blogger.” Tony Rose, Business Partner & Creative Director, with Xpressive graphiX writes the following… Lock 9 Pizza a new business located in Duncan Falls, Ohio, came to...
Mine car wheels (Revisited)
About three years ago I started a demo sign project that featured a mine and mining car. Just about then we got really busy and it languished until last year. Then I used the parts to create a little mining car that became the weather vane for the water tower of the Cultus Lake Adventure Park. Now with the addition of the Runaway mine train I needed another set of mine car wheels
Runaway Train sign
The next project to be created is the Runaway Mine Train sign. The file wasn’t difficult but it had a lot of pieces. The first step was to decide what would be on each layer. Much would be built as separate reliefs and then merged at the end. I then made a vector around the outside
Wheels
I enjoy building complex files that take lots of individual steps to accomplish. I find them to be a real challenge and I LOVE a challenge! Today’s complex files are the wheels and tires for this jeep. Save for the raised lettering I built the entire file inside EnRoute. The tires will be extreme lug mud tires and so I first created the chevrons that go around the outside of the tire. I only had to build one and EnRoute automatically does the rest.
Golf Fore Autism
This past weekend, I had a lady tell me that we do great work and she really appreciates what we do for the community. I proceeded to tell her we were just doing our part like any business should when they have been blessed as much as we have. She went on to say that we should tell more people and promote ourselves more when we give back. I though to myself for a minute and told her we were just paying it forward and really didn’t need all the recognition
More drawing the old fashioned way
I thought I might show another project’s development in sketches. These were done in my sketchbook on a plane ride as I traveled home on a business trip. The drawings were quick and I filled there pages of my sketchbook in about half an hour or less. You can see the drawings were far from perfect. The client would never see them as they were just to guide our building of the feature.
Exploring ideas with pen and paper
One of the keys to coming up with a great and original designs is to learn to draw. While many may say they simply can’t draw I believe it is a skill we can develop to a great degree. The key is to practice, practice practice. I buy inexpensive blank hard bound books (Staples) and fill them with ideas. I keep them handy and stashed wherever I might need one.