MAKING A HEADSTOCK DECAL

[Shay]

I've been trying to make my own headstock decal recently, but haven't had much luck. I've got a laptop and an inkjet printer as well as water slide decal paper. I'm just not sure how to accomplish it. I have a font that I found on a website that I've laid out the lettering in. I'd like to use that for my decal, but I'm not sure how to set it up so I can print it off.,I need to be able to change color and size as well as add or changes words as well. Some say use photoshop, but when I tried that I couldn't seem to go anywhere with it. So if anyone can help with some advice I would certainly appreciate it.

[Norris]

I don't know how much experience you have with computers, or indeed how artistic you are. One program I do like for doing layouts like you are trying to do is Inkscape

https://inkscape.org/en/

This is a vector based drawing program. Rather than colouring in lots of little dots (pixels) like Photoshop does, this is more like stretching an elastic band until it's in the shape you want it. Text is very easy to grow, shrink, squish, rotate, etc. and change the colour

It would certainly be worth checking out the resources and tutorials under the "Learn" menu, to see if it might be suitable for your needs.

And the best thing... it's absolutely FREE

 

Then you might want to check out some of the vector graphics on http://www.flaticon.com/ - which you can download in "SVG" (scalable vector graphics) format and use within Inkscape - and again stretch & squish them around

 

[Shay]

On January 9, 2017 at 8:05 AM, Norris said:

I don't know how much experience you have with computers, or indeed how artistic you are. One program I do like for doing layouts like you are trying to do is Inkscape

https://inkscape.org/en/

This is a vector based drawing program. Rather than colouring in lots of little dots (pixels) like Photoshop does, this is more like stretching an elastic band until it's in the shape you want it. Text is very easy to grow, shrink, squish, rotate, etc. and change the colour

It would certainly be worth checking out the resources and tutorials under the "Learn" menu, to see if it might be suitable for your needs.

And the best thing... it's absolutely FREE

 

Then you might want to check out some of the vector graphics on http://www.flaticon.com/ - which you can download in "SVG" (scalable vector graphics) format and use within Inkscape - and again stretch & squish them around

 

Thanks, I definitely will check these out, it sounds like it may be what I'm looking for.

[Prostheta]

If you're not wanting to work with vectors and your software won't give you an easy answer, it can be done manually. I don't use Photoshop though, so this is purely "universal" and needs applying to whatever you use.

Say I want a 4" x 1" logo, and my printer is 1200DPI. I'll set up a new file at (1200x4) x (1200x1) or 4800 x 1200 pixels. Paintshop Pro (which I do use) also allows me to start new files by specifying size and DPI, and comes up with those same numbers. Whatever you place in that rectangular workspace should print 4" x 1" if you output it at 100% and the printer settings aren't trying to "tell you what you want". Easiest thing there is to do that 4" x 1" and draw a border. Print it out and set a ruler against it to make sure it's 1:1.

Maybe not a complete solution, but it should give you some ideas on solving things. Give us a shout if things don't work out.