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Dan"s Story "Yes I can" got me to thinking how I got my own start in the sign business.
I remember in High school I was watching a Classmate of mine drawing, she was really quite talented, and of course being the type of guy I am, I always kidded her about how bad she was at it, and that I was a much better Artist than she was... the truth was, I wasn't interested in Art at all, didn't even do it in school. One day after "Tormenting" her, she said,"Here!" see if you can do any better, and handed me the pencil and paper... Boy now I was in Trouble, so I sheepishly started to draw "something", and she was looking on at me struggling and laughing the whole time. When I finished she said something to the effect that it was pretty darn good! She was really supportive of it and encouraged me to do more, which I did!
After a few weeks I drew everything I could get my hands on, and then one day, I had a call in class over the PA System to go to the Guidance Counciller office. I did't know what was up, I was nervous really. He sat me down and told me that he saw some of my work and that he thought that I should change my application from "Welding" to "Commercial Art" that I had ready, and send it in to the local Collage here. He also had arranged for me to go meet the Teacher of the course.
Anyway I did do that course and while doing it, I was woking at the local supermarket, and when they found out I was doing Commercial Art, they asked if I could paint signs??? I said "Sure!" How hard can that be????/ lol... well I spent from 6 in the evening to 12 at night doing signs for 2 nights in a row, foe a grand total of 10 showcards, I was under the gun, afterall I was an expert in sign painting... they took delivery of the on Wed Morning, and asked if I could those everyweek? And that is how I learned the secret of freehand sign painting, I was sort of forced to learn it.
That Girl "Zena" was her name, was the "One" who gave me my start.. I'll never forget her.
[ December 12, 2010, 07:19 AM: Message edited by: Neil D. Butler ]
-------------------- "Keep Positive"
SIGNS1st. Neil Butler Paradise, NF Posts: 6277 | From: St. John's NF Canada | Registered: Mar 1999
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I'll never forget the name of the one who got me started either. I think his name is........ Dad! I was born into it and raised in both studios, Graphics and Recording. He got his degree in Commercial Art in maybe 1969 or in 1973 when he came back I think. He started at the Acaemy of Art in SanFranciso while waiting to get into Kunstschule Westend in Offenbach am Main in Germany. They accepted him after one year, he got his degree and returned to the states in maybe 1973 or so. I have no formal art education, but I have a great built-in teacher. Since I inherited the studio things changed a little. All new equipment that Dad never used before like the CNC, wide format printers, laminators, lots of tools besides all the chisels that were always here. He was a rendering artist with brushes and air-brushes and his projects were a lot more artsy. Now our projects are hospitals, schools, developments, lodges and like projects. We still do the mural carvings but they don't pay as well as ADA production and large dimensional copy, lit and unlit. I've learned a lot and still learn every day.
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From an early age I showed promise with my drawings(we weren't rich but I always had pencils and paper to play with) One summer when I was 14 my dad told me that instead of working in the tobacco fields on the farm that summer he had found the perfect job for me,....I can remember my first day that summer vividly as i was introduced to the owner of that sign shop and then to the lead brush mechanic who took me under his wing.I suspect there was some sort of debt my father owed that I did not know of or have yet to find out,or it may have been the other way around as I believe there was a certain amount of babysitting at first just finding work to keep me preoccupied and not asking dumb questions all day. But by the end of the summer break I was doing repaints and showing a certain amount of promise as a brushman.
-------------------- fly low...timi/NC is, Tim Barrow Barrow Art Signs Winston-Salem,NC Posts: 2224 | From: Winston-Salem,NC,USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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I got my start when my Dad throw me out of my bedroom window. Oh, ya means sign making. I got my start when the restaurant I worked at, Ozzies, burnt down. Did some trailer lettering for a local guy, and the rest is history. I was into my second year at Los Angeles Trade Tech college's Sign Graphics course at the time. "Ya want fries or slaw wit dat burger?"
-------------------- Signs by Alicia Jennings (Mudflap Girl) Tacoma, WA Since 1987 Have Lipstick, will travel. Posts: 3813 | From: Tacoma, WA. U.S.A. | Registered: Dec 1999
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I followed in my immediate family's footsteps and if I would have followed in the families business I would have been a completely different person
You get my drift?
-------------------- HotLines Joey Madden - pinstriping since 1952 'Perfection, its what I look for and what I live for'
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I worked for a dept store for 13 years. My best days were during the Warehouse Sales, which meant I could dress casual and draw up hand sketched signs all day. Yep, mine were the most unique of all.
Then the dept. store I was working for was going under. Scared out of my wits, I decided to start applying for something I WANTED to do. I put a few scribbles together and landed my first sign shop job. No idea how... I didn't even know what premask was or how to work a computer!
From there I went to my 2nd job in the industry, autographics.
Both home spun run places let me go for really wonky illegal reasons. Not fully understanding what was going on, rather than fall, I decided to take a graphics course while collecting unemployment. I started my business while in school. I bought my equipment and worked at night while going to school by day.
I learned so much in such a hurry I ended up teaching part of my own class I was paying for! Which later led to an actual teaching gig in the same school. I 'created' a sign division taught in the school AND my shop for hands on work experience and eventually hired two of my own students.
To my two starts in the industry, thanks for firing me!
[ December 12, 2010, 02:27 PM: Message edited by: Donna in BC ]
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I started drawing pictures in grade school, and it evolved into car-related stuf. I became a car nut, at around 12, inspired by no less than Ed Roth and his "wierdo shirts". I bought early hot rod books, and copied pinstriping ideas by some of the old pros (Art Himsl, Jimmy the Greek,etc.) and drag car lettering.
I guess my first lettering job was on about a dozen "license plates" for our bicycle club, the Road Runners, made to hang on the back of our bike seats, like the old car clubs hung plaques off their bumpers.
I did some pinstriping on friends' cars in high school, got my first lettering job there. Buddy of mine had me letter "Runnin' Bare" on his rear quarter windows, for which I got paid the great sum of 10 bucks. Several days later, he came back and asked for his money back, since his mom made him scrape it off. Too bad, skippy....
After high school, I spent a couple of years in college (misspent), did some body/paint/and mechanical work, electrical maintenance, etc. in preparation for what was to come.
My brother went to art school, while I was in the service, and upon graduation, decided to go into the sign business. I went too, upon my discharge, was able to apply much of the prior learned knowledge, and have been doing it since.
Lots of ups and downs along the way; but I always felt that this was my calling; the place where I feel happy to come to work everyday, and don't care if I ever really retire.
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Whoa! Pretty impressive story Duncan. A master of his craft. Cool! I've been on the board reading for a few days now and there are some pretty talented people here. I have a lot of reading yet to do. Cool place.
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Well, since you asked, I'll try to keep it short. I was hitch hiking from California back to my home in far upstate New York, by way of Houma, LA. on a rainy Sunday morning. The young man who gave me a lift was the shop foreman at the Houma Sign Shop. We talked and he offered me a job starting the next day. I had zero experience and said so. Not to worry, if you want a job, you've got one. I started doing a little of everything, and caught on to it rather fast. Neon service, sign erections, painting billboard backgrounds, and even some hand lettering. I eventually made it back to NNY and stayed in the sign business, doing just what I had learned in Houma. I eventually ran my own full service sign co. foe over 20 years, till I got tired of those long hard winters in NNY and moved to North Carolina in 1985, where I did neon tube bending, and now have my own wholesale neon shop. I have slowed down some, still do some screen printing, hand lettering, etc. But after just over 60 years I guess I need to. Would I do it again?, You bet! I have met many fine people in many states where I have worked my dream. I hope to meet many more. I still get a thrill out of a good job, well done. Stay tuned, maybe one day I'll fill in the blanks. Peace, Don
-------------------- Donald Miner ABCO Wholesale Neon 1168 Red Hill Creek Dobson, NC Posts: 842 | From: North Carolina | Registered: Apr 2006
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I grew up on H.B. McCall's Used Car Emporium where we had many nice choices in fine automotive transportation. At least that is where I learned all my dirty words. I noticed my old man out leaning up against a car with a bottle of tempera paint in one hand and a lettering quill in his other. He was hand lettering the price on a windshield. Next day, I was assigned the task with the chamois to go wipe down the fender as the dew had ruined the sign and it was all over the side. Several years later, I saw a bottle of Future floor finish on the shelf and mixed it with some white tempera. Voila! They lasted a few days longer and the old man was impressed, however he hated the lack of coverage and went right back to straight tempera, me with shammy still in hand.
I bought my first 55 Ford 2 door post for $50. I cleaned it up and parked it out on the front row. My old man thought he would humor me with the old bone that needed everything....tires, motor, tranny work and probably a case of 8c a quart oil to go with it. I broke out the brush and tempera paint and decided I too could paint a windshield. After a couple hours, my sign looked about as bad as it could get. I priced it at $100. Sold it to an airman that afternoon. Typically a good 55 Ford would fetch then fetch $500, so implicit in mine was that there were a few problems. He was thrilled and paid me cash. He almost made it home and the hood blew open and cracked the crystal (windshield).
45 years and 170,000 hand painted windshields later, I have picked up some speed, at least. I can now do around 30 an hour. I would love to have a pic of the first one!
4 years in a drawing and painting degree, three years in grad school in architecture and I still could not letter. A buddy of mine from art school went to Chicago and apprenticed at a gold leaf shop and was a journeyman painter who would carry his kit on the L around downtown, lettering commercial places. He moved back to where I lived in Lawrence, Ks and we opened a sign shop. I knew how to run a business and in no time I was practising my lick lettering every day on a glass panel with a maul stick and the little pallette. Practise makes perfect. Sold him the sign shop and left the sign business for eight years and then started my present window painting business. 21 years later, I can now bang out respectable lick lettering on windshields and a few showroom winders.
Anymore, there are so few of us left. No one is coming up behind us doing hand lettering. It is rapidly becoming a lost art. Oh well.
-------------------- Preston McCall 112 Rim Road Santa Fe, New Mexico 87501 text: 5056607370 Posts: 1552 | From: Santa Fe, New Mexico | Registered: Nov 1998
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I was playing around with a motorcycle and an airbrush for a relative when I knocked over the rear fender and dented it. Took it to the local body shop for repair and they had a 1988 Buick set up for dirt racing. We did a deal...they fix the fender and I do something on the hood with my airbrush. Some time before I'd finished the following Sunday afternoon, about a dozen drivers and the owner of the local track had shown up. Picked up 4 cars and a bunch of signs to do by 5PM that day.
Haven't looked back since. Rapid
-------------------- Ray Rheaume Rapidfire Design 543 Brushwood Road North Haverhill, NH 03774 rapidfiredesign@hotmail.com 603-787-6803
I like my paint shaken, not stirred. Posts: 5648 | From: North Haverhill, New Hampshire | Registered: Apr 2003
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I started doing Christmas window splashes at the age of 14. I made $700 after school and on weekends that first year in only a couple of weeks - a fortune in 1969. Those first splashes led to some signs and in my high school year I formed my first sign company, Big Rock Signs after we moved to Vancouver Island. At first I worked in our driveway but with the coming of winter I needed a shop. I sub-leased a small space from an acquaintance in exchange for some signs. That lasted until I went to college for a year.
After college I needed work and being in Vancouver with a small apartment didn't have room to make signs. I landed a well paid job in a grocery store. My focus was on marrying the girl I loved and building a career as a fine artist, doing pen and ink drawings. I got my first big commission in 1979, three years after we were married. My drawings and prints were shown in more than 40 galleries across BC. I was also doing logo design and commercial art on the side. In 1982 I started doing more sign work and murals. In 1983 we moved to Chemainus on Vancouver Island. We opened our own art gallery and did my first sandblasted sign for it. I was instantly in the sign business once more as people saw our dimensional sign and wanted me to make one for them.
I also started traveling extensively and painting murals in this time. Our sign business was called the 'Signtist'.
In 1992 we formed our current company Sawatzky's Imagination Corporation to do larger themed projects. We grew rapidly until I had a change of heart in 1999 and we purposely downsized the company once more. We relocated to the Chilliwack area where we are now in 2000, bought our current property in 2003. It was here I built our first real shop, something I had dreamed of for many, many years. We also decided to slowly drift towards high end dimensional signs as our future. We bought our CNC router in 2005.
The recession made our change of direction a much more immediate goal as our large theme projects simply went away with the tough economic times.
Now as we plan for 2011 I am optimistic and excited about our future. The winding and sometimes hard path through the last four decades in the business has prepared us to do some pretty incredible things.
I think I am ready...
-grampa dan
-------------------- Dan Sawatzky Imagination Corporation Yarrow, British Columbia dan@imaginationcorporation.com http://www.imaginationcorporation.com
Being a grampa is one of the the most wonderful things in the world!!! Posts: 8738 | From: Yarrow, B.C. Canada | Registered: Nov 1998
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Having six kids 10 and under and living in a town with a population of ~70, I needed something to retain my sanity so I returned to the art I had loved as a child....whether it did the trick remains debatable. Being tagged as the local artist in a rural area made me the one to turn to for and "art" related needs and soon I had people coming to me for signs. The first signs I did were done with letraset letters and an overhead projector..... ~~~~Baby, you've come a long way!~~~~ Soooo, I'm one of those housewives with a Cricket you love to hate. Actually it took a lot of courage back in '89 to sink $11,000 into a Roland Cutter, especially when living on a shoestring. But I decided if I was going to do signs I was going to do them right and took a 2 week crash apprenticeship with Cardinal Signs in Brandon Manitoba where Ron (his last name is eluding me tonight) put me on to "Letterheads". It's been a tough climb, but a rewarding one.
-------------------- “Did you ever stop to think, and forget to start again?” -Winnie the Pooh & A.A. Milne
Kelly Thorson Kel-T-Grafix 801 Main St. Holdfast, SK S0G 2H0 ktg@sasktel.net Posts: 5496 | From: Penzance, Saskatchewan | Registered: May 2002
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I was five years old and spending the summer with my great aunt Maud and her family in Junction City, Ark. One day my little brother and I got to talking with the man next door, who was sitting on his front porch. He said he could draw, so we asked him to show us. He took out a fountain pen and a piece of paper and drew a damn fine picture of a bird. The picture made a great impression on me. I can still remember that it was in blue ink, and I decided I wd like to draw and started doing it. I actually had a lot of talent for it so I was soon turning out all kinds of pictures of Popeye, cowboys, soldiers, boxers, and of course birds, some of which I still have because my folks saved a lot of them. I was selling stuff by the time I was about 16.
-------------------- dennis kiernan independent artist san francisco, calif, usa Posts: 907 | From: san francisco, ca usa | Registered: Feb 2010
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Went to a drag race in 1966 and saw some work of Nat Quick on a dragster. I can still remember it spun aluminum leaf script, and said "I have to learn how to do that!" So I went to Los Angeles Trade Tech for sign graphics!
-------------------- Bob Ficucell Glass Arts Woodland Hills,Ca Posts: 220 | From: Woodland Hills | Registered: Mar 2000
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A broken leg got me started in the sign profession forty years ago. I had been supporting my full time ministry by doing landscaping. In my late teens, I broke my leg playing soccer with a baseball at a driving range (yes–it’s a long story and besides that, I was winning!) and was not able to mow lawns or plant shrubs for a while.
A friend, Jim Sanders, who owned a sign service company, hired me to drive around at night spotting signs that had portions of the lighting not working properly. When my leg healed, he put me on a repair truck where I learned electrical service and crane operation, also gaining valuable experience in sign fabrication and installation.
When I married Sophie, Jim did not have enough work to support us so I started working on my own. It seemed kind of natural in some ways that I ended up in the sign trade since I have had, from an early age, a fascination with typefaces. In high school, I would write notes that looked like they came from a typewriter. I could duplicate any of the fonts that were commonly used at the time for typing.
When I was in school, I always enjoyed math and science classes more than anything and one of my all time favorite courses was high school chemistry. I thought I had found my secular calling-but imagine my laughter when an aptitude test said I would make a great bricklayer but a lousy chemist. Fast forward more than four decades and sometimes, after hauling brick and stone samples around all day, I feel I could scratch my ankles without bending over. We build a fair amount of brick and stone monument signs, mostly for the apartment industry. Monument signs are one of my favorite mediums because there are so many choices of material, shape and application.
-------------------- David Harding A Sign of Excellence Carrollton, TX Posts: 5084 | From: Carrollton, TX, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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-------------------- Eric Elmgren ericsignguy@comcast.net A & E Graphic Signs Park Ridge, IL "The future isn't what it used to be" -Yogi Berra Posts: 192 | From: PARK RIDGE, ILLINOIS | Registered: Aug 2009
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Readers Digest version, after passing entrance exam and being enrolled in the Spring, had to wait till Fall. Took a job in a sign shop to get a head start in lettering for commercial art. Enjoyed working in signs and went to a six month lettering school instead of four years college. Lettering came easy and after working eight years in a sign shop, had to start my own business in order to pay the mortgage and support a started family. Bill
-------------------- Bill Riedel Riedel Sign Co., Inc. 15 Warren Street Little Ferry, N.J. 07643 billsr@riedelsignco.com Posts: 2953 | From: Little Ferry, New Jersey, USA | Registered: Feb 1999
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My adventure into signs was not my intentions.I was entertained with paint and loved to mess with it.At 12 years old Keloggs had a coloring contest on the back of a cereal box and I painted it with testors model airplane paint instead of coloring it.The picture was some sort of mickey mouse theme.Believe it or not..I won 2nd place.The prize was a Lionel electric train,and a Bell & Howell camera.At 14 I spent a lot of time in a printing shop and one day I went to that printing shop and a black man had set up an easel and was painting paper signs for Krispy Kreme Dougnuts.Ihad never seen this kind of painting done before.Seeing this done,I decided this is what I would like to do the rest of my life.was this a good decision, Idon't know yet!
-------------------- Bill Wood Bill Wood, Sign Artist 3628 Ogburn Ave., NE Winston-Salem, NC 27105-3752 336-682-5820 Posts: 397 | From: Winston-Salem, NC | Registered: May 2006
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I owned a body shop and was doing a lot of work for a friend/neighbour who had a small fleet of trucks.
The local sign guy decided to quit and pursue other ventures and by friend asked if I knew anyone who could letter his trucks after a repaint. I didn't.
He suggested that I start offering that service along with the paint work.
I already had a computer, I already had CorelDraw software, so I boughjt a used Roland cutter and added the service.
My friend must have been happy because he refered me to a supplier of truck parts and I got a contract to all of their work.
Then another trucker that I had done paint work for refered me to his girlfriend's company (yes his girlfriend was CEO of a 100 truck company!!!) I ended up doing all of their work and never looked back!!!
I had spent most of my life either working at jobs I disliked or were unhealthy. Once I got involved in the sign business, I LOVED it and had more enjoyment and made more money than ever before in my life!
Sadly, because I truly did love the sign business, I also hated Canadian winters, so we retired to Mexico and sold the business to a good man.
Sheesh..I guess this was more of an epic than a Readers Digest version!!! LOL
-------------------- Dave Grundy retired in Chelem,Yucatan,Mexico/Hensall,Ontario,Canada 1-519-262-3651 Canada 011-52-1-999-102-2923 Mexico cell 1-226-785-8957 Canada/Mexico home
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Got my start working with my dad out of the back of his '73 Caprice station wagon custom painting anything from trucks to airplanes all across Texas in the 1980's. We started getting requests for lettering in the designs and my dad assigned me the job of figuring out how to pull it off. Took a job in Seattle a few years later and bounced around at different sign shops. Moved to San Francisco in 2005 and started doing what I wanted to get back to doing all along: hand painted work.
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4-h projects then race cars and splash windows at the young age of 15,I went full time with the shop after moving to the Napa Valley from my home town of Redding Ca. in 1985 when a brick fell out of the sky....cracked me in the head and showed me I was making a ton of more cash with signs and graphics than swinging a hammer in construction or cooking and farming and it was alot more fun and rewarding
-------------------- Aaron Haynes Aaron's Signs & Windows Napa Ca aa4signs@sbcglobal.net ------------ Important Rule For Life: "Look out for number one... Don't step in number two" ------------ If your never the lead dog on the sled...the scenery never changes. Posts: 241 | From: Napa Ca. USA | Registered: Dec 1998
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but my real start came from School..............................................................i drew.... on my home work, my books, my desk, my locker....my friends locker....home work.....cars
and if it was not for wood shop and metal shop prob. would have never gone.....and oh ya... girls and football....lol
-------------------- Aaron Haynes Aaron's Signs & Windows Napa Ca aa4signs@sbcglobal.net ------------ Important Rule For Life: "Look out for number one... Don't step in number two" ------------ If your never the lead dog on the sled...the scenery never changes. Posts: 241 | From: Napa Ca. USA | Registered: Dec 1998
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I have always been able to draw and paint since I was a real little kid. I don't remember ever not being able to draw & paint. I do remember never getting enough materials I thought I really needed, like paper and crayons and paint. I remember gettin whippins for colourin' on the walls . . .
When I was 20, in 1982 I quit dopin' and drinkin and started goin' to church. My sister-n-law told some people there I was an artist. They put me to work on bulletine boards and I had a lot of creative fun with those. A business man there, seein' these boards, asked me if I could paint a sign for his business. So I did.
Meanwhile, I had a 1 year old daughter and my husband of 3 years would commonly disappear for months at a time. I had a part-time job at a bookstore, and I also raked yards and cleaned houses while the baby watched from a stroller. I also started findin' work repainting faded signs. I began studying these signs closer because I could tell the letters were made with single strokes rather than being coloured-in as I was doing. But I could'nt figure it out. I was using Red Devil paint, house paints, and cheap artists brushes. One time, I was trying to paint a bare 4x8 sheet of plywood. The material was soaking up coat after coat after coat, of yellow oil-base paint, but was not getting shiney! I called a local sign shop owner, Aubrey Guinne at Guinne Signs. I explained my situation. He said one sentence; 'Ya gotta prime it with somethin' white.' and hung up. I went a few rounds with the building supply guy trying to explain this when he finally mentioned 'primer'!
When my child was old enough to go to kindergarten I went to find a full time job I could do from 7:30am - 3:30pm. I went to 2 sign shops - Guinne Signs and Sign fabricators. Mr.Guinne was never there and never returned calls from the notes I left on his door. By this time, I knew Mr.Guinne's work because he hand-painted all the huge billboards for Budwieser and colt 45, & others - These billboards were giant murals really. Beautiful paintings of horses, or bass jumping out of water. To me, Aubrey Guinne was the Leonardo DiVinci of signs. I adored him. And I had never even seen him in person. The other sign shop owner, NeonRon at Sign fabricators told me he the same thing both times I went by there; he was NOT hiring. I was afraid to go by a third time!
One day I was paintin' a sign on a block wall with my artist's brushes and Red Devil paint. I was accustomed to people commenting as they passed by. A man came up behind me and said, 'You could do pretty good if you had the right kind'a brush . . .' I was a little indignate and turned to ask him who he thought he was. He stuck out a hand and introduced himself. "I'm Aubrey Guinne" he grinned. I gushed. I began to tell him how I'd been by his shop several times lookin' for a job. 'Go to Sign Fabricators in the mornin' . . . 'he said. I explained that I'd already been there twice. "Go on back down there . . ." he replied. " You gotta job."
When I arrived, there was a 4x4 white masonite panel with a wolverine face laid-out on it, for a high school. Sort of a clip-art style. Ron put a brush in my hand and showed me how to thin the brilliant blue paint and pallete the brush. Then he walked away. I loved the paint. The way it was so smooth and covered so well. About 20 minutes later I was done and had a full-time job. I LOVED everything about it. I learned & did a lotta other stuff for the next two years; I cut a bunch of acrylic letters with the scroll-saw and bandsaw, and made a lotta channel letters. I drew a lot of patterns & cut a lot of grip-flex mask. And I painted all the signs. And I finally understood the brush- stroked letters. Ron did not like hand-lettering even though he was superb at it. Turns out, he had been trained by Mr. Guinne! But Ron loves all things electric. And he is a pro neon-bender. After a couple of years I started working part-time for him because he was giving me side jobs. With his help I was able to become self-employeed by 1988. He admonished me about how big-sign jobs are where the money is, and that I would have a hard time making a living with paintin' signs. But it's all I've done since! (with the exception of addin'a plotter a about 5 years ago)
Thanks and gratitude to these two great sign guys for giving me a chance and being so willing to teach!
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Now drawing? That is a different matter. My mom told me I could take a drawing class at the new Art Center near our house. It was called 'life drawing' and I thought we would go do drawings of farm animals and cows. I was 12 and at the height of puberty.
OK. I show up with my new newsprint pad, kneeded eraser and charcoal. I find a bench near the front and noticed the next youngest person in the class looked over 40. Humbled in thinking they all knew how to draw, I set my mind to try real hard.
Then walked in this woman who was wearing a kimona like wrap. She pulled it off and right there in front of me less than ten feet was a perfectly naked woman! WOW! everyone else in the class laughed and I felt like I was a complete joke. Persevering, I managed to at least get the breasts right. Circles, huh? After a few months, I was speaking art like the rest of them!
-------------------- Preston McCall 112 Rim Road Santa Fe, New Mexico 87501 text: 5056607370 Posts: 1552 | From: Santa Fe, New Mexico | Registered: Nov 1998
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always took art courses in jr. high and sr. high, thought i wanted to be a commercial artist, 1963... the jr. college comm. art class was full, tried the sign painting class 9 months did it 2 years, worked in shops til ;82, opened my own shop, sold in 200, to go back to "hand lettering only, now do that plus work on tv/movies as signwriter
i have loved this "work" for 46 years, it's a wonderful life...
-------------------- John Lennig / Big Top Sign Arts 5668 Ewart Street, Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada bigtopya@hotmail.com 604.451.0006 Posts: 2184 | From: Burnaby, British Columbia,Canada | Registered: Nov 2001
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My father was a brilliant artist/architect but worked in advertising agencies. He never taught me anything!
"You can watch, then go figure it out yourself and practice. You are bright enough"
We had military cadets for 1/2 day every other week, but my father would not let me participate after his WWII experiences.
So I took a one on extra art classes. Instead of just art he taught me layout and design and lettering. Basic block and Roman, kerning and how to modify and distort the tow basic fonts.
My first sign was a cut out of my secondary schools logo for the main stage. Lots of small signs too.
My career after University was very speckled. Included 10 years in advertising as a visualizer/copywriter among a very talent creative crew. Then I took off to north America for a couple of years. Always traveled with my brushes..
Started a sign shop with my youngest brother back in the 70s. Both self taught and brought up in the "school of hard knocks."
Emigrated to Toowoomba back in 1986 and set up my own shop. Took a while to establish a business but ended up very comfortable and enjoying it.
Another great break was when a customer asked me if I could paint a horse. Yes as long as he stands still
Turned out to a historical mural a a huge concrete tank and the horse was 16ft tall! I developed my Bushie^ sepia style and never looked back. I have now done over 60 in OZ, New Zealand, Canada and USA. Most lucrative was $40,000 in ten days with help from RT who I flew out from USA all experiences paid and a good salary.
Now semi retired, I ave two more large murals next year waiting on Government grants to come through. An art exhibition. And I think I will die with a brush in my hand.
[ December 17, 2010, 01:18 AM: Message edited by: Jon Butterworth ]
posted
My dad manufactured bookmobiles which were lettered by an "old school" sign painter, Eddie McLeod. I watched Eddie for hundreds of hours from the time I was 8. He was always patient and answered my questions about how this, why that color, why this was so small as compared to how big that was etc, etc. Allowed me to fill in some of the really large letters all the while explaining everything he did.
Fast forward 30 years later my truck equipment business needed extra income so I went to a trade show and got interested in a vinyl cutting package. Bought it and offered truck lettering to my existing customers.
As the margins grew smaller and smaller in the truck equipment business I decided to close up and do just truck lettering and smaller signs.
8 years later I'm still learning hand painting, pinstriping, carving, slapping vinyl and making a comfortable living in my one man sign business.
Never had any formal training, but I can't tell you how many times I have looked at a layout and said to myself, Eddie McLeod would never have done it like that.
Thank you to Eddie McLoud and all those "old timer masters" who took the time to pass on their skills and to the many who continue to do so on this forum.
-------------------- Bob Moroney The Sign Guy 310 Club Valley Drive Falmouth, MA 02536 508-259-6297 Posts: 216 | From: Falmouth, MA | Registered: Jul 2008
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posted
Please note the correction out of respect for Mr. Aubrey Guinn - ! I spelled his last name wrong! *me> <me* I don't know why I'm so compelled to add that 'e' . . . . Mr.Guinn has been retired now for about 3 or 4 years . . . about 2 years ago I spent an entire afternoon with him to 'interview' him so I could share some of his interesting life as an A 1 sign man, before he ever passes away. Seems like a lot of great stories get told about these guys after their gone. I thought it would be nice for him to be able to read it. We set a day and i wnt to his home. I got nearly 3 hours of tape-recorded stories - nearly his entire life history beginning from his childhood - but hardly anything about sign-biz! He also did not have the pics of the billboards and sign work out - 'somewhere around here in boxes', He said. I kept asking him questions like "how did you get started in signs?'-'how did the billboard work come about? etc. but he would just say 'I'll get to that later on . . .' lol . . . so I have'nt written the piece yet.
-------------------- Signs Sweet Home Alabama
oneshot on chat
"Look like a girl, act like a lady, think like a man, work like a dog" Posts: 5758 | From: "Sweet Home" Alabama | Registered: Mar 2003
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I was born into it and raised in both studios, Graphics and Recording. He got his degree in Commercial Art in maybe 1969 or in 1973 when he came back I think. He started at the Acaemy of Art in SanFranciso while waiting to get into Kunstschule Westend in Offenbach am Main in Germany. They accepted him after one year, he got his degree and returned to the states in maybe 1973 or so.![[Cool]](cool.gif)
"Ya want fries or slaw wit dat burger?"![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
Does that come with fries? ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
![[Rolling On The Floor]](graemlins/rolf.gif)
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<me*
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