Just throwing a banner up on a wall or a sign on a pole could be some of the worst money you'll ever waste if you don't have a "scientific" method for determining the size of letters, negative space, and viewing distance for your sign, coupled with the reaction time an ordinary driver will have when they view your sign at 35 mph - give or take.
Calculating Outdoor Signs Negative Space and Copy Area to Get the Most Impact
In this article, we'll talk about copy area in combination with negative space to give your potential customer the best chance of reading your business advertising banners or main identification signage.
The Copy Area
The copy area of any banner or sign is the area of that sign covered by lettering, including the space between the letters, but not between lines of copy. When we are talking about lettering, this also will include any other graphics, photos, or illustrations that might be used, including your business logo, which may or may not include any copy or the name of your firm.
The copy area is of paramount importance, in combination with the negative space on your outdoor banners and/or sign, because it is what gives your sign decent legibility over an extended distance - which is where your potential clients will more than likely be viewing your sign from.
The Negative Space
Negative space is that area that is not in the copy/logo area. As stated previously, without this area, your sign or banner would be rendered virtually unreadable, and if too little negative space is appropriated, it can have damaging effects on the readability of your sign or banners.
Rule of Thumb for Negative Space
There is a percentage recommended by the United States Sign Council as a "rule of thumb" for negative space on your advertising signs. The illustration should show the combined percentages grouped. Typically, approximately 40% of the sign surface should be the negative space component of its readability, and approximately 60% should be copy. Again, this is a basic guideline, so if you are at 42% and 58%, you would be likely be within good design characteristics for your signage. Find the link to the image below.
HOW TO DETERMINE WHAT SIZE OF SIGN YOUR BUSINESS NEEDS
As we've been discussing, there are factors such as VRT (Viewer Reaction Time), VRD (Viewer Reaction Distance), Letter Height, Copy Area, and Negative Space that need to be determined, and once these factors have been determined, it is possible to determine the size of sign your business will require.
There are 10 steps used to determine the size of banner or sign needed. They are as follows -
Determine speed of travel (MPH) in feet per second (FPS)- (MPH x 1.47)
Determine Viewer Reaction Time (VRT)
Determine Viewer Reaction Distance (VRT x FPS)
Determine Letter Height in inches by reference to the Legibility Index (LI)- (VRD/LI)
Determine Single Letter Area in square inches (square the letter height to obtain area occupied by single letter and its adjoining letter space)
Determine Single Letter Area in square feet: Single Letter Area in square inches/144)
Determine Copy Area (Single Letter Area in square feet x total number of letters plus area of any symbols in square feet)
Determine Negative Space Area at 60% of Sign Area (Copy Area x 1.5)
Add Copy Area to Negative Space Area
Result is Area of Sign in square feet
Let's see how this works in "real" life...
Our car is travelling at 45mph - so 45 x 1.47 = 66 feet per second (FPS)
In a multi-lane high speed environment, as we determined in part one of this article, the viewer will need about 12 seconds to react
Our equation to ascertain the Viewer Reaction Distance would be 66fps x 12sec = 792 ft (VRD)
792 feet is our VRD. We'll arbitrarily, for this calculation, use the LI of 30 from part 2 of this series. The formula here is 792 / 30 = 27 inch letters
The area of a single 27 inch letter would be 729 square inches per letter - 27² inches
729 / 144 = approx. 5 square feet per letter
For our purposes, we are going to have a banner made that says "GRAND OPENING THIS WEEK" - so our formula here will be 20 letters x 5 sq. ft. per letter = 100 square feet
Negative space will be 100 x 1.5 = 150 square feet
Your designer can now determine the approximate size of your banner based on this calculation by adding the copy to the negative space
Based on the above calculation, our 28 ft. x 7 ft. banner might look something LIKE THIS.
In Part 4, we'll go into specific formulations for the area of a sign that hone in a little more scientifically on how we calculate signs both in perpendicular and parallel environments.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Barry K. Brown has been in the Sign, Banner, Decal and Display Business for over 20 years. It isn't what he thought he'd do with his life, but he says he knows too much now to do anything else! He has been marketing these products online since 1998, and the company he was general manager of in 1998 was the first sign company to be listed on Yahoo!
