custom decals

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T

trainman78

Member
this might be the wrong room for this but does anyone know of any companies out there that produce custom decals for HO scale railroads, i created a railroad and i dont have a steady enough hand to use dry transfers to spell out the company name and just using the initals does not look right to me. can anyone out there help me? thanks if you can.
 
Highball Graphics has gotten back into the custom decal business. Im going to re-email him about doing a set for a 1 off boxcar project. A little pricey for 1 car but no way else of doing it.
 
Have you considered making your own? There are quite a few places that sell white or clear decal paper for inkjet printers. I use an open source program called Gimp to create the artwork, and then you print it out on the decal paper and then spray it with a clear acrylic sealer after the ink has had a chance to dry.

The main drawback is if you have any white in your design that is not surrounded by another color. Because most of the inkjets that people own don't print white, you need to use white decal paper. If the white edge is exposed, you won't be able to see it on the paper.

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I just bought Bell decal paper in white and clear to try and do some work for models im working on. I tried to make a road number on the side of the cab and pieced together #'s look like crap. So im going to try and make it where the road initials and # are 1 decal so its all lined up properly and even.
 
Jerome, how are there prices and turn around time? Did you supply the artwork or did they work on it for you? I want to do a sheet for a SD40 and SD70M in my freelanced railroad but can't come up with anything.
 
Steve, the first time is about $100 for the set-up and the first batch of 25 sheets I believe. After that is gets cheaper. I did my own AP logo, but he will do artwork if you can't, extra $$. Turn around has always been fast, he's in Batavia ILL. central to most people in US and Canada.

One's on the right side are my older style decals, and on the left my newer modern style and JTEX decals also.

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I can't decide if I want initals or spell out the name, but being that my freelance railroad is long, and the fact that I am modeling a earlier era, then I might just go with the initals, so this information helps me as well. Though it might be a lil bit pricey but I think I will have one of the above named companies make the decals for me.
 
As far as using initials or full words it can depend on whether or not you are following a prototype. My freelanced road follows the New Haven RR in some respects. The era I model is in the time after the NH no longer used the script herald and went to the simple N over H. I had these decal mmade by Solidesign in Fenton MI. I provided New Haven sample decals with some rough artwork and instructions as to colors, etc. There was a 1 time set up charge and I had them make two 8 1/2 x 11 sheets with variuos sizes and colors of the LV and also the name Lobuc Valley spelled out in black sets and white sets, as per New Haven practice. There is enough on those 2 sheets to do over 30 engines and freight cars heralds and names spelled out. Total cost as I recall was $90 for everything. Solidesign advertises in MR and/or RMC in the smaller ads at the back of the magazine.

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My road is freelanced, it does not follow any one particular road. So I think I may just stick to using the letters on the locos and freight cars and spell it out on passenger cars.
 


Well the 2 loco's i want to do, I want it spelled out across the long hood. But not sure if I want as simple as it used to be on the "erie lackawanna" or something more. But I do want a cool logo for the nose and I've had something in my head for a long time that nobody will draw up for me.
 
I want to come up with some type of artwork for a logo, but I can't seem to be able to come up with anything.
 
OCN Guy said:
That's really good! Do you have a photo of one of your cars or locos that have the decals on them?
Click to expand...

Here is the only piece of rolling stock I own! I used Evans Design decal paper on this caboose, but I think I will try the paper from Bell next time. I made decals for the marker and ditch lights, and I think they turned out ok.

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NYSW F45 said:
Well the 2 loco's i want to do, I want it spelled out across the long hood. But not sure if I want as simple as it used to be on the "erie lackawanna" or something more. But I do want a cool logo for the nose and I've had something in my head for a long time that nobody will draw up for me.
Click to expand...

Steve do you have any info on what you wanted I haven't done any design work for a while but I could give it a shot

Mike
 
Well the freelanced railroad is the New Jersey Atlantic & Eastern. It's long haul passenger train is the "Route of the Jersey Devil". I have had a vision of a cartoonish devil standing upright with a smurk, his trident in one hand and a conductors hat on with the devils horns peeking thru. LOL

As for what i'de want on the loco's, that I have no clue. The nose logo, probably something with the shape of nj in a circle or a star with the name going around the inside of the circle or outside of the star. The colors im tossing around are Dark blue top, cream/sand color for center and a lighter shade of blue for the bottom. CNJ used these colors on the blue comet. Dark blue for the skies, cream for the sandy color of the beaches and lighter blue for the ocean water.
 
NYSW F45 said:
Well the freelanced railroad is the New Jersey Atlantic & Eastern. It's long haul passenger train is the "Route of the Jersey Devil". I have had a vision of a cartoonish devil standing upright with a smurk, his trident in one hand and a conductors hat on with the devils horns peeking thru. LOL

As for what i'de want on the loco's, that I have no clue. The nose logo, probably something with the shape of nj in a circle or a star with the name going around the inside of the circle or outside of the star. The colors im tossing around are Dark blue top, cream/sand color for center and a lighter shade of blue for the bottom. CNJ used these colors on the blue comet. Dark blue for the skies, cream for the sandy color of the beaches and lighter blue for the ocean water.
Click to expand...

Wow, you'd probably have to either get a graphic artist or...
a). find a cartoon image of a conductor (maybe a rapido ad?)
b). photoshop maybe Yosimite Sam's face on it

I'd overlay the image over a long diagonal streak with a comet at the head of it.
 
CMMR said:
Here is the only piece of rolling stock I own! I used Evans Design decal paper on this caboose, but I think I will try the paper from Bell next time. I made decals for the marker and ditch lights, and I think they turned out ok.

preview_gedc0002.jpg


preview_gedc0004.jpg
Click to expand...

Hey! those look really good!
Were you unhappy with the Evans paper?
 


NYSW F45 said:
Well the freelanced railroad is the New Jersey Atlantic & Eastern. It's long haul passenger train is the "Route of the Jersey Devil". I have had a vision of a cartoonish devil standing upright with a smurk, his trident in one hand and a conductors hat on with the devils horns peeking thru. LOL

As for what i'de want on the loco's, that I have no clue. The nose logo, probably something with the shape of nj in a circle or a star with the name going around the inside of the circle or outside of the star. The colors im tossing around are Dark blue top, cream/sand color for center and a lighter shade of blue for the bottom. CNJ used these colors on the blue comet. Dark blue for the skies, cream for the sandy color of the beaches and lighter blue for the ocean water.
Click to expand...


Steve I'm working on it the Devil is the hard part but I do have a lot of art work I've been doing this type of thing for 30 years (offset printing, screen printing and a vinyl sign shop plus about 30 years in the signal dept at the RR) Those colors you mention are those for the engine itself or the nose logo ? Give me a couple of days and I'll come up with something Mike
 
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