How to work with 2pt (0.7 mm?) line so it scales right for larger print. (1:10 scale rule?)

[Zower]

Hello everyone,

I would like to ask, a company I work for, recently had brand manual made for them. In the manual there is one graphical element - curved line, they specify that whenever using the line as a graphic element, it is a simple line with 2pt thickness.

I am now designing a banner that will be on a tradeshow, size is roughly 2m x 1m (2000 mm x 1000 mm document size) and I would like to use the above mentioned line element. If I set the line thickness to 2pt in my project, how will it print? Will the resulting line thickness be adjusted somehow for print or it will have a real thickness after print of just 0.7mm, that will be just invisible on a larger print, or am I missing something?

I asked the company that made the brand manual how to work with such line so it scales right, and they replied, that for example for a billboard of say 5m x 2m I should work in 1:10 scale - (so 500 mm x 200 mm document size) and in that scale, the 2pt line will work fine. If I had the document set for 5000 mm x 2000 mm they said I would need to x10 the line thickness so making it 20pt at that point.

How does that work? Does it not mean that 2pt line is always 0.7 mm thick?

Could anyone who is experienced in this field please provide me some insight on how it works?

Thank you in advance for your time to reply.

[Jacob Bugge · Accepted solution]

Zower,

The specification of 2pt thickness is completely meaningless unless it is tied to a specific size of the artwork in question.

Therefore the manual is wanting:

Either the 2 pt thickness must be specified in connexion with a specific size of the artwork, then scaled with it just as everything else.

Or the thickness must be specified as a proportion of some (overall) measure contained in the artwork at whichever current size.

The former will give everyone something to work with in an accurate way by simply scaling, the latter will lead to some strange values and inaccuracies, and especially at the default size it was defined by, the thickness will probably be some decimal number close to 2 pt, which is exactly what the company wishes to avoid.

Further, I am afraid the 1:10 scale example will lead directly to errors, unless the 2 pt thickness is actually established/defined/specified for the 500 mm x 200 mm document size and must be different to 2 pt at any other size.

This seems all the more likely since the instruction starts with the 5000 mm x 2000 mm billboard size rather than the 500 mm x 200 mm.

If the latter is the size that the 2 pt thickness has been specified for, the simple and clear instruction could just have been to scale to whichever size is needed (with Scale Strokes & Effects ticked).

[Zower]

Hello @Jacob Bugge Thank you for your reply!

Well this is the exact quotation from the manual regarding the line thickness specification

"We use a classic line with a stroke thickness of 2pt."

In addition to that, they provided us an .Ai file containing such lines - that file is A4 with line thickness of 2pt, but there was nowhere written in the manual how to correctly apply the line (or any other element for that matter).

I understand what you wrote, in case they specified that for A4 format use line of 2pt thickness and size down, or up accordingly (by transforming the original example by dragging) that makes sense and I know what to do, but with their description (for 500x200mm 2pt is going to be just fine) is rather odd.

I have never worked with a brand manual so far, what we have access to seems rather unfinished in terms of how to apply their "vision".

Anyway thank you for your time, I will ask them again to be more specific in the line thickness applications.

Have a nice day

[Jacob Bugge]

You are welcome, Zower.

I made a few additions while we were cross posting, and they deal with part of your new post.

Since it is an A4 size document, in other words 210 mm x 297 mm with the line thickness of 2 pt and presuming the line is contained within the Artboard of that size, we are talking about a horizontal line with a length less than 210 mm or a vertical line with a length less than 210 mm, in other words completely different to the 500 mm x 200 mm example page.

So there seems to be a genuine confusion/error.

[Zower]

I am sorry I was not clear enough in my initial message.

From the marketing company we received .Ai file that contained source files for the brand identity. The file was A4 document with "lines" - part of the identity design. 

I had a task to do banner that would be printed 2000x1000 mm and while designing that, I realized that in the manual there is no mention about how to scale the line thickness so I wrote the company an email, and their response is in my first post here. I was confused. With their "5000x2000 mm billboard" it was just an example of a large graphic design.

Since their first reply to my question how to scale the line properly was confusing, I had to ask them additional questions and it showed up, that the lines are designed to be 2pt thick in the A4 document size and then scaled accordingly for anything bigger/smaller. But since this information was nowhere to be found I did not know how to work with it. I expected since it is a "manual" I would think it would have all the neccessary information as to how to work with those design elements.

Well anyway, it is now solved, thank you for your time replying, appreciate it.

Have a good one

[Monika Gause · Accepted solution]

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@Zower  schrieb:

 they specify that whenever using the line as a graphic element, it is a simple line with 2pt thickness.


I asked the company that made the brand manual how to work with such line so it scales right, and they replied, that for example for a billboard of say 5m x 2m I should work in 1:10 scale - (so 500 mm x 200 mm document size) and in that scale, the 2pt line will work fine. If I had the document set for 5000 mm x 2000 mm they said I would need to x10 the line thickness so making it 20pt at that point.

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That looks like the straight way into desaster.

What would work is to specify that line thickness to always be a certain fraction of the width of the artwork. Or to always be the same thickness as some elment in the logo or some fraction of the text size. But that definition looks like they want to be asked every time you create something. 

[Zower]

Thank you for your message @Monika Gause 

Later yesterday I found out that baseline thickness of 2pt is meant to be for a document size of A4 and scaled from there. But since this information was nowhere in the brand identity manual, I was confused how to use it correctly.

Thank you for your time replying, have a nice day.