Urgent help with a hoarding design (document)

Hi everyone I hope all I well
I am a newbie designer and I require some urgent assistance
I am to to design a hoarding for an upcoming Store that will advertise that it is coming soon
This hoarding has a few 90 degree angle bends , and I want to make sure all important information does not get bent and that certain information gets shown on the door

I need assistance in setting up an extremely accurate ,or close as possible, print document in photoshop with all the correct measurements (scaled down to about 80%) and guide lines as to where it bends and where the door starts
I’ll attach below the plans for reference …a flat lay and as where it will bend …
The height is 3717mm but I would like to scale everything down by 80% so that my laptop does not explode (lol)

I would really appreciate whatever help ,I am truly freaking out and unable to think straight >< and I am struggling to make sense of it …
Thanking you in advance !!!


Why on Earth would you be using Photoshop for this and not Illustrator?

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Photoshop or illustrator - forgot to mention that
I’ve used photoshop for straight walls before so I assumed that it would be fine

All I see is a basic blueprint with square shapes and dimensions on it.
Are you supposed to be adding graphics to this?
Have you used vector software before?

I’m not familiar with the term “hoarding” in your post.
Looks like its referring to “barricade” graphics here in the states.
Just get your true dimensions for length and height for each wall and you should be fine…
And if you are adding graphics to it, account for bleed for the top, bottom and sides…

We all learn something every day. I had to look up “hoarding.” I had no idea that it could be used to refer to a temporary fence around a construction site. I’ve never heard the word used that way in the U.S.

Anyway…

You’re operating under some erroneous assumptions.

First, you probably shouldn’t build the entire thing in Photoshop unless the imagery is composed exclusively of bitmapped images, such as photos. Instead, use Illustrator or InDesign (or their equivalents) and import photos as needed. This raises the question of whether Photoshop is needed at all, but that depends on your design.

Second, you mentioned needing to keep the file size down and believing that building the file at 80% would help you do that. This is a little difficult to explain, so I won’t go into detail, but if you decrease the dimensions, you’ll need to increase the resolution of the Photoshop imagery, which means the file size (in bits) stays the same.

This also leads me to believe that you’re under the false assumption that your Photoshop resolution needs to be the same 300ppi that’s used for printed work that’s held by hand. For something that will be viewed from a distance, the resolution can be much less. A resolution of 120ppi would probably be fine for a hoarding.

Here’s what I would do (In addition to using Illustrator and/or InDesign, plus Photoshop).

Unless they’ve given you instructions to build the file at 80%, I’d build it at 10% since the math gets easier that way. Doing so also avoids some possible file dimension limitations. Remember what I wrote about needing to increase the resolution of the Photoshop imagery when decreasing the dimensions? In other words, if the resolution of the output information needs to be 120ppi, but you’re building the file at a tenth of its size, you need to increase the resolution of the Photoshop imagery by ten times (1200ppi).

I would also try to divide the file into panels that correspond to the panels in the hoarding and build each one separately. Perhaps you’re already doing this. In other words, I’d probably try to avoid wrapping important things across the bends and gaps.

I intentionally didn’t go into much detail, so if you have any questions, please feel free to ask. Either I or someone else here will respond. There are forum members who are very knowledgeable about large-format printing.

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I apologize in advance for the inches conversion. I’m way too tired to try to think in mm.

So I had a whole thing written out for a hoarding as in a building wrap, but on second look, this hoarding wall is a build out. Are you using self-adhesive vinyl to make what amounts to a giant car wrap?

You need to speak with the printer/installer doing this to find out what your bleed and seam overlaps are. Generally the media used for wall wraps prints to 52" wide and that has to include your bleeds and overlaps. It can be trimmed narrower if you want to hit corners in a certain way.

If you were running this through our shop, I’d have you design at a scale of 1:10 at a resolution somewhere between 750 and 1000ppi. (that would be 75ppi-100ppi at final size.) Laid out in Illustrator with all critical colors as Pantone Solid coated, all fonts outlined and all images linked. Packaged. Not PDF.

Put the drafting on a separate layer as an overlay so the printer knows how to break up the file and locate the doors. If we were doing this, we’d use that drafting to locate seams and send to you for approval.

Assume there is a 1/2" overlap at any seams.
Assume you need 2" bleed top and bottom (4" total) and if you have not measured this yourself, give it at least 6" left and right (12" total).

Assume there will be some misaligment at corners because build-outs are NEVER plumb, square nor level. Nor are they ever built to the dimensions on the drawing. Keep this in mind on your bends and give yourself some safety.

If the file is too big, you can break it up by wall sections.


On the other hand…
If this is wrap like a big hung curtain that’s a whole different thing.
Let me know and I’ll redo that write-up.

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