Roadside Hoarding for a Coaching Centre
A coaching centre has booked a 20 ft × 10 ft hoarding facing a two-lane road. Traffic moves at 40–60 km/h, the nearest lane is 8 m away, and the opposite lane is about 25–30 m from the board. The centre's current artwork is a scanned A4 sheet carrying a building photo, 14 courses listed in 12 pt type, two phone numbers, a QR code, and a 20% discount burst. The hoarding company will print CMYK on flex at 150 dpi, but the supplied file is a 72 dpi RGB JPEG. The centre's coordinator insists that all information must stay because 'parents read everything' and asks you only to sharpen the image. The board will be seen by drivers for roughly three to five seconds. The installation date is fixed, and a reprint would cost the centre heavily.
1. Assess whether the supplied artwork can be printed as a 20 ft × 10 ft hoarding. Give your reasoning about resolution, colour and file type.
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The file cannot simply be sharpened. A 72 dpi JPEG from an A4 scan contains roughly 595 × 842 pixels. At a finished width of 20 ft (240 inches), that is about 2.5 dpi at full size. Even if the printer works at a 1:10 scale, the file would need about 3,600 pixels across at 150 dpi, and the scan has only about 595. Sharpening adds edge contrast; it cannot invent missing detail.
The artwork must be rebuilt. Text, the logo and simple shapes should be recreated as vectors so they stay crisp at any size. Any photograph must be replaced with a high-resolution original or used small enough that its effective resolution is acceptable for the viewing distance. The file should be converted to CMYK and supplied as a press-ready PDF at the printer's required scale, with fonts embedded or outlined. RGB colours, especially bright greens and oranges, can shift badly in CMYK flex printing. I would also ask the printer to confirm whether their '150 dpi' refers to final size or to a reduced-scale file, because that changes the pixel dimensions completely.
2. Redesign the content for a three-to-five-second read. State what you would keep, cut and enlarge, with reasons.
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A driver at 40–60 km/h has no time to read 14 courses or scan a QR code. The main line should be the centre's name and one clear promise, such as 'Class 10 & 12 Coaching' or 'Board Exam Results'. I would keep two or three course categories at most, not fourteen individual courses, and direct people to a website or one phone number for details. The discount burst can stay only if it is large and secondary; otherwise it competes with the name.
I would cut the second phone number, the QR code, the long course list and the building photo unless it is a strong, simple image. At 25–30 m, a useful rule of thumb is about 25 mm of capital height for every 3 m of viewing distance, so the main letters should be roughly 200–250 mm high or more. The phone number must be large enough to read in the same glance. I would use a simple, high-contrast colour scheme, such as black on yellow or white on dark blue, and avoid red on dark green or other low-contrast combinations. One message, one image and one action is the realistic limit.
3. What technical specifications would you put in the print order?
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I would specify the finished size as 20 ft × 10 ft, the substrate as flex, the print method as CMYK, and the file scale as 1:10 with an effective resolution agreed with the printer. Text and logos must be vector; photographs should be at least 150 dpi at the reduced scale, or otherwise acceptable for the viewing distance. I would add bleed and a safe margin for hemming and eyelets so no text is lost at the edges.
The PDF should be press-ready, with fonts embedded or outlined, CMYK colour, and no RGB elements. I would ask for a reduced-size proof to check hierarchy and contrast, and a colour reference for any brand colour. If the board is lit at night, I would check the proof under similar lighting. I would also confirm the installation method, because eyelets, frames or overlapping panels can cut into the design. Finally, I would get written approval on the proof from the coordinator, listing exactly what was removed, so the reprint risk is not carried by the designer alone.