Salesperson Toolkit: Using Online Tools To Calculate Scale From An Image

Finding scale is an essential part of any sign estimators job. This guide will show you how to use online tools to get the information you need to complete your bids and get accurate measurements for all portions of your signs.

Oftentimes artists or clients provide you with PDFs or JPGs of what they are needing, but they don’t include any measurements. Salespeople and estimators need this information to provide pricing to clients.

Scenario: Channel Letters

An owner has approached you wanting channel letters put on their building. Their architect has provided you with drawings of exactly what they are wanting. You know they want the entire width of the sign to be 66″. How do you figure out the height of individual elements of the logo in order to know how much material will be needed?

Find scale using blocklayer.com’s Scale From Image tool

Go to www.blocklayer.com/scale-fixer.aspx. I recommend watching the video tutorial towards the bottom of the page. It will show you visually how to use their tool.

Tip: If you don’t have an image file type (say you were given an EPS), use a file converter online (like https://www.zamzar.com/ ) to quickly convert the file to the file type you need. Or if you have a PDF, just open it and then use your Snipping Tool to take a screenshot image of the open PDF.

Set Main Image

Click on Browse to set the main image you want to investigate.

A browser window will pop up. Find the file on your computer system, then press Open.

Result:

Set Your Scale

Click and drag a box over the area of the measurement that you know. In this scenario, we know that the channel letters should be 66″ wide overall.

Then you’ll be able to click and drag boxes as you wish. Each result will show you the width, height, and area based upon your 66″ scale.

Tip: Use the blue slider above the image to change the size of the image on your screen. This is especially helpful since the text can be small and hard to read.