By signcraft
Posted on Monday, November 20th, 2023
Bob Behounek has lettered loads of trucks. In his 50-plus years of sign making, he has probably lettered thousands of them. You could even say he “wrote the book on truck lettering”—SignCraft published his book Trucks! in 1998, which is unfortunately no longer in print.
“I averaged about 400 trucks per year,” says Bob, “and most of those were done in the days before computers and vinyl. It was just how you did it—you made a pattern, got your brushes and lettered it. They were in and out in a day or less. Most of these trucks were done in the Chicagoland area and some were done in Wisconsin.”
Bob’s approach to truck lettering was based on traditional, sound layout principles, and the results were layouts with loads of appeal. The lettering and individual copy blocks were framed by plenty of negative space. Words that related to each other were close, often even overlapping. There was plenty of contrast in color and weight.
Lack of contrast leads to monotony, and monotony means the end of appeal. It’s a turnoff to the viewer’s eye. Strong contrasts also saved time back in sign painting days.
“Time is money,” Bob says. “We used strong contrasts in color so that we didn’t have to come back and add an outline or a shade to try to make the lettering more interesting or more visible. If you use the right color to begin with—one with plenty of contrast to the background—you’re done and out of there, and on to the next truck. And you know people will be able to read it out on the street.”
Bob also used strong contrast in line value. Notice how every layout has lettering that is very bold and some that is very light. The bold copy delivered the main message while the lightweight copy took a step back.
With the exception of one simple graphic and a few background panels, these layouts were all about the text. There’s plenty of contrast in letter style, too, and script also found its way into almost every one of these layouts.
“Hand-done script loosens up the layout,” he says. “It’s unique and interesting. It gives viewers a reason to keep looking at the sign and read it. It brings energy to the layout and creates an emotional attachment to it. Going forward, though, we may not be able to do this as much because young people aren’t learning to write cursive anymore, so they have a hard time reading script.
“Most of these trucks were done 20, 30 or even 40 years ago. Every once in a while I see one of the trucks from those times. They still stand out and are very easy to read and interesting.”
