DesignFix Design Studio
Vectorization
Vectorization is what you need when a design has to leave the screen it was made on. Vector artwork is stored as shapes rather than pixels, so it can be printed at any size, cut from vinyl, engraved, embroidered or separated into print colours — none of which a fixed grid of pixels can do.
What this covers
What we work on in vectorization
Logos and brand marks
Rebuilt as clean shapes with proper curves, so the mark works from a business card to a vehicle wrap.
Apparel and print graphics
Designs redrawn so they stay hard-edged at garment size and can be separated for the press.
Editable, workable files
Artwork built with sensible paths and named colours, so it can be recoloured and adjusted later.
Type and lettering
Text matched to the original typeface where it can be identified, or drawn where it cannot.
Projects that fit here
Examples of the kind of thing people send us. If yours isn’t on the list, describe it anyway.
- A logo that only exists as a small image pulled from an old website
- A graphic that goes soft and blocky the moment it is enlarged
- Artwork that was auto-traced elsewhere and came back lumpy
- A design that needs to be cut from vinyl and currently cannot be
- A mark being prepared for signage, where size is unlimited
- A file a printer asked for “in vector” with no further explanation
Who this tends to be for
Businesses with an unusable logo file
Very common: the mark is fine, and no file exists that can be used at size.
Print shops and sign makers
Customer artwork that has to become vector before the job can run.
Anyone told “we need a vector file”
Usually said without explanation, and usually meaning exactly this.
Redrawn, not auto-traced — and what that costs you
Every vector program has a button that converts an image automatically. On clean, simple, high-resolution artwork it can do a decent job. The trouble is that files needing conversion are usually none of those things, and the trace faithfully reproduces every flaw it finds: compression artefacts become hundreds of tiny bumps along an edge that should be straight, smooth curves become chains of short segments, and letterforms come out subtly wrong in a way people notice without being able to say why.
It also produces something nobody can work with. A traced file often carries thousands of unnecessary points, which makes it slow to open, awkward to recolour and difficult to separate. It is vector in file format only.
Redrawing means rebuilding the artwork deliberately: real curves, type matched or reset, colours defined as values rather than sampled approximations, and shapes constructed so they can be recoloured, separated and scaled. It takes longer, and it is the reason the result works on press.
What it cannot do is invent detail that was never there. A very small or heavily degraded source becomes a redraw from reference rather than a conversion — closer to illustration than tracing — and photographic imagery with continuous tone is usually the wrong candidate entirely. We will tell you which of those yours is before quoting, because it changes the work substantially.
Which file formats you receive is agreed as part of the offer, since it depends on what you are doing with it. Tell us where the artwork is going and the right set follows from that.
How it works
From a sentence to a finished design
- Step 1
Tell us what you need
One or two sentences is enough to start. You don't have to know what the work is called or which category it belongs in.
- Step 2
We discuss the project
We ask what we need to know — where it will be used, what size, what it has to work on — and tell you honestly what is and isn't possible.
- Step 3
Share files or references
Send the artwork you already have, a photo, a sketch, or examples of the look you're after. Files go straight into private storage.
- Step 4
You get a custom offer
A written scope and a fixed price for your project specifically. Nothing is charged and nothing is started until you accept it.
- Step 5
Approve and pay
Accepting the offer creates the order and takes you to payment. Decline it or ignore it and nothing happens.
- Step 6
We complete the design
The work runs through the same production and delivery process as every other DesignFix order, with revisions included in the scope.
What to send us
You don't need to know what to ask for
None of this is required, and a single sentence is enough to start. It's simply what tends to be useful, so a first message doesn't turn into three.
Whatever artwork you have
The file itself, however rough — an export, a screenshot, a photo of something printed, or the version a supplier rejected.
A reference or a sketch
Something you like the look of, a rough drawing, or an existing design you want the new work to sit alongside.
Where it's going
The product, the size, and the process if you know it. Print, garment, screen or sign changes what the artwork has to be.
Any specification you were given
A printer's requirements, a supplier's template, or the rejection message you received — that usually says exactly what needs fixing.
Colours and brand material
Existing brand colours, fonts or guidelines, so new work matches what you already have.
What you want changed
A sentence is enough. "Make this printable", "this needs to work on a dark shirt", "I want something like this but ours".
Questions
Common questions
Tell us what you need
Describe the project in a sentence or two. We’ll ask what we need to know, then send a written scope and a fixed price before anything is charged.