Virtual Design
and Gold Leaf Lettering
After Dodds purchased Lebanon Monument Company in the fall of 1998, we retained the services of Jim Smith, who had worked at Lebanon for close to seven years. One of Jim's areas of expertise was his ability to create full color renderings of memorials on the computer. One of the ideas that Eric (owner of Dodds) had been thinking about, was hiring an artist who could draw a concept memorial special for the family and draw that memorial in a cemetery setting so a family could get a feel for how their memorial would look completed. Eric approached Jim with this idea, and Jim said he could take it a step further. They took a picture of a monument from the display showroom, and took a picture of a park setting, represent a cemetery atmosphere. Both pictures were scanned into the computer, and added names and dates to the monument. Jim was able, through the software, to place the picture of the monument onto the park setting. By doing this, it made it appear that the monument was actually in the "cemetery".
After some refinements, we now can take a photograph of the actual cemetery plot where a family is going to place a monument, create a picture of the monument they chose to purchase, add the names and dates to that picture, using the computer, and "overlay" that photo proportionately onto the cemetery photo. We can then present to the family a photograph of their monument, placed on their lot, showing other memorials existing in the area, all before the granite for their memorial was even ordered. This process allows the family to be sure how the memorial will look in advance and not worry about making a purchase they may not be happy with. The "Virtual Design" concept is a Dodds original, and we are the only company in the country making this available.
Click here to see how Virtual Design is achieved
Another special design service now available by Dodds artists is "Gold Leaf". We can now add 23 karat gold leaf to lettering and designs on selected colors. It works very well on black and deep red granites. The effect is spectacular. We sandblast the letters as we normally would, then add the gold leaf through a special process. We guarantee the process for 25 years unconditionally. Even if many years from now it wears off, the lettering will look as it would as if we had never added the gold leaf.
The pictures below show the Gold Leaf lettering. Click on pictures to see full size.
