Totoro Bus Stop

My Neighbor Totoro is one of my families favorite movies and I wanted to make the bus stop signt for a while now. The main problem was finding the correct lettering of the signs, but more on that later.

All measurements are metric, imperial units are approximations, but since this is based on an anime, so are the metric measurements. ヽ(ヅ)ノ

• PVC pipe, 50mm diameter, 2m long (2" / 6'6")
• PVC pipe endcap (matching)
• foamed PVC board, 3mm (1/8") FOREX, Sintra or similar...
• spray paint (off-White, light blue)
• metal cupboard mounting rail
• standing table foot
• self adhesive vinyl (black & white)
• vinyl cutter
• hobby knife
• screws
• some wood scraps

First step is to decide on the colors. The colors of the sign vary in the movie and since the whole scene is in dark forest it's even harder to tell.

So i just went for a light blue, that I liked (and that was availiable at my hardware store), but either way it's not movie accurate.

For the white I chose an off white. I didn't want it to be too yellowish cause the vinyl I had was "pure" white and I didn't want it too look too dissimilar.

Once the colors are settled upon, the fun part can begin:

I chose foamed PVC board (Forex) for the sign cause it is suitable for outdoor use and I had it on hand. If you plan to do an indoor version you could use thick card stock or foam board or even go metal if that is your thing. (I might do that in the future)

I cut out a circle, 40cm (16") diameter for the sign and a 30cm x 18cm (12" x 7") with rounded corners for the timetable.

The sign and timetable can now be spraypainted white. After the paint has fully dried, I devided the sign in thrids, masked off the middle part and painted the top and bottom parts blue.

While that dried I painted the PVC pipe white. Before painting the PVC pipe I would recommend you to sand off the factory markings (or use acetone) cause those tend to bleed through the paint. I didn't cause I was lazy and regretted it. I will have to go in and fix that (or hide it with weathering)

Next I attached the PVC endcap to a table foot. I have a bunch of these aluminium feet at hand (again: not movie accurate, may replace later). To one I attached the endcap, simply by putting a screw through it with some scrap wood on the other side to hold it together. This is not ideal, but I might revisit the foot soon anyway to replace it with a concrete one and then i need to rething my mode of fixing the pipe (may update this 'ible then).

To fix the sign and timetable to the pipe, I cut off some cupboard mounting rail (I have no idea what it is called really). This is ideal, cause it is u-shaped, so it sits nicely on the round pipe and it has mounting holes in the right places (mine had).

I marked the center of the pipe and pre-drilled all the srewholes. I wanted to use the same holes to hold the sign and the rail, so I had to transfer the positions to the sign and make sure it's all at the right angles. I also countersunk the holes. This might not be nessecary because the Forex is really soft, but I didn't want to risk the paint cracking or any other funny stuff happening at the last moment. I also pre-painted the screwheads because I didn't want to go in and try to hide them with paint when it's all done and mess up the lettering. (꒪⌓꒪)

One of my main holdbacks was the lettering. I don't speak nor read japanese and even those who can are not clear about all the details. There are two seperate pieces (obviously)

The Bus Stop

Refences for the sign itself are pretty easy to find. But since I had no plan of painting the japanese characters by hand I needed a version that I could outline in Illustrator and cut with my vinyl cutter.

There seems to be some "controversy" to what the sign actually says, but I found this thread https://bit.ly/3Okk6Cd and it all sound reasonable to me. So i went for the thrid version of the sign propoded here.

I thought about posting the files for this here, but this is not my work and I don't want to take any credit for it. So please if you plan on making this, download the images from it's source and trace the path yourself.

I then imported the paths into my cutting program and cut the black and white characters. Remember to include some registration marks to make the appication much easier.

Since the sign was problably meant to be handpainted anyway, it's okay if it is a little off.

The Timetable

For the timetable, I found this thread: https://bit.ly/3HN3Zup

It's even more of a controversy to what it reads cause it's hard to see and there are multiple Versions. I decided to go for an incoplete mix of all of them. I may add missing text later once I find reasonable hints on the contents.

Since there pictures are not good enough to trace, i redid it. And since this it NOT someone elses work i attaced the Illustrator and PDF versions of it.

If you are interested in what both signs read, have a look at the threads. They are quite interesting. ( ⊙‿⊙)

After lettering was cut, I applied it to my signs. This is much easier while they are not attached to the pipe. Be aware that some of the letters might cover your screwholes, though. In these spots I carefully peeled back the vinyl before screwing down the sings and put it back over the screws. Then just press the pipe on the foot/encap and you are done. Maybe.

Weathering

You may have noticed that I haven't weathered the sign yet. I must admit that I am a little intimidated by that. I love how the sign turned out and i don't want to ruin it by a bad weathering job ... maybe I'll find the courage one day. ⊙﹏⊙

Foot and mounting

I'm not too happy with the whole foot situation. For one the foot looks like what it is, a table foot and also, it is too light. The sign is proteced from most of the wind, but a strong gust can blow it over. Also I noticed that the sign got a little wobbly during the past hot summer days (although standing in the shade) since the PCV gets more flexible when it gets warm. ಠ_ಠ

The plan is to pour a proper concrete foot with some kind of rod that provides some extra stability. Should not be too hard.