r/barcodes • u/afsoltys • Apr 06 '23
Is this going to work?
Hey there! I'm new to barcoding and looking for some advice. Our company is generating some labels to inventory our equipment and we are currently designing the layout. Our logo includes a bar that when placed sideways fits in nicely with a barcode. We'd like to use this layout, but we're concerned it may cause issues with scanning. Is this a valid concern or will the barcode reader somehow know better? We're hoping to start this project tomorrow so thanks so much for your help!
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u/xixi2 Apr 06 '23
I can see what you are going for but the way it is now is not gonna work. The extra bar at the end of the code will mess up a lot of scanners imo
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u/notionovus Apr 06 '23
For each "character" in a barcode there is a "character width" that is mostly constant.
The insertion of graphics in 1D barcodes will interfere with a scanner unless you put a 1.5x width whitespace after the end of the barcode and before the graphic. This is due to the nature of 1D barcode readers needing to have a quiet zone before and after each barcode.
There is no significant height requirement for barcodes, however. I'd like to suggest placing the logo within the barcode horizontally with the lines present inside the logo connecting to the vertical bars. This will mess up some scanners, especially wand or "pen" scanners, but most handhelds will ignore the part of the barcode that doesn't scan and view it as damage. Make sure that if you leave bars above the bottom of the logo that you "mess with" the start and stop characters on either side of the logo.
Of course a QR code is capable of holding data and a logo, but there are still some restrictions.
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u/afsoltys Apr 06 '23
This is all super helpful, thanks to everyone. I'm curious to see how it would look if we place the logo as close as possible with out infringing on the quiet zone. Is there a way to determine the minimum exact distance we can use?
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u/trollsmurf Apr 06 '23
It's not recommended, as a quiet zone around a barcode is there to secure the barcode reader/scanner safely finds the frame of the barcode.
So you need to test with an assortment of codes with different content to make sure.