Learning Hub

From first sketch to first glow.

Everything about designing, ordering and living with an illuminated chart: a guided film, every step written out, answers to common questions, and a sailor’s guide to reading the chart itself.

Read the guide Set up your frame

Film: Guided film, narrated and captioned
29: Steps, each written out
51: Questions answered
13: Stages from quote to your door

Start where you are

I · The film

The guided tour, start to finish.

The guide film

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Until then, every step is written out below.

II · Step by step

The whole journey, written out.

Three chapters, in the order you’ll meet them. Choose one, or search every step at once.

Chapter one

Design your chart

Find your waters, choose a size that prints well, make it yours, and watch every light come alive.

You’ll need: Nothing but a place in mind. No account, and nothing to install.
You’ll finish with: A finished design, saved in your browser, that you can preview glowing and framed.

Begin in the designer
Select Design a chart from any page.
Find your waters
Search for a harbor, a town or a NOAA chart number, such as 12327 for New York Harbor.
Good to knowA NOAA chart number is the quickest way in. It is printed in the corner of any paper chart you own.
Every light, plotted
The official NOAA chart appears, with every buoy, beacon and light from NOAA's latest data.
Shape the view
Drag inside the gold frame to pan; pull a corner to reshape what prints, or draw a new area from scratch.
Good to knowPress A at any time to bring your whole chart frame back into view.
Frame size
Each size is compared with the chart's detail and the best one is marked. Select the ⓘ on any size to see why: sharpness, how much of your area shows, and room for your lights.
Good to knowSizes with no note under them print your area with good detail.
Lock scale
Under More size options. Off (the usual): changing the size keeps your area and prints it larger or smaller. On: the map keeps its scale, so a bigger frame shows more water around your area and a smaller one crops in. It only takes effect the next time you change the size or turn the frame.
Easier to read
Small markers on your size? Make markers easier to read offers a closer view, bigger chart symbols, or NOAA's more detailed harbor charts, each with a preview.
Lights too close to print
Each light is a fiber in its own hole, so lights need 2.5 mm between them on the print. Spots that are closer are listed; Show rings each one on the map. Keep one light at each spot in one click, leave it for your designer, or try a larger frame or closer view. Undo takes a fix back.
Good to knowNothing is lost by leaving this for your designer: they will go through each spot with you.
Title, border and style
Add a title and a second line, choose the title panel's corner, a border (edge ticks, chart border or NOAA-style margin border), and a palette: Classic NOAA, Vintage, Muted or Monochrome.
Good to knowHide the title panel and nothing prints in that corner. The designer tells you when a title is hidden.
Compass rose and tide
Under More style options: major roads on the land, and the compass rose, placed in an open corner and draggable anywhere. Four LEDs on its ring can show the tide.
Every light, by name
The Markers tab lists each aid with its name, color and light pattern. Choose which print and which glow.
Your own lights
Add your home, marina or a favorite anchorage. Name it and choose its color and flash.
Good to knowDrag a light to move it. Your own lights are counted with the chart's lights.
See it come alive
Glow preview dims the chart and flashes every light with its true NOAA timing.
Good to knowThis is the best way to judge a design: it is what you will see on the wall at night.
In its frame, on your wall
Preview the chart framed and hanging on a wall.
Chat with a designer
Select Chat at the top of the map to ask a ChartGlo designer anything. Share the chart you're designing and they see it as you do.

III · Your order

From quote to your door.

Every order moves through the same 13 stages, and your order page shows which one it has reached. Four of them wait for you; the rest are ours.

Quote requested

Your design and notes reach the workshop. A designer replies on your order page.
Size confirmed
Yours to confirm
You check the frame size and the area of your chart, and confirm them.
Markers confirmed
Yours to confirm
You confirm the lights, buoys and beacons, with any lights your designer suggested.
Frame selected
Yours to confirm
You see your chart in each molding offered in your size, and choose one.
Design approved
Yours to confirm
Your designer sends a proof of the complete design. You approve it or ask for changes.
Deposit collected

You approve the price and delivery date. With the deposit, the chart moves into the workshop.
Printing
In the workshop
The chart is printed at its final size.
LED install
In the workshop
A fiber is set in its own hole for every light on the chart.
Programming
In the workshop
Each light is given its color and its real flash pattern.
Final build
In the workshop
The chart is framed and finished by hand.
Balance due

The balance is settled before the chart leaves the workshop.
Shipped

Your chart is on its way.
Delivered

Hang it, switch it on, and dim the room.

Nothing is charged until every detail has been confirmed with you. Questions along the way go to your designer from the order page, and you’re emailed whenever there’s news.

ChartGlo Connected · A second film

Setting up your frame, and making it yours.

From plugging in and joining your Wi-Fi to a chart that lights itself at sunset: the control page, tab by tab, with the chart on the wall answering every tap. More about ChartGlo Connected

IV · Questions

Ask anything.

About the chart, the lights, ordering, or living with it at home. Start typing and the answers find you.

Still wondering? Your designer replies within one business day.

Ask the workshop

V · Reading a chart

Every mark has a meaning.

A nautical chart is written in its own quiet language. Here are the symbols you’ll find on yours, and what each becomes when it’s lit.

Lighted buoy
G “5” Fl G 4s
A floating mark with a light. The buoy symbol sits on its position; the magenta flare says it carries a light. Its label gives color, number and light pattern.
Gets its own LED, flashing its real pattern.
Can buoy
G C “3”
An unlighted green buoy shaped like a can. In US waters it marks the left side of a channel when you return from sea, and carries an odd number.
Printed in place on the chart.
Nun buoy
R N “2”
An unlighted red buoy with a cone-shaped top. It marks the right side of a channel returning from sea, and carries an even number.
Printed in place on the chart.
Daybeacons
SG · TR
Signs on fixed posts. Green squares (SG) mark the left side returning from sea, red triangles (TR) the right. Some carry a light too.
Printed, or lit when NOAA lists a light on it.
Safe-water buoy
RW “A” Mo (A)
Red-and-white stripes: open water all around, often the start of a channel. Its white light spells the Morse letter A, short-long.
Its LED spells the Morse A.
Lighthouse or major light
Fl W 10s 52ft 14M
A fixed light on land or a structure: a dot with a magenta flare. The label adds its height above the water (52ft) and how far away it can be seen (14 nautical miles).
One of the brightest points on your chart.
Range lights
F R · Iso R 6s
Two lights, one behind and higher than the other. When a ship sees them stacked one above the other, it is in the center of its channel.
Both lights glow, each with its own pattern.
Sectored light
Fl WRG 4s
A light that shows a different color in different directions. White marks the safe approach; red or green warns you're straying toward danger.
Glows in one of its colors.
Soundings and contours
12 · 7 · 3
Small numbers give the depth at low tide, in feet, fathoms or meters (the title block says which). Lines join equal depths, and shallow water is tinted blue.
Rocks
✱ · ⊕
An asterisk is a rock that covers and uncovers with the tide. A cross in a dotted circle is a rock under water, dangerous to boats.
Wreck
Wk
A sunken ship. The dotted circle means it's a danger to navigation. Famous wrecks make a lovely signature light on a chart.
Can carry a signature light of your own.
Anchorage
⚓
Magenta anchors and lines mark areas set aside for boats to anchor. Magenta is used for the information a navigator must not miss.
Compass rose
Var 14°W
The outer ring of degrees points to true north, the inner ring to magnetic north. The difference, the variation, is written in the middle with the year.
Title panel
Your words
On your ChartGlo chart, the corner panel carries your title and second line, with the scale and the NOT FOR NAVIGATION notice.
Choose its corner, or hide it.
Red, right, returning
The rule behind every channel in US waters: coming in from sea, keep red marks on your right and green on your left. Numbers rise as you head in.

Symbols simplified from NOAA’s U.S. Chart No. 1, the key to every US nautical chart.

Words worth knowing

Aid to navigation: Any buoy, beacon or light placed to guide vessels. On this site: a marker.
Can and nun: Unlighted buoys. A can is green and flat-topped; a nun is red and cone-topped.
Characteristic: A light's rhythm: flashing, quick, occulting and so on. It is how sailors tell one light from another at night.
Chart scale: 1:40,000 means an inch on the chart is 40,000 inches on the water. A larger second number shows more area in less detail.
Compass rose: The circle that shows true north and, inside it, magnetic north.
Daybeacon: An unlighted sign on a fixed post: a green square or a red triangle.
Fathom: Six feet. Older charts give depths in fathoms; a chart's title block says which it uses.
Nautical mile: 1,852 meters: one minute of latitude. The M in a light's code, as in 14M.
Period: The time a light takes to run through its whole pattern once, in seconds.
Range: Two lights, one behind and above the other. Line them up and you are in the middle of the channel.
Red, right, returning: In US waters, keep red markers on your right when coming in from the sea.
Sector: The arc in which a light shows one color. White usually marks the safe approach.
Sounding: A depth, printed as a small number on the water.
Fiber: On a ChartGlo chart each light is the tip of a fine fiber set in its own hole, lit by an LED behind the print.

VI · Light codes

Read a light like a sailor.

Beside every light on a chart is a short code. Type one in, or choose an example, and watch it flash just as it does on the water, and on your chart.

Light code

Two red flashes, then one, repeating every 6 seconds

Fl: flashing
(2+1): groups of 2 then 1
R: red
6s: repeats every 6 seconds
16ft: 16 feet above the water
5M: seen 5 nautical miles away

A preferred-channel mark, where a channel divides. The top color shows the main channel.

Codes are read the way NOAA prints them beside each light. Where NOAA hasn’t recorded an exact sequence, the rhythm is built from the code, as on your chart.

The rhythms, at a glance

FixedF RA steady light that never goes out.
FlashingFl G 4sA brief flash, then a longer dark. Here, once every 4 seconds.
Long flashingLFl W 10sA flash that lasts two seconds or more.
QuickQ GAbout one flash every second, without a pause.
IsophaseIso W 6sLight and dark in equal measure.
OccultingOc W 4sMostly lit, with a brief dark: the opposite of flashing.
Group flashingFl (2) W 10sFlashes in groups. The number in brackets is how many.
Morse codeMo (A) W 8sSpells a letter in Morse. A is short, then long.
AlternatingAl WR 20sChanges color from one flash to the next.

W R G Y white, red, green, yellow4s the whole pattern repeats every 4 seconds16ft the light’s height above the water5M seen from 5 nautical miles

Your waters, illuminated

Ready when you are.

Designing is free, needs no account, and nothing is charged until every detail is confirmed with you.

Design your chart Ask the workshop