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Printing cabinet decals

Snux

Snux

Site Supporter
Joined
Nov 10, 2011
Messages
349
Location
Maidstone
Alias
Mark Sunnucks
Has anyone had a set of cabinet decals printed themselves by a print shop rather than buying ready-made ones? If so, what do you ask the print shop for in terms of finish etc?

I swore I'd never pimp a machine, but with the new F14 playfields finally coming next year and me hopefully finding time to continue with the P-ROC DMD project in my machine, I'm looking at gettings side rails, lockdown etc powder coated, and the guy that did the PPS artwork for the F14 cabinet decals has offered to do me a custom version. Nothing very different, maybe changing the red (or the yellow) in the decals to match the blue on the playfield plastics (same colour as I'm thinking for the powdercoat) and perhaps adding a "2.0" to the logo.

But anyways, he'll do me the artwork but I'll need to get it printed, so I need to know the right thing to ask for.

cheers
Mark

PS If you've got any suggestions for subtle changes to the cabinet artwork and/or powdercoat colours please chime in. I'm looking to make the machine a one-off, but I don't want it to be too over the top...
 
Be interested in hearing how you get on with this Mark.

I'm debating scanning and touching up the artwork for my R&B in Photoshop and then getting them printed onto Vinyl. Not got as far as finding out about the printing side yet but when I do there are a couple of signage and promotional item stores in town that can probably help me out. It's gonna be pricey (i'd estimate heading up towards £200) to get them done but it's the only way i'm going to get the artwork back to pristine.
 
Id be very surprised if it was anything like £200, especially if you are supplying the artwork.....
 
HI Guys,


We are a Signs & Graphics shop, i can assure you if it is lets say sides of the cab and backbox should be no more than £100 that would be laminated with a uv scratch resistant coating, you can even go for different clear coats with different properties, as its all flat and not going round curves etc, you can apply a hard polyester to really protect it. Just make sure all you cab paint is mint and is spotless or you will get lift and delamination if not careful.

jim

( not a plug for our company ) lol
 
Oh yes - i did look at your site yesterday Jim.... VERY impressive :) I know where i'll be coming for printing stuff (as long as you guys are happy to deal with one offs etc)
 
ABSOLUTE CONTROL said:
( not a plug for our company ) lol
Click to expand...

why on earth not? dude, when a pinhead comes along who owns a print shop, everyone can benefit. just don't upset anyone by publicly advertising anything that may affect copyrights etc..... i'm sure loads of people on here would be interested in what you could do for us with decals, with plastics, with posters, with backglasses and translites .....
 
Woo hoo for Jim's printshop!! This could be the start of something beautiful.

Going back to your initial post Mark, regarding custom art for you F14. I'm interested in seeing how that pans out. If I end up keeping my BoP, I'd like to custom the artwork. I actually like the artwork, just not the colour. I've seen custom artwork on pinside with the background purple changed to black which looks cool. I also like the Dutch pinball artwork.
 
ABSOLUTE CONTROL said:
HI Guys,


We are a Signs & Graphics shop, i can assure you if it is lets say sides of the cab and backbox should be no more than £100 that would be laminated with a uv scratch resistant coating, you can even go for different clear coats with different properties, as its all flat and not going round curves etc, you can apply a hard polyester to really protect it. Just make sure all you cab paint is mint and is spotless or you will get lift and delamination if not careful.

jim

( not a plug for our company ) lol
Click to expand...


It looks like this is yours
http://absolutebrands.co.uk/wp/

I felt the need to put it there as if you are saying eg £125 for decal sets delivered,that is a perfectly fine thing to plug on here,as pinheads would be very interested in it.
When I did my Ramones retheme,my cabinet decals were exactly like you said with laminated uv scratch resistant quoting.
They were done for me by a mates mate who owned a print company.

I also got my translite done there Jim.
I think if you can knock off translites for a decent price(copyrights aside)for 50 or 60 quid delivered,I would be interested in an alternate one for some of my Gottliebs.

cheers
 
TYHO said:
It looks like this is yours
http://absolutebrands.co.uk/wp/

I felt the need to put it there as if you are saying eg £125 for decal sets delivered,that is a perfectly fine thing to plug on here,as pinheads would be very interested in it.
When I did my Ramones retheme,my cabinet decals were exactly like you said with laminated uv scratch resistant quoting.
They were done for me by a mates mate who owned a print company.

I also got my translite done there Jim.
I think if you can knock off translites for a decent price(copyrights aside)for 50 or 60 quid delivered,I would be interested in an alternate one for some of my Gottliebs.

cheers
Click to expand...

TYHO

Thanks for that, website direct url is www.absolutecontrol.co.uk the http://absolutebrands.co.uk/wp/ is a redirect (lol )

Can you explain the translites a bit more ? for the back glass ? or on the playfield plastics ?

jim
 
Cool Thanks Moon.


choice of 2 options, reverse printed or normal face mounted, either way im willing to give it a go as never done a pin before but have done many graphics on glass and used to paint rc cars for a living so know the backwards way well...


and also you can use polycarb instead of glass if you absolutely have too, safer for removing and not so fragile lol
 
ABSOLUTE CONTROL said:
TYHO

Thanks for that, website direct url is www.absolutecontrol.co.uk the http://absolutebrands.co.uk/wp/ is a redirect (lol )

Can you explain the translites a bit more ? for the back glass ? or on the playfield plastics ?

jim
Click to expand...




Printer said

"We printed it onto a 125mic opaljet vinyl than we put a 80mic gloss laminate over the printed face"
sure that makes sense to you as a printer:)

It was a plastic translite.Also done a translite for my knackered HH backglass

email me poibug@btinternet dot com if I can help more
 
Haha, bonus. So my £200 price was over-inflated and now I learn it would actually be much less.

Maybe I should get my behind moving and actually get the scanner so I can start getting the artwork together.
 
Complete newb question here but how are you going to scan the original cabinet side artwork? what type of scanner would you use for that?
 
Yup, i'm going to have scan the entire thing. It's going to be quite the challenge. But i'm a bit of a masochist so i'll most likely enjoy it.

Easy route would be to scan it using a large format scanner like the Cruse. But there aren't many of those in the UK and certainly none local to me. I have a feeling the costs would be too high.

The route i'll most likely go is to use a 'Magic Wand' scanner.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Black-Magic...-2-fkmr0&keywords=magic+wand+scanner+logitech

At least these ensure you have a constant illumination source so the image is consistent. You can actually do the artwork using a normal digital camera but the issue then is that you have to ensure it's always oriented correctly and that lighting is good and consistent across all shots prior to stitching them together. Magic wand scanner seems to be the way to go.
 
TYHO said:
Printer said

"We printed it onto a 125mic opaljet vinyl than we put a 80mic gloss laminate over the printed face"
sure that makes sense to you as a printer:)

It was a plastic translite.Also done a translite for my knackered HH backglass

email me poibug@btinternet dot com if I can help more
Click to expand...


Just to make sure i'm on the right track..... are we talking about the inlay not direct to the glass ?
 
Jim - You're only down the road from me.... (I'm in Birmingham).... I can feel a coffee coming on.... ;)

One thing I feel i need to mention on here is that, and I'm sure that Jim would agree, is that no copyrights should be breached... We don't want this place or Jim's to get into trouble with Planetary Pinball and the associated Rights holders.
 
Paul said:
Jim - You're only down the road from me.... (I'm in Birmingham).... I can feel a coffee coming on.... ;)

One thing I feel i need to mention on here is that, and I'm sure that Jim would agree, is that no copyrights should be breached... We don't want this place or Jim's to get into trouble...
Click to expand...


Hi Paul

Coffee is always on !!!!

And a big YES on the whole copyright. Only if gone down the right routes and you have permission etc which can be possible I won't do do it and I don't mean a verbal I'm allowed lol I need it in writing and I will also contact the copyright holder

Jim


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Does copyright still apply if you're encompassing the original artwork in a custom design? I assume it does. And if planetary pinball own the rights to the artwork to Bally Williams, I can't see permission being easy. Not without a hefty chunk of the profits. Which would then defy the object of keeping cost down in the first place. We all know how they reacted when Dreads released his TZ side decals.
 
Gaz Shiells said:
Does copyright still apply if you're encompassing the original artwork in a custom design? I assume it does. And if planetary pinball own the rights to the artwork to Bally Williams, I can't see permission being easy. Not without a hefty chunk of the profits. Which would then defy the object of keeping cost down in the first place. We all know how they reacted when Dreads released his TZ side decals.
Click to expand...

dreads stuff is ace, i love it as they are add ons not original copies he is safe i guess.
 
Have a look on pinside there's a thread that pp has commented in regarding copywrites. No idea what thread but I read it last week. They said something along the lines aslong as it's coppied for personal use and not made and sold to the masses they have no issue. It was something to do with someone wanting to copy a plastic set that isn't available
 
Possibly this discussion? http://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/copyright-question Granted this one is from a year ago.

I have my own opinion on the subject but it's just that - an opinion. It has no basis in law and I don't know from a legal standpoint where you would stand, nor what the views of the current license holders would be.

My gut feeling is that making a reproduction decal for a table you own in order to make it nicer is less likely to get you in trouble. What they don't want is people scanning the artwork, tarting it up and then trying to turn out thousands of copies in order to make a profit.
 
Makes sense to me mate. It's the good old saying. "Don't kick the ****ing **** out of it!!" As long as absolute control don't scan every cab going and plaster it for sale on their website and and eBay etc.. In a massed produced manner, the average hobbiest wanting 1 set for a cab restore shouldn't ring alarm bells anywhere. We just need to keep it low key and don't start advertising the services all over the internet.
"Play it cool Trig. Play it cool"

image.jpg
 
Problem with laminated cab art is around the legs, the mylar coating moves leaving a ripple effect when you clamp the legs on, un-coated they are prone to easy wear so Ideally you need these laser printing (if that is possible?) or screen printed, I would not recommend inkjet coated with a plastic coating on any surface that is going to be exposed to pressure, it may be OK if you use felt protectors instead of plastic and maybe it was just bad luck with this custom decal set, maybe suck it and see.

$_12.jpg
 
Last edited:
Wiredworm said:
Possibly this discussion? http://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/copyright-question Granted this one is from a year ago.

I have my own opinion on the subject but it's just that - an opinion. It has no basis in law and I don't know from a legal standpoint where you would stand, nor what the views of the current license holders would be.

My gut feeling is that making a reproduction decal for a table you own in order to make it nicer is less likely to get you in trouble. What they don't want is people scanning the artwork, tarting it up and then trying to turn out thousands of copies in order to make a profit.
Click to expand...

It's not that one planetary actually commented on it stating what I said. I'll see if I can find it I only came across it by chance
 
Problem with laminated cab art is around the legs
Click to expand...

Don't the new metal Stern leg protectors like you get on AC/DC solve this? Sure I'd seen a post somewhere showing that you cut round the edge of them after fitting and it stops the dreaded wrinkling :)
 
Like Chris has said, the best cure for this is the Stern metal leg stand off's.
These are now a given with every pinbll machine Stern sell, they let the leg stand off the artwork thus no wrinkle.
 
Looks like we're good to go. I got my custom artwork (see below for lo-res pics of current and new) and Jim is going to print it for me. The new artwork is only a fairly subtle change which is what I wanted - replaced the yellow with the blue colour from the playfield plastics (and some of the orange on the backbox), and I'm planning on powder coating the side rails etc the same blue.

You can also see on the cab front the name of the new game "F14 TOMCAT - SECOND SORTIE" because when I get time to get back to the development this will be running a DMD with new software (via P-ROC).

I'll post some more pictures of the decals when they arrive and some more when they're on the machine...

F14 cab.jpg

f14 door.jpg
 
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