| Crafty! |
[Jul. 18th, 2008|09:49 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  accomplished | ] |
This is entirely ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) bryant's fault. Yesterday, he made a post describing a really cool idea for making durable gaming counters, an idea so nifty I had to take a stab at it myself today.
Here's what you do and how to do it. For games that use a lot of 1" based figures, get a 1" circle punch (used in scrapbooking, apparently), some decoupage medium (I bought Mod-Podge), some craft brushes, and a bunch of little 1" round wooden disks (available at Hobby Lobby for about a buck fifty per bag of twelve). Print out whatever art you wish to adorn the counters, punch said art, mount same on disks, then coat with Mod-Podge and allow to dry. The result is nifty, durable, easy-to-store customized game tokens.
(Also, the disks come in a wide range of shapes and sizes, so you could mount larger counters or square counters, or what have you.)
This morning, I went off to Michael's and Hobby Lobby to gather supplies. After I got back, I took my first crack at it, using a selection from Counter Collection 1, a PDF full of D&D counters I had handy.
The learning curve definitely shows on these. The counters were designed to print as 1" squares (possibly a touch smaller), so while they fit on the disks quite nicely, the punch tended to catch the borders a bit, and since I'd cut them out along the borders, they don't fill the disks completely.
The fellow behind the bar was my very first attempt, and I learned to be patient after mounting the printout to the disk. I tried coating it too quickly and it blurred the ink a bit. I'd hoped this close-up would show it, but my photography was even blurrier than my decoupage technique.
A shot of all the counters against a neutral backdrop shows off the shortcomings pretty clearly. Except for the blurry guy, who inexplicably isn't. Go figure. For my next batch, I decided I'd work with slightly larger images (1.25"). That way, there would be some leeway for me to center things the right way.
And so, I proceeded to Stage Two: Superheroes!
Thanks for the lovely Heromatic, I have an ample supply of cool looking superhero art in electronic format. All I had to do was crop it down to headshots, and scale it properly. The cropping was a no-brainer, and I put together a template sheet of a 1.25" grid in PageMaker to lay out the counters. I could've done it in a number of ways, but PageMaker was the quickest and surest I personally know. Then it was jut a matter of placing the art, printing, punching, and mounting.
My first batch of supers taught me some additional lessons and I was finding some other trouble areas in the process. The wooden disks are fine for gaming when finished, but kind of hard to hold and paint with a glue-like substance. At least if you're at all concerned about not getting fingerprints and dirt and smudges on the final product. Also, heavy blacks make for smudges when exposed to Mod-Podge in all but the smallest quantities. Since a lot of this art featured heavy black lines and abundant dark hair, I had to be very careful. Even then, I ended up re-doing one completely.
So, after doing an initial batch of superheroes, I made another trip to Michael's this evening to pick up a couple of additional supplies. Some Krylon clear-coat designed for preserving digital images, and a block of modeling clay, to act as a work surface. I press the disks into the clay and it holds them well enough to mount the art and do the final coating.
So, let's look at the results, bearing in mind they show the process in evolution.
First up, let's see what's happening at the corner of Clobber & Times:
At least, that's what we always called this map back in the early days. It's an overall view of all my superhero counters so far, on the best Champions map ever made.
Here, we see Troubadour giving fits to a couple of Silver-Age looking VIPER agents. These counters were from late in the process. Troubadour benefited from the clear-coat prior to final coating, and a couple of the agents (one in particular) suffered from a serious overdose in the coating department. Also, the agents are breaking the facing rules, which shows how long it's been since I've played Champions.
Next up, we see Dr Destroyer taking on a host of heroes.
[Clockwise from Top: Firebrand (DC Comics), Dr. Destroyer (Champions), Daedelus (Mutants & Masterminds), Oracle (one of Jane's Champions characters), and Spectrum (my first ever Champions character).]
This picture shows off the thickness of the wooden disks rather nicely and the substantial nature of the finished product. Oracle also shows a bit of gray smudging above the top of her hair. My first try at Spectrum left a huge gray smear off his face, which led me to re-do him completely. And Dr. D looks rather keen, IMO.
Next up, a somewhat blurry (or bleary) White Queen exits Rosie's Bar and Grill
The White Queen artwork had a gray background, mainly to contrast with the rest of her costume. This one also got clear-coated before finishing. The clear-coat was a bit excessive and soaked the paper to the point that it became a little transparent. I have to work on that.
On a distant rooftop, Gargoyle lurks.
It's hard to tell, but this was probably the best of the first batch of supers I turned out. Also, nothing says really old-school Champions like the Gargoyle being on this map.
Finally a blurrier than I'd like shot of all of my supers counters so far on a neutral background:
Viper Agent #4 shows what happens when you overdo the clear-coat. It looks just as bad up close. I think for my next attempt, I'll try printing them out on cardstock to see if it handles the clear-coating better. Also, I'll do the spraying prior to punching and mounting.
And that's how I spent my day. Fun times.
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