HOW TO MAKE A PINBALL MACHINE: Artwork Tips
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 15 ก.ค. 2024
- HOW TO MAKE A PINBALL MACHINE: Tips for making your artwork
In this video I share some of the things I found important while working on creating the artwork for the cabinet, backbox, and playfield.
Table of Contents:
0:00 Intro
1:48 Patreon shout-outs!
3:00 Backbox Translite info
4:00 link to BOM
10:48 Cabinet and Coin door tips
12:16 link to HSII vid
13:16 Playfield Art Issue
15:44 The RIGHT way to export a DXF from F360
21:23 Make test prints!
24:43 humbled.png
25:15 Insert border strokes
28:51 Applying the cabinet decals
33:21 Final look!
39:18 Max Moon - upcoming pinball designer
Would you like to support me and my channel? Here's how: / thepinballroom
Links to Resources mentioned in the video:
* Led Zeppelin Pinball Project BoM (Bill of Materials): docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...
* Public Files on my Google Drive:
drive.google.com/drive/folder...
* Pinball Cabinet Fusion 360 file created by and shared with permission by John Marsh
-- Spike 2 Pinball Cabinet: a360.co/2RatbVw
Thanks for watching!!! I hope you found this helpful or interesting - if you did, please like and subscribe and even share this so other pinheads can find this series of videos.
As always, give me some feedback on what you liked and didn't like about this video - if there's anything you'd like me to cover in more detail, lmk!!!
If you haven't already, I challenge you to start building your own pinball machine, cuz why not!?! - แนวปฏิบัติและการใช้ชีวิต
Im a life long Zeppelin Freak and I love your playfield art. It can be hard to design around all the objects, at least for me. Everything I think will work gets covered up by a ramp or bumpers. Yours has a nice upward flow and I cant wait to see it finished
That really means a lot, thank you!!
WOW. I love it. First of two, I have also understood that an ink, oil, polymer can bleed onto another material.(What Paul said), This plays to your science research. I know you will win. Second, Foregive me, I missed the part where the over lay gets the holes cut. Would you mention it the next video. Thank You from Bill.
It's look like pro.
For me too it did me a lot of good to finaly apply vinhyl.It’s also the moment when friends take us less for a fool and when they finally realize the work accomplished.
Bring it to TPF! The art is the intimidation part for me. Your tips are helpful.
Yes I'm planning on bringing it to TPF and expo next year
Awesome, I know what I will do next 40 minutes. 🎉
Art looks fantastic! Sad that we won't be seeing the game at expo but I totally understand! No rushing! You need to be happy with it before you let people flip it!
Wow it looks good at the end.
So glad to see another video from you my friend. Glad your recovery is going well, and happy to see you back at it. That art is so satisfying once it's on the cabinet, definitely a source of motivation! Keep up the great work!
Nice work, Steve and congratulations! *uuuhhhh* :)
Max sounds awesome! I started my retheme similarly in 8th grade. It would be sweet if you showed some of the updates as he builds his game.
Thank you so much for this series! it means a lot to have a step by step guid to build my pinball machine!
The cabinet with the artwork on it looks amazing!
...or you could have printed the playfield print without the inserts, cut it to fit the edge of the playfield, and then had the cnc machine cut it again...
But that cabinet art sure pops. Can't wait to see the translight!
The artwork really pops, Steve. Looking like a pro machine, now!
Looking great! Thnx again for a awesome video!
Just FYI the software isn’t visible from min 17-18 not sure if you noticed.
Yeah not sure what happened, sorry!
what i am doing is going to my local car detailer and having them apply vinyl to the board
Love seeing the artwork installed! Backbox is my fav. I know I'm asking for a lot, but I think it would be amazing if you could do a behind the scenes at the printer when they jet the artwork on your playfield. It'd be really cool to know more about the pre-print playfield prep, and of course what steps you take to finish the playfield after printing. Of course you already know that's all something I super interested in, but I bet I'm not the only one. I know UV inkjet is the tech used by the big guys these days, and I've seen video of that tech for other applications, but I've never seen it actually being used for playfields. Your steps are slightly different than what I've researched - I think you've already top-coated your playfield before artwork, and I think it is more common to print artwork on bare wood. I wonder if adhesion will be ok.
Your idea to do cheaper printshop test prints is super smart and helpful, I'll be sure to do the same. I would also recommend you take some smaller sample boards to the UV inkjet printer so you have some to play with - i.e. check if your topcoat cause the ink to bleed on a small sample before you commit.
So sorry your public unveiling plans fell through, I know your pain all too well. I think your decision is the right one, let the stress go and enjoy the build.
By the way, you've got a couple bad spots in the video, starting around the 17:10 mark and again at 19:42, where you have a black screen instead of your PC's screen.
I think stern do clear then print, not direct to wood. I am yet to test it personally though but have options to do this on big flat bed printer.
@@chinering23 Perhaps. I don't have any insight on Stern's process. In conversations with CPR's custom art department, they mentioned doing two white base coats with the UV inkjet, and that the first coat acted as a sealer and smoothed the surface, filling in the wood grain, for all subsequent colors. If they only did one coat, it didn't look good.
Back in the day they used to silkscreen over bare wood, and it seems like they are essentially replicating that process, substituting UV ink for silkscreen paint. They even apply the colors one-by-one, layering them up just like the silkscreen process, light to dark. I think they also do playfields for other pin companies, JJP maybe?
Anyway, if it works on bare wood, I can't fathom any reason to make the process unnecessarily more complex and expensive.
I also know CPR worked with their printer manufacturer to determine a chemically compatible topcoat. Trade secret of course, I have no idea what they use. Inks also probably vary company to company, so Steve needs to work with his chosen printer company to get this guidance.
And since Steve is gonna need to topcoat the artwork, I think that means the current topcoat needs to be sanded to permit adhesion, otherwise it will peel. That glassy surface is no bueno.
@@PaulStevensonPinball They did a factory tour video. It wasn't that long ago, but it was cleared with inserts, then printed, then cleared again.
Yea, used to do silk screen but after seeing the stern one, on another video Gary says "It's much cheaper easier and looks just as good if not better".
I think something like stern CSI with their photoshops would print much better. Surely that game was still screen printed?
@@chinering23 Sure enough, you're absolutely right. I just checked out Jack Danger's 2020 Stern Factory Tour video, new to me, and it has some real nice reveals. I really liked that drill jig, but at the same time I wonder why they don't do that step on the CNC. While they glossed over applying the playfield artwork (ba-dum-dum), they definitely showed a glossed playfield pre-artwork. Since the video is from 2020, I would assume that Stern had already transitioned to UV inkjet printing, but I can't seem to find any info. Perhaps CPR is accomplishing the same result with the extra white base layer. One thing I can safely assume is that Stern used a different gloss coat than what Steve rattle-canned.
Steve, if I were you, I would make a couple sample boards, say 1' x 2', with one top coated and one bare wood, both with a few inserts. Have the same artwork printed on both. For the bare wood print, have them lay down an extra white background layer before printing the rest of the artwork - you'll have to separate your color layers in Illustrator or whatever art package you're using, and the initial base white layer should be behind all artwork, but not over your cutouts. Then slice up the boards into smaller 8" wide strips, and use them to test different finishes. That way, you'll have 6 test boards, and you can evaluate 3 different top coats for each. I know this sounds like a lot of extra work and expense, but it's far less work and expense than remaking an entire playfield.
For your test artwork, you might just want to do a color chart test pattern. Perhaps only 1 color runs due a different formulation. Having nice straight squares of color would make it very easy to see runs even if they only affect a single color. This color chart would serve double-duty, giving you a chance to evaluate color saturation vs. what you see on-screen. You might find you need to boost your reds or blues or something, especially if your monitor isn't color calibrated to their printing process.
@@PaulStevensonPinball Yes it's a shame I can't find the other video where it comes from Garys mouth about digital.
It was Jack and Gary playing Avengers with masks on.
He mentions it there on how good it looks and how much cheaper / easier it is to do.
In your first post it's good advice to the small tests and that's what I will be doing, is printing some small test pieces but I know how well these printers work when doing glass and they should be spot on.
The glass we do have holes and sockets for kitchens and that prints a white backing first before doing the art.
Awesome work steve. Hope you're recovering well.
I have a question for you im working on a project unrelated to pinball that involves having peices of wood and acrylic being CNCed by an online service,I have never done this before so how does a DXF file work ?
Do the dimensions need to be displayed on the drawing for every part ? how accurate can CNCs cut i have parts that measure point digits of a mm ?
How accurate the machine cuts depends on the machine, if it's an online service they should be able to tell how accurate they guarantee etc, but I wouldn't count anything more than a half millimeter,.25 mm of they're super high quality, also will depend a bit on the material. Thin acrylic can be tricky to cut in my experience.
As for the DXF file, again talk with the service you're using to see what they expect to get in your file, but I think the most important part is just having it exported at the 1:1 scale, you can't in notation of key dimensions in fusion as part of the drawing it makes, so if you're using fusion you might want to include some of those too as part of the DXF file
@@thepinballroom Thanks for replying. Yes I'm using an online service, they stated they need the drawing labeled with dimensions but since I've never done this before it was my understanding that the dimensions are built into the files so I was confused as to why they were asking for annotated dimensions. Is it for machine calibration reasons ?
I'm actually using Inkscape to make my drawing,based on what you said about the accuracy it looks like I might be spending another 2 or 3 hours to adjust everything which is not ideal. I should have done more research before hand. Oh well.
It's a tricky thing this computer drawing, I'm not an expert like you ha ha
Didn't get to see half of the editing of the play area because it was just a black screen.
I'm very sorry for this!! I'll be uploading another short videos that covers that part of the video better, watch for that tomorrow!