Designing and making your own custom poker chips
Background
With the recent popularization of poker, many people today are getting their own set of poker chips. While many are content with cheap plastic chips (like those you'd get at the mega-pharmacy in the "games, candy, and zippo-flint" aisle), many people are opting to invest in a more substantial set of chips. One of the most popular styles is the "clay-composie" chip, which isn't made of clay, but has a metal disc in the center that adds weight, and "casino-like" feel to your home game. While many people will debate the true "casino-like"-ness of these chips, the truth is that most people aren't really trying to run a casino - they're simply trying to have occasional poker games with their friends, and they want a heavy chip that looks, sounds, and feels better than the el-cheapo's, and they're willing to spend $50 to $100 for a set large enough to accomodate the number of people attending their occasional games. This guide is for them. There are certainly many sites on the Internet, and maybe even kiosks at your local mall that will offer more professional customization services, and if you want to spend the money, these services offer you another (pricier) option. I'm offering you a cheap option. Take your pick.
Why would you want customized poker chips?
What do I need to get started?
The only thing that you might not be able to make without help from a handy friend is a jig used for the purpose of lining up the stamp with the center of the chip. You don't technically need this, but it sure beats lining everything up by hand, for all 500 chips (times 2 sides.) I spent about 15 minutes making mine, and I did it with minimal tools. Semi-coherent instructions for this are given later in this guide.
Preparing your picture for the stamp
If you're carving your own stamp, the first thing you'll need to do is find a picture, logo, or other design to use (maybe your initials?) The more details that this picture has, the more difficult it will be. Also choose something that will look good in one color. Now scan this into your computer (or use something that's already on your computer.) Using your favorite photo-editing software, create a mirror image of your picture. Assuming your favorite image editing software is Microsoft Paint, you can do this by hitting Control-R, and choosing "flip horizontal". Now switch your picture to 2 colors - black and white. With MS Paint, do this by choosing "file - save as - and choose "Monochrome Bitmap" on the save-as type field.
Resizing your picture
If you're using Windows XP, this is surprisingly easy! Find your picture wherever you saved it, right-click on it, choose print, and the "Photo Printing Wizard" will appear. Click Next, ensure your picture is selected, click next again, and then choose your printer and click Next again. Windows will give you the option of printing a "contact sheet". Cooincidentally, the size of the picture, when printed on the contact sheet, happens to fit perfectly in the center of the standard "clay-composite" poker chip. Handy stuff! However, if your picture is overly square or you want to adjust the exact dimensions of the final stamp, you may have to experiement with re-sizing your picture to fit exactly. Print out your test pages at work - it's cheaper for you!
Transferring your (reversed) printout to the stamp
You can use carbon paper to trace your printout onto the surface of the eraser, or, like me, trace the ink side of the printout with a really wet pen, flip it over onto the eraser, and then trace through the paper, transferring the wet ink onto the eraser. Your choice. Carbon paper might be easier, but I didn't have any and didn't want to buy any.
Carving the stamp
Take your time. Cut off little bits and pieces at a time. Obviously, carve away the pink parts, and leave the inked parts as the stamp surface. I can't offer any real tricks here - but if you have difficulty, there are undoubtedly several "how to carve stamps" sites on the Internet that you can search for.
Creating a jig for stamp allignment
This might be the hardest part of the project. Again, this isn't 100% necessary, but I spent about 15 minutes making one out of scrap wood, and it made the process of lining up the stamp to the center of the poker chip an estimated 46 billion times easier. In my case, I took a scrap block of wood, routed out a channel that the same width and a little deeper than the poker chip. This created the "base" that the poker chip sits in. Another option would be to drill a hole into (but not through) a block of wood that was the same diameter as your poker chip. I didn't have a drill bit this size, and didn't feel like running to Home Depot. Depending on your approach to creating the "poker chip holder" part, your method of creating the "stamp holder" part may vary. If you simply drilled a recess for the chip to sit in, you'd need to ensure that your stamper block fit snugly into the circular recess. This doesn't mean that your stamper block must be round - it could be square, assuming that the diagonal of the square was the same length as the diameter of the circle. Meaning, of course, that the side of your square would be sqrt((d^2)/2), where "d" is the diameter of your poker chip. If using "d" for the diameter confuses you , you're in luck, because "d" is also the diagonal of your square! I just love math! Anyhow... My method was to route out channels on another scrap block, so that it would line up when pressed into the "base" block. The pictures might make more sense here...
I realize these pictures aren't much better at describing the jig than my words were. Alas, I am neither a professional photographer nor a competent writer. Too bad for you! Ha ha ha.
Seriously, though, too bad for you.
Regarding the stamping block (shown earlier): The stamp, in my case, is held in using pressure from the strips of wood along side it. I cut the channel a little on the small side, and then carved pieces of eraser out to that it would fit nice and snug. In my opinion, this was better than using superglue to mount it, since I could make small adjustments to get the stamp so that it would hit dead-center on the pokerchip. Double-sided tape would offer the same adjustability, but once again, I didn't have any, and didn't want to go buy any.
Time for Stamping!
As stated earlier, the brand of stamp pad I used was "Brilliance". I had pretty decent luck with this, though the dry time on the plastic chips was well over 4 hours. I had to leave them overnight to get a satisfactory result. Even after 4 hours, you could rub the ink off with moderate pressure. As stated before, you might be able to get assistance on this from your local craft store employee, or a stamp enthusiest you may already know. If all else fails, however, use the same type of ink as I did, which, I should point out, was about $7 per pad. I did consider using some "blow drier" tricks or similar to get the ink to set faster, but I had enough time on my hands where I could stamp out a hundred or so, let them dry over night, and then do the reverse sides. Fast enough for me. Assuming you create some sort of jig to line everything up, you can knock out a chip every few seconds, while watching TV (I recommend any of the "Law and Order" series.) If you don't/can't create a jig to help align everything... you'll have to do this manually. Sorry. Use moderate pressure with the stamp (you'll get the hang of it after a few dozen attempts) and stamp away! That's really all there is to it at this point.
I used a platinum ink for the colored chips, and "graphite black" to stamp the white chips with.
The before and after
Before - a nice, but boring, set of poker chips
(oops - i forgot to take pictures beforehand... Basically, they looked like the 'after' chips, but without the design. Use your imagination.)
After - a nice, but not boring, set of
poker chips.
FAQ
How durable is the final product?
Pretty durable. If you really try hard, you can rub it off. However, sliding across poker table felt, and other general use, does not seem to affect the stamp. Over time, it might. Hard to say. And this is, of course, using the specific ink I used. Maybe if you gun it with the blow-drier it'll set faster and more permanently. Who knows.
How long does it take?
Once I got going, I could knock out a chip every 5-10 seconds, depending on how distracted I was at the time. Figure on the slow-side of 6-7 per minute. Therefore, a stack of 500 would take about an hour and a half to do one side. Then wait a day, and do the other side. If your wife won't let you cover the dinner table with poker chips, and leave it until the next night, you'll have to work in small batches, like 100 at a time.
How many chips did you get out of one stamp pad?
I finished all of my colored chips, front and back, with just the one platinum stamp pad. I don't especially feel like counting, but that should be approximately 450 chips. Your mileage may vary.
How is the quality?
It's decent. Would it fool someone into thinking you paid thousands of dollars to get your chips customized? Only if they're an idiot (at which point, start shuffling!) It's not even what I would consider "great" quality. It's good. Decent. Possibly more than you'd expect for $15. In short, if you're serious about quality, and you're using poker chips as some sort of promotional tool or something, you should probably pay someone to do a more professional job. If, on the other hand, you're just looking to dress things up a bit, the quality is certainly good enough. Consistant pressure when stamping and clearly defined edges on the stamp will increase the quality. Poorly carved stamps dipped in ceiling paint will produce less than stellar results.
With the recent popularization of poker, many people today are getting their own set of poker chips. While many are content with cheap plastic chips (like those you'd get at the mega-pharmacy in the "games, candy, and zippo-flint" aisle), many people are opting to invest in a more substantial set of chips. One of the most popular styles is the "clay-composie" chip, which isn't made of clay, but has a metal disc in the center that adds weight, and "casino-like" feel to your home game. While many people will debate the true "casino-like"-ness of these chips, the truth is that most people aren't really trying to run a casino - they're simply trying to have occasional poker games with their friends, and they want a heavy chip that looks, sounds, and feels better than the el-cheapo's, and they're willing to spend $50 to $100 for a set large enough to accomodate the number of people attending their occasional games. This guide is for them. There are certainly many sites on the Internet, and maybe even kiosks at your local mall that will offer more professional customization services, and if you want to spend the money, these services offer you another (pricier) option. I'm offering you a cheap option. Take your pick.
Why would you want customized poker chips?
- As stated above, many people are buying the same "pretty nice, but inexpensive" set of chips that you are. If you're the type of person who puts giant spoilers on your Ford Focus, this is all the reason you'll need.
- Believe it or not, some people cheat when playing cards for money. One way to cheat is to bring your own chips. It would be easy to conceil one high-value chip in your pocket, with the intent of adding it to your stack after you've "bought-in" and received your official chips. This is, obviously, why casinos don't buy their chips on eBay.
- Maybe your buddy has the same set of chips, and you want to have a "big" tournament or something, and you'll need to combine your chips so everybody can have a nice amount. Customizing your chips will help you get yours back at the end of the night. This is especially useful if one of you has a different weight of chips than the other, and they have the same design. If they're exactly the same chip sets, you can pretty much just count out the correct number at the end of the night and be done with it, even without customization.
- Because you want to add cash amounts to the chips. Maybe your dumb-ass friends can never remember that white is 1, red is 5, blue is 10, green is 25, and black is 100. Maybe they can, but you can't. In this case, personally, I'd recommend just making a few signs and hanging them up during poker-night, as the advantage of being able to set the values to whatever amounts suit the particular game are nice, when the chips don't have a declared value on them. Plus, you can pretend that whites are 1 million dollars, blues are 10 million, etc, if you want to be stupid.
- You haven't updated anything on your website in several months, and need a good topic to write about, and want to write a walk-through. I realize this is a very specific circumstance that won't apply to most people, but I thought it seemed relevant.
What do I need to get started?
- 1 set of poker chips with a plain center
- 1 Pink Pearl eraser.
- 1 Exacto knife (or a knockoff brand.)
- 1 or more ink pads. I had decent luck with the first one I tried, which was "Brilliance" brand ink. If you're willing to talk to the people at the craft store (I wasn't), you may inquire about a better ink to use for your project.
The only thing that you might not be able to make without help from a handy friend is a jig used for the purpose of lining up the stamp with the center of the chip. You don't technically need this, but it sure beats lining everything up by hand, for all 500 chips (times 2 sides.) I spent about 15 minutes making mine, and I did it with minimal tools. Semi-coherent instructions for this are given later in this guide.
Preparing your picture for the stamp
If you're carving your own stamp, the first thing you'll need to do is find a picture, logo, or other design to use (maybe your initials?) The more details that this picture has, the more difficult it will be. Also choose something that will look good in one color. Now scan this into your computer (or use something that's already on your computer.) Using your favorite photo-editing software, create a mirror image of your picture. Assuming your favorite image editing software is Microsoft Paint, you can do this by hitting Control-R, and choosing "flip horizontal". Now switch your picture to 2 colors - black and white. With MS Paint, do this by choosing "file - save as - and choose "Monochrome Bitmap" on the save-as type field.
Resizing your picture
If you're using Windows XP, this is surprisingly easy! Find your picture wherever you saved it, right-click on it, choose print, and the "Photo Printing Wizard" will appear. Click Next, ensure your picture is selected, click next again, and then choose your printer and click Next again. Windows will give you the option of printing a "contact sheet". Cooincidentally, the size of the picture, when printed on the contact sheet, happens to fit perfectly in the center of the standard "clay-composite" poker chip. Handy stuff! However, if your picture is overly square or you want to adjust the exact dimensions of the final stamp, you may have to experiement with re-sizing your picture to fit exactly. Print out your test pages at work - it's cheaper for you!
Transferring your (reversed) printout to the stamp
You can use carbon paper to trace your printout onto the surface of the eraser, or, like me, trace the ink side of the printout with a really wet pen, flip it over onto the eraser, and then trace through the paper, transferring the wet ink onto the eraser. Your choice. Carbon paper might be easier, but I didn't have any and didn't want to buy any.
Carving the stamp
Take your time. Cut off little bits and pieces at a time. Obviously, carve away the pink parts, and leave the inked parts as the stamp surface. I can't offer any real tricks here - but if you have difficulty, there are undoubtedly several "how to carve stamps" sites on the Internet that you can search for.Creating a jig for stamp allignment
This might be the hardest part of the project. Again, this isn't 100% necessary, but I spent about 15 minutes making one out of scrap wood, and it made the process of lining up the stamp to the center of the poker chip an estimated 46 billion times easier. In my case, I took a scrap block of wood, routed out a channel that the same width and a little deeper than the poker chip. This created the "base" that the poker chip sits in. Another option would be to drill a hole into (but not through) a block of wood that was the same diameter as your poker chip. I didn't have a drill bit this size, and didn't feel like running to Home Depot. Depending on your approach to creating the "poker chip holder" part, your method of creating the "stamp holder" part may vary. If you simply drilled a recess for the chip to sit in, you'd need to ensure that your stamper block fit snugly into the circular recess. This doesn't mean that your stamper block must be round - it could be square, assuming that the diagonal of the square was the same length as the diameter of the circle. Meaning, of course, that the side of your square would be sqrt((d^2)/2), where "d" is the diameter of your poker chip. If using "d" for the diameter confuses you , you're in luck, because "d" is also the diagonal of your square! I just love math! Anyhow... My method was to route out channels on another scrap block, so that it would line up when pressed into the "base" block. The pictures might make more sense here...
I realize these pictures aren't much better at describing the jig than my words were. Alas, I am neither a professional photographer nor a competent writer. Too bad for you! Ha ha ha.Seriously, though, too bad for you.
Regarding the stamping block (shown earlier): The stamp, in my case, is held in using pressure from the strips of wood along side it. I cut the channel a little on the small side, and then carved pieces of eraser out to that it would fit nice and snug. In my opinion, this was better than using superglue to mount it, since I could make small adjustments to get the stamp so that it would hit dead-center on the pokerchip. Double-sided tape would offer the same adjustability, but once again, I didn't have any, and didn't want to go buy any.
Time for Stamping!
As stated earlier, the brand of stamp pad I used was "Brilliance". I had pretty decent luck with this, though the dry time on the plastic chips was well over 4 hours. I had to leave them overnight to get a satisfactory result. Even after 4 hours, you could rub the ink off with moderate pressure. As stated before, you might be able to get assistance on this from your local craft store employee, or a stamp enthusiest you may already know. If all else fails, however, use the same type of ink as I did, which, I should point out, was about $7 per pad. I did consider using some "blow drier" tricks or similar to get the ink to set faster, but I had enough time on my hands where I could stamp out a hundred or so, let them dry over night, and then do the reverse sides. Fast enough for me. Assuming you create some sort of jig to line everything up, you can knock out a chip every few seconds, while watching TV (I recommend any of the "Law and Order" series.) If you don't/can't create a jig to help align everything... you'll have to do this manually. Sorry. Use moderate pressure with the stamp (you'll get the hang of it after a few dozen attempts) and stamp away! That's really all there is to it at this point.I used a platinum ink for the colored chips, and "graphite black" to stamp the white chips with.
The before and after
Before - a nice, but boring, set of poker chips
(oops - i forgot to take pictures beforehand... Basically, they looked like the 'after' chips, but without the design. Use your imagination.)
After - a nice, but not boring, set of
poker chips.
FAQ
How durable is the final product?
Pretty durable. If you really try hard, you can rub it off. However, sliding across poker table felt, and other general use, does not seem to affect the stamp. Over time, it might. Hard to say. And this is, of course, using the specific ink I used. Maybe if you gun it with the blow-drier it'll set faster and more permanently. Who knows.
How long does it take?
Once I got going, I could knock out a chip every 5-10 seconds, depending on how distracted I was at the time. Figure on the slow-side of 6-7 per minute. Therefore, a stack of 500 would take about an hour and a half to do one side. Then wait a day, and do the other side. If your wife won't let you cover the dinner table with poker chips, and leave it until the next night, you'll have to work in small batches, like 100 at a time.
How many chips did you get out of one stamp pad?
I finished all of my colored chips, front and back, with just the one platinum stamp pad. I don't especially feel like counting, but that should be approximately 450 chips. Your mileage may vary.
How is the quality?
It's decent. Would it fool someone into thinking you paid thousands of dollars to get your chips customized? Only if they're an idiot (at which point, start shuffling!) It's not even what I would consider "great" quality. It's good. Decent. Possibly more than you'd expect for $15. In short, if you're serious about quality, and you're using poker chips as some sort of promotional tool or something, you should probably pay someone to do a more professional job. If, on the other hand, you're just looking to dress things up a bit, the quality is certainly good enough. Consistant pressure when stamping and clearly defined edges on the stamp will increase the quality. Poorly carved stamps dipped in ceiling paint will produce less than stellar results.
Labels: poker
