Calaveras Poker Room Fantasy Chips (1 Viewer)

[TheOffalo]

I know there are Dia de los Muertos and Nevada Jacks designs that feature skulls, but for lack of a better term, they look "ceramics-y" (not used pejoratively), and I had an idea for a more "traditional" design...

Again, I'm not an illustrator, so I took a publicly available vector art of a calavera, a.k.a. sugar skull, and I replaced some of the elements with poker suits (clubs in the eye sockets, spade for the nose, heart in the forehead, diamonds across the top, using four-color deck coloring).

Had to decide between having the skull in-full above the denomination or having the skull be enlarged and faded as a background with the denomination centered. Decided on the former for this first mockup (the denoms on top of the faded skull is too busy, even with a stroked border around the denoms, and it blocks too much of the calavera design), though I used the latter idea for the bounty chip (I also faded the "Poker Room" on the bounty chip, which I'll probably carry back to the denom chips).

This only my second attempt at designing chips, so all feedback welcome!

 

[davislane]

I know there are Dia de los Muertos and Nevada Jacks designs that feature skulls, but for lack of a better term, they look "ceramics-y" (not used pejoratively), and I had an idea for a more "traditional" design...

Again, I'm not an illustrator, so I took a publicly available vector art of a calavera, a.k.a. sugar skull, and I replaced some of the elements with poker suits (clubs in the eye sockets, spade for the nose, heart in the forehead, diamonds across the top, using four-color deck coloring).

Had to decide between having the skull in-full above the denomination or having the skull be enlarged and faded as a background with the denomination centered. Decided on the former for this first mockup (the denoms on top of the faded skull is too busy, even with a stroked border around the denoms, and it blocks too much of the calavera design), though I used the latter idea for the bounty chip (I also faded the "Poker Room" on the bounty chip, which I'll probably carry back to the denom chips).

This only my second attempt at designing chips, so all feedback welcome!

View attachment 793093

grey background for starters.

try not to use similar colours on adjoining chips

 

[TheOffalo]

grey background for starters.

try not to use similar colours on adjoining chips

Thanks! I'll try the grey backround (on the png, not the inlays, I assume). I was "linking" each chip's spot colors with the denoms above/below on purpose, but I can see how with wider spots, like on the $100s, that may be confusing if sitting between stacks of $25s and $500s. It should be less of an issue between the 25¢/$1/$5/$25 since they have smaller spots, I'd think...

How about this?

 

[John81276]

I really like the integration of the suits into the calavera! That then makes me think - what if you took off those colors and integrated them into the chips - you already have the red and green, but it would be cool to pull the blue into either the base color or edge color of one or more chips.

This from a newbie who's NEVER designed a chip, so take it for what it's worth!

 

[allforcharity]

If you move your denom to either side of the skull, you probably can make the skull quite a bit bigger.

 

[TheOffalo]

If you move your denom to either side of the skull, you probably can make the skull quite a bit bigger.

How about both sides? I think I may have to shrink the skull a little bit...

 

[Shaggy]

How about grayscale skull on one side with the denomination covering it (like your bounty chip). On the other side of the chip, blackline skull with no denomination.

 

[allforcharity]

How about both sides? I think I may have to shrink the skull a little bit...
View attachment 793694

How about grayscale skull on one side with the denomination covering it (like your bounty chip). On the other side of the chip, blackline skull with no denomination.

Yes, there's no reason you have to have the same inlay design on both sides. Small skull on one side, large on the other can work. Avoid overcrowding is the concept we're after.

 

[TheOffalo]

How about grayscale skull on one side with the denomination covering it (like your bounty chip). On the other side of the chip, blackline skull with no denomination.

Thank you and everyone for your feedback. I tried it but didn't like how the denominations looked on top of the large skull even grayscale and transparent, and even with stroking the denoms with a white border. I could probably play around with it more, but opted to with just the big skull (mostly) by itself on one side.

Yes, there's no reason you have to have the same inlay design on both sides. Small skull on one side, large on the other can work. Avoid overcrowding is the concept we're after.

One more attempt below. Probably too hard to read, but on the large skull side I really didn't want to leave no denomination, so I put the Spanish word for the denomination ("uno", "cinco", etc.) to the side of the big skull. Turns out it's not legible so next iteration I'd remove those I guess. And the larger denominations on the front of the chip need to be shrunk down a little.

 

[feltschmerz]

I love DDLM skulls--cheerful, yet macabre. Have you considered using multiple different skulls, one for each denomination? It might be cool to have some variety, since the skulls themselves vary so widely.

 

[buzzmonkey]

Reminds me of the roulette scene in Grim Fandango when Manny Calavera buys the diner and turns it into a casino.

 

[TheOffalo]

I love DDLM skulls--cheerful, yet macabre. Have you considered using multiple different skulls, one for each denomination? It might be cool to have some variety, since the skulls themselves vary so widely.

It's a good idea. I'm working from free graphics since I'm not an artist myself. For a proof of concept I just picked one that was a good candidate for replacing some of the elements with card suits, but if I develop this further, I'll definitely try to find a variety.

Reminds me of the roulette scene in Grim Fandango when Manny Calavera buys the diner and turns it into a casino.

Love those LucasArts games! Was thinking about designing a Monkey Island-themed chip set.