Cephalopod Theme (1 Viewer)

[stefalopod]

I'm a long way from getting any sets made but have had so much fun using the design tool. Since I won't be making a purchase any time soon I thought I'd share here. I'm wondering if anyone has any advice on making them work better. I'm a creative but definitely not a designer. Refinement over the next stretch of time will be the name of the game. As far as the inlays, the nautilus is probably my least favorite cephalopod but I kind of love the cheesy idea of making its shell part of the 5.

My one question with the CPC tool is what they mean by weighted colors...I kind of like the brighter retro red than the classic red for the 5s. Is there a reason to stay away from the unweighted colors?

Thank you and feel free to hammer away!

 

[chipinla]

I don’t even know where to begin…

 

[Tonysquander]

what they mean by weighted colors

The weighted chips have brass flakes in the mix which makes those colored chips slightly heavier than the unweighted colors. The only thing you need to worry about is combining a dayglo or bright white body color and small non-dayglo spots because that combo can result in a higher than average incidence of split spots but the tool will warn you if you have mixed colors which might cause same.

 

[stefalopod]

I don’t even know where to begin…

I choose to take that as a compliment. I definitely wanted them to be non-traditional inlays and my interest in cephalopods (hence the screen name) seems to fit that really well. Tried to push them to be as out-there as I could. I think I succeeded.

 

[Skagglio]

I'm a long way from getting any sets made but have had so much fun using the design tool. Since I won't be making a purchase any time soon I thought I'd share here. I'm wondering if anyone has any advice on making them work better. I'm a creative but definitely not a designer. Refinement over the next stretch of time will be the name of the game. As far as the inlays, the nautilus is probably my least favorite cephalopod but I kind of love the cheesy idea of making its shell part of the 5.

My one question with the CPC tool is what they mean by weighted colors...I kind of like the brighter retro red than the classic red for the 5s. Is there a reason to stay away from the unweighted colors?

Thank you and feel free to hammer away!

View attachment 984191

I think your inlay designs and color combos are very nice. Do you know the pain of ordering on 4 different molds? You may get one mold in 2023 and another in 2024 depending on when it's run so I would recommend sticking to just one. That is unless you plan to hit the minimum 300 chips for each different mold and are a cephalopod who has been around for millions of years and thus doesn't mind waiting another two.

 

[VivasTable]

A Cephalopod theme would be fun.

I'd start by choosing a single mold design vs 4.
Then look into some spot progression (less spots for lower denom chips working your way up to more spots)

The $1 is making my eyes bug out and the chips look wedge shaped when stacked. Not sure if that's just because it's on screen or if that will carry over in an actual barrel stack.

 

[ekricket]

I'm a long way from getting any sets made but have had so much fun using the design tool. Since I won't be making a purchase any time soon I thought I'd share here. I'm wondering if anyone has any advice on making them work better. I'm a creative but definitely not a designer. Refinement over the next stretch of time will be the name of the game. As far as the inlays, the nautilus is probably my least favorite cephalopod but I kind of love the cheesy idea of making its shell part of the 5.

My one question with the CPC tool is what they mean by weighted colors...I kind of like the brighter retro red than the classic red for the 5s. Is there a reason to stay away from the unweighted colors?

Thank you and feel free to hammer away!

View attachment 984191

Those are all octopuses

 

[louBdub]

Those are all octopuses

And all cephalopods

 

[louBdub]

I like it. The Kraken lives……

 

[Highli99]

I like themes like this that are original and not over wrought. I’m more of a molllusk and bivalve fan personally, but these are cool too.

 

[allforcharity]

The Wonderful World of Invertebrate Zoology is definitely a theme that has not gotten enough consideration. Good on you!

I was addicted to cuttlefish snack food when I was a kid.

 

[ekricket]

I quit eating the cephalopods because they seem to be really intelligent. No way do mollusks and bivalves have brains though

 

[jdub]

I hate to give you ideas, because this one is in my queue for one of my Mariner chips. It's public domain though so enjoy.

Google for Bertuch polypus octopus to find the provenance.

 

[stefalopod]

Thank you all for the feedback. I agree with @VivasTable that the 1 chip is a little too busy. It was the first one I designed and the more I look at chips (and this set), the more I want to simplify the design. I don’t know how I feel about edge spot progressions (it does seem like the workhorse chip should be among your favorite designs) but this is too much. I’ll probably revise this one over the week and post the update.

I totally see what everyone is saying about different molds. I had everything on hourglass and just thought it’d be fun to have different designs. If I’m ever able to actually get the set created I’m almost certainly going to revert to everything hourglass (it’s probably my favorite mold).

Finally, I just don’t super love the red and green for 5 and 25. I like the designs but might color change. I know the community generally says to just use the colors you like but I’ve played so much with Vegas colors at this point that it’s kinda hard wrapping my head around a deviation from that. One argument in favor is that I do want these chips to be pretty “out there” so then why stay so loved in?

That’s a way-too-long preface for the following question: is there anything to be aware of when deviating from a traditional color set? For example, I think pink would be a really cool 5, would fit the nautilus well. Is there any reason to not just do it?

Oh and my favorite chip of these is the 100. I want a rack of these yesterday.

Thanks so much all. This forum is a kind of fun that I never would have expected.

 

[stefalopod]

I've made an alternate color scheme. Not married to it but it's colors I like more. One of the goals was to create a set that I could hypothetically order, so I made sure to make everything the same mold and eliminated any color-choice or inlay-size related warnings. I'm calling this the "alternate" design set for now.

I also want to add a quarter and was presented with a problem: I already have a chip designated for each of the four categories of cephalopods (octopus, nautilus, squid, cuttlefish) so how would I handle the next creature? I figured it should either be another sea creature or another mollusk. While I could have chosen another sea mollusk (clams as the $1 anyone? nudibranch?), I decided that I'd rather go with either the jellyfish (very cool) or the banana slug (I'm a UC Santa Cruz alum so it's my mascot). The jellyfish is clearly a better design.

I will note that the quarter is the only denomination used. I fooled around with the dollar sign a bit but felt that with the bigger numbers in my designs it didn't quite fit the aesthetic. I actually think the cent sign works.

Again, don't expect to be seeing real photos of these suckers (pun intended) any time soon. But it's fun to keep working on them and I'll probably keep posting design refinements in this thread. I hope it's not overposting.

 

[stefalopod]

I had an idea for the quarters. I know it could be dirty stacks with the 100s but I'm not sure. Just wanted to get the general idea down and can refine colors down the road. But I like this as a general idea for the quarters, as the generic cephalopod theme seems appropriate.

 

[Chippy McChiperson]

Squid Game obvs

 

[allforcharity]

How often will your quarters play with your hundos? I think you're safe from a dirty stack perspective.

 

[stefalopod]

Fair point. Can’t imagine hundreds being on the table much at all in my home game. Which is unfortunate because it’s my favorite chip.

 

[BonScot]

Here you go. What can be more cephalopod and current?

 

[RainmanTrail]

Here you go. What can be more cephalopod and current?

View attachment 995145

Too bad you can't get square and triangle shaped inlays. A man can always dream though!

 

[allforcharity]

Fair point. Can’t imagine hundreds being on the table much at all in my home game. Which is unfortunate because it’s my favorite chip.

Consider making your favourite chip one of your workhorse denominations.

 

[chipinla]

Consider making your favourite chip one of your workhorse denominations.

Always. Make the workhorse chip first. Make it your favorite. Then build other chips around that

 

[megabit]

Will you be serving calamari?

 

[allforcharity]

Will you be serving calamari?

Or maybe takoyaki?

 

[stefalopod]

An update on this. Note that I don't have immediate plans to produce this set, though I am trying to refine refine refine for the next _______ until I'm ready.

In the "eviscerate" thread I got some really good notes but I think this is the more appropriate place to post these refinements. While I'm definitely still working on these, I think this is better. A chip-by-chip breakdown:

• 25¢ chip is largely the same but I've shrunk the ¢ symbol, definite improvement
• $1 chip reverted colors back to my original concept, which I like, and also have a total of 8 edge spots to symbolize the 8 tentacles of an octopus
• $5 chip swapped cephalopod with the $100, now it's the cuttlefish (my favorite cephalopod). I like the idea of having cuttlefish on the table instead of hidden in a drawer (as I can't imagine hundreds being on the game very often). I've also adjusted the edge spots.
• $20 replaces $25, also has a new squid that I prefer (that's a fun sentence to write). I don't know about the background on this one, or the green base. Definitely going to play around with this one.
• $100 now has nautilus, is now blurple instead of black. While I thought the cuttlefish and wild colors were fun on the old version, I think this is a good adjustment. Some refinement on the inlay is needed but I like this adjustment.

I'm open to any thoughts. Revising this is pretty fun.

 

[Skagglio]

Just in case you don't have color samples.

 

[Machine]

$20 replaces $25, also has a new squid that I prefer (that's a fun sentence to write). I don't know about the background on this one, or the green base. Definitely going to play around with this one.

20s are typically yellow, black, or orange

 

[ekricket]

One of the chips should be an 8 spot and the inlay designed and applied so that each arm ends at a spot and so appears to continue to the edge of the chip.

 

[Darson]

20s are typically yellow, black, or orange