Nani-pani project (1 Viewer)

Taghkanic

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For my first milling/relabeling project, I have been collecting Paulson THC (SCV) solids. I’ll be using 7 colors for my tournament set. I’d be psyched to get some feedback as the label design progresses.
 
The concept for the set is based in my interest in local Native American history, which is common to both the place I’ve settled and the place I grew up.

The area where I live now (Columbia County, in New York’s mid-Hudson Valley) was populated by Mahican (not Mohican!) tribes. My research in academic texts and old maps leads me to believe that they were active close to my 250-acre forest/farm property.

Coincidentally, as Dutch and English colonists pushed them out of the area, a tribe of Mahicans landed in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, also close by where I grew up. So I have a double interest in their history.

I grew up with the following old sign hanging in my grandmother’s studio. It was painted by an itinerant sign painter in the 1910s or 20s, but some Puritanical local ladies took offense to the imagery—the nudity of the Native American, and the suggestiveness of his loincloth:

fullsizeoutput_1622.jpeg
 
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I’m using this sign as the principle image for the common side of all the chips. The second sides will have different (though related) images unique to each type of chip. I used an image editing program to simplify the Mahican archer down to a sort of woodcut-like texture:

IMG_3733.JPG
 
Another component, as mentioned, is old maps. This 1714 map of the region where I live is not that precise. But several key names and words crop up right near where my land is:

livingston beatty map.jpg
 
nanipanihekan.png


The first word of interest is nanipanihekan, which appear along a north-south stream which I believe runs on my property. I researched the word, and it describes the topology and natural features here exactly:

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That “heaps of stones” bit will come up again later... There’s a sort of tie-in to poker.
 
I chose a modern font which has a little of the feeling of the map typography, and used the Graphic app to do some type-on-a-curve:

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Next, I touched up the base image a bit, and started fiddling with modest gradients, including a landscape element to create a starter label, to see how I was liking it:

paste-in.jpg
 
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Here’s a sample of the THCs I’ll be using, in the seven colors: White, Red, Green, Black, Pink, Gold and Sky Blue...

IMG_3763.jpeg
 
So, my first debate is, re. this first side: Should I keep the labels monochrome (basically, just tinting the template with the base color of the chip)? Or should I add more contrast?

Above, for the Black 1K chip, I tried inverting the image and using a contrasting mustard color, to see what some variety looks like.

Anyway, more to come later about the source material for the unique second sides planned for each color, and the tie-in between the old map and poker...
 
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The flipside of each color will have a wild animal pulled from various old, early maps of the Northeast which I have been going through... Most of these come from the “Nova Belgica et Anglia Nova” map of 1640:

Nova_Belgica_et_Anglia_Nova_(2675719332).jpg
 
Here are some closeup details, which I now need to convert to the same woodcut-like style as the Mahican archer. For example, I may put the turkey on the Whites, the stag on the 500s, the fox on the 1Ks, etc.:

Animals-in-maps.jpg
 
The thing which got me onto this idea was a Mahican place name which appears just above nani-pani-hekan on the Livingston map above: Mawanagwassik (which is spelled countless different ways, as they are all phonetic Colonial mangling of the non-written Mahican language).

Here’s one interpretation of the word:

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Here’s the fun part, for me a anyway:

A “gwassik” or “quassik” or “qussuk” refers to stones, or a place of where stones may be.

Per above, there was a Mahican custom when passing certain landmarks to find a stone and throw it on a pile. Over time, very large piles of stones accrued.

There is, in fact, a gigantic pile of stones along the stream which is marked on the Livingston map as “nanipani/e/hekan.” This might be Native American, or it might have been made by sheep farmers in the 19th Century, who would collect frost-heaved stones for building walls later... Or maybe both—the colonists may have just thrown their wallstones where the Native pile started.

Anyway, it occurred to me to think of poker chips as “stones” which you throw onto a pile, which accumulates during a hand. As the hand progresses, each player throws in more stones (or doesn’t...).

On the other side of the pile, I’ll use the word Mawanagwassik (haven’t chosen which phonetic spelling I prefer yet) along with the wild animal images...
 
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Great story, Sam! Now, back to the design features:

1) I vote for more contrast on the inlays.

2) I think all the text should face outward, i.e. the bottom toward the rim of the chip. "nani" on the left, "pani" on the bottom, and "hekan" on the right.
 
I’ll give that a try. The “nani” is misaligned, so I’ve got to go in and mess with it anyway...

(My thinking here was that nani and pani are the same length, balancing left and right; while hekan is longer and fits better between the two feet.)
 
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Neat back story, I love designs that start with personal ties to history, landmarks, etc. Are you planning on including the denomination somewhere on one of the labels? IIRC your group already plays with a lot of non-standard colors, but was just curious if you're working denominations into the design. For as much as I like the how the monochrome labels came out, I think the contrasting one on the black chip looks the best. Considering the flip side will be different for each denomination, I think going with the same label (the one on the black chip) will help to tie the set together. My 2¢ worth.
 
More work on the design. I’m tinkering with two added elements — a faux shaped “inlay” and a sunburst behind the archer. Each color chip would have a different faux shape and a different sunburst behind the figure. I’m trying to give this a more authoritative, finished stamp without making it too busy:

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I am also really interested in Native American history so I love this theme. I am not much help in terms of design input but I love the story and the chips.
 
Neat back story, I love designs that start with personal ties to history, landmarks, etc. Are you planning on including the denomination somewhere on one of the labels?


Not planning on denoms... We have a tight group which is familiar with the color progression, and cheat sheets for any newbies/guests. If they can’t grasp it, they probably are in the wrong game. (My position on this is already firm, per that controversial post.)

I agree that denoms sometimes can add a finishing design touch. But here I think they would be too cluttery.

This also allows me to repurpose the base white/red/green/black chips as a standard East Coast cash set, in theory, if I everv want to do so. Though I have a separate PCR v2 set for that, for now.
 

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