Settlers of Catan Custom Game Boards
Settlers of Catan custom printed game boards for groomsmen gifts
These particular printed custom game boards were created for a groom-to-be with a love for Settlers of Catan.
“My son Jim just graduated from Gonzaga and will soon be stationed as an Army officer in Hawaii with his wife Hannah. They were married this past weekend and he wanted to make something truly unique for his groomsmen gifts,” Signs for Success owner John Bogensberger said. “Since Jim has been working around the sign shop since he was a kid, he’s got a good feel for what we can do. With our state-of-the-art design and printing technologies, we can come up with a solution for just about any project. Even though it was our first time working on a project like this, Jim knew it could be done, and with style.”
Digitally printed wood game boards with shape cuts
Jim came up with the idea of printing the game on a thin 1/8” wood board and personalizing the games to each groomsman. Signs for Success designers Vanessa Bogensberger and Will Oakley created the designs.
After purchasing raw wood, Jim applied a layer of clear finish to the entire printing surface. Then the graphics were printed with our HP FB500 and covered with another layer of clear finish. He then took the boards to Decade Awards where Ted & Adam laser cut the shapes out of the board. Jim used transfer tape over the surface to protect the graphics from the laser.
Next, he printed a parchment background on the back side of Marine Grade vinyl upholstery fabric to give the fabric the look of Parchment. On the face of the vinyl fabric Jim printed the cover and back, each of which were customized with a nickname and the event date. The custom game boards were then attached to the parchment side of the fabric.
Custom printed wood game boxes
To take it over the top, Jim decided to make custom wood game boxes that required a lot of cuts and finishing. The custom game boards box lids were printed with our HP FB500. Because the inks are translucent against a non-white surface, we utilized the white ink channel and put a layer of white ink, also called white ink underflood, under the graphic in order to maintain the color.
“There was no money in this project but it was great fun working with my son and learning new things that can be done with our equipment. We learned we can laser cut wood after printing on it and we can print on both sides of the Marine Grade Upholstery fabric,” John said. “Kudos to his mom and one of our designers Will Oakley for working out all the print and cut files. That alone took many hours.”
Here’s a short video about the project:
