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BackGlass Art Package

A project log for Star Trek: The Mirror Universe Pinball

A custom / unique pinball machine. This is a 1978 Bally Star Trek table “mirrored” and re-worked into a Star Trek Mirror Universe Theme.

zittwarezittware 04/07/2014 at 07:450 Comments

02/03/2013: I learned last weekend that my Comic book artist continues to have life-getting in the way issues; and probably won't make delivery of the backglass art in time for me to get it on the machine for TPF. I asked him to be done several times... but family / deaths / real-work deadlines keep getting in the way.

So; On Thursday - I decided I was going to scan my existing CPR repro Prototype backglass and create my own. Well; the same HP Scanjet 4670 I used to scan the PF is now giving me a interference pattern on the scans.

As a result; I decided to use an existing scan of the production backglass and "mirror-ize" it to have some of the features of the ProtoType Backglass.

First; here an example of the original Production BG:
And here's My current revision of the BG I've modified:
I'm not sure about the nasa render of earth replacing the planetoid... I like it... but it may be too much for the BG.

2/21/2014:  Received the Star Trek: Mirror Universe translite from GameOnGrafix.com today... Overall I think it looks pretty damn sweet.This weekend I hope to start cutting out the windows for the nixie tube displays and begin mounting it to the Acrylic I hope to get tomorrow from RegalPlastics.

2/24/2014: Right now; the artwork is a translite - as a result; I want to make sure the lamps behind it don't wash out the colors and I need to provide a mechanism to enable the hidden text which is illuminated by said lamps. So I used a black layer to create a "lite blocker" layer which if successful will be sent to the vinyl cutter at Techshop where it can be use to create the dark silver layer necessary to "block" said lamp light.

I took the ipdb.org picture, straighten and scaled it in photoshop then used it as a template to enable the custom "silver layer" for the mirror universe:

I wanted:
1) the yellow part of the sky to "glow" and contrast the dark planet side features.
2) the pants of the crew to be dark (unlike the original).
3) Artists signatures to glow.
4) Hidden text is an Original Series font.
5) Gold parts of logo glow... as does some shading on the red part of earth.
6) Primitive ruins glow.

Here's a rendering of what it should look like if the lite block comes out like I hope:The hardest part is going to be getting the dark to register closely to the translite.

 3/6/2014: Just after work Tonight -  ClayD (clay), Bess, and I worked on vinyl cutting the light blocker from Black vinyl on Techshop's Cutter. Here's the bottom of the LiteBlocker, Weeded on transfer tape; ready to move to the backside of the glass:
 And after some work getting it aligned right:
Then We cut the top lite blocker and after about 1.5hrs working on the top; This is what I can show you:
Here's a picture with it backlit by the overhead fluorescent lights in my garage. Best I can do right now as I'm waiting on USPS to deliver my CometPinball LED order. Some slight registration issues in a couple of spots; Due to workflow issues between photoshop (raster -> path) ... then to CorelDraw. I think at some point one of the conversions grew the mask by a 1/4" causing registration issues in some areas. If I have time I'll try to trim it up a bit more with an xacto knife before TPF.

Anyway; overall really happy with the results.

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