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"Making your own Boardgame Counters ?" Topic


11 Posts

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Joes Shop Supporting Member of TMP19 Nov 2012 2:48 p.m. PST

Looking for shareware or inexpensive program for making my own counters for use as 'markers', etc. in miniature games.

Thanks in advance for any assistance!

Regards,

J. P. Kelly

Waco Joe19 Nov 2012 2:55 p.m. PST

A good starting place:
link

And if you are good at photoshop clones there is GIMO
link

MajorB19 Nov 2012 2:55 p.m. PST

OpenOffice Draw.
It's free!

Cherno19 Nov 2012 3:30 p.m. PST

"And if you are good at photoshop clones there is GIMO
link"

It's called GIMP, of course ;)

I second the suggestion of using a dedicated graphics editing program like GMIP or even Photoshop if you can get your hands on a cheap copy.

I made a lot of custom counters for my board and miniature games; I typically print them to glossy or matte photo paper and then glue it to 1.5mm finn board before cutting. I wish I had a laser or die cutting machine! :D

normsmith20 Nov 2012 2:53 a.m. PST

Suggest an older version of Serif's DrawPlus, really cheap but very capable. I'm on version x4 and it does all my DTP stuff.

1815Guy20 Nov 2012 1:05 p.m. PST

Yes Serif is good. They are in Nottingham iirc.

Joes Shop Supporting Member of TMP20 Nov 2012 3:04 p.m. PST

Thanks to all who responded!

Regards,

J. P. Kelly

pellen23 Nov 2012 12:57 p.m. PST

I recommend Inkscape. It's a free vector drawing application that is really easy to work with. Also I made a free extension for it to make countersheets, so if you get bored with manually doing the layout and entering values for every counter, you can just draw a template and read in values from a spreadsheet. More on boardgamegeek. I just released a 2.0-prerelease that could use some more testing. ;)

link

Last Hussar24 Nov 2012 3:47 p.m. PST

What sort of counters? I've made lots of good ones using Word and Paint. Never got the hang of GIMP etc

May I make a further suggestion. Get a pack of self adhesive vinyl floor tiles. – 30cm/12" square. When you print off the sheet of counters stick them to the tile, cover in clear sticky back plastic and chop up (the last bit being the hardest). Gives a good weight to them.

Lfseeney27 Nov 2012 3:18 a.m. PST

Cyberboard is good for making prototypes as well, might want to take a look.

Lee

John D Salt09 Dec 2012 8:34 a.m. PST

Margard wrote:


OpenOffice Draw.
It's free!

Seconded.

I've tried the freebie Serif DrawPlus, and after a day ro two went back to OpenOffice. There isn't really that much you need you need to be able to do to produce counters -- it's just pictures and writing in boxes.

I use an inkjet printer on plain A4 paper, fix the paper to grayboard using spraymount or UHU, and cut by hand, but a decent cutter would probably be a more sensible investment than more software.

All the best,

John.

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