28 - When You Want the Prototype to Look Pretty … (Part 5: Cardboard Tokens / Markers / Standees)

With my cardboard components, things get pretty difficult using regular tools. The shapes of my tokens are a bit more complicated than simple rectangles.

As you can already see, these shapes are much harder to cut out of cardboard with a knife — at least if you want them to still look nice afterward.

Unfortunately, the print quality for these cardboard pieces isn’t great. I used my home printer and sticker paper, but it’s good enough for a prototype.

I cut both the cardboard pieces and the stickers with a laser cutter. Because of that, bleed and margin are important here as well. With these irregular shapes, bleed and margin are trickier, so we decided on a color gradient that still looks good even if it’s slightly misaligned. Even though the laser is very precise, I still have to align everything manually — and every tiny inaccuracy becomes noticeable.

After cutting, I simply stuck the stickers onto the cardboard. Yes, it’s tedious and takes a while, so it’s best to put on a show in the background. But the result is fairly precise and looks reasonably good.

2 mm cardboard is not easy to work with — a laser cutter helps tremendously. Do you have any other ideas on how to achieve something like this with a reasonable amount of effort? I’m open to suggestions.