Complete Newbie & Dealing with Lighting

[unsthable]

Good morning folks. I sought out this forum because I am completely inexperienced in the industry, but am at a point where I am floating the idea of trying to get into it, at least for my own products. I am hoping to lean on some of your expertise not for in depth trade secrets, but mainly a 'can I do x with y'.

Background: I used to have a food truck business that eventually purchased a couple carnival games for county fair events that I played at. A recurring theme that I hate about the games out there is how they all rely on those unseen gimmicks that leave them essentially being scams, and most games out there are 30+ years old. So while my spouse is away at basic training for the USAF I've shifted my business and am going to use my experience in that industry and invest my business earnings in actually creating a newer generation of carnival games.

I'm comfortable enough with photoshop that I can produce my own graphics images. Most of my proposed games were/are planned to use aluminum framing with HDPE sheet panels with the idea of applying the graphics to those panels. I understand HDPE isn't the easiest to work with for application so there would surely be some trial and error there. Then I ran into the issue of lighting. Obviously being on a busy midway I would like these games to be easily seen from many feet away, so crisp looking lighting is important.

My first thought was to arcade game cabinets. Do you happen to know what material is used for those cabinets so that say instead of an HDPE panel with strip lights around it or a flood pointed at it, I could just use one of these panels and have the lighting behind it shining through? Then does the vinyl images applied to the panel have to be a specific material so that they don't completely block out the light? Hopefully I'm being descriptive enough, but if I'm not please ask any questions you have and I'll try to explain better. Right now the plans are all in the head and I haven't moved forward with any purchases, but I would like to be prepared so I can get right to work after my spouse figures out what base they'll be stationed at and I lease warehouse space in that area. Currently I am looking at the FC9000 from Graphtec for the vinyl printer. I have a fair sized budget but not unlimited, if anyone has experience with that model or perhaps endorses a different machine more suited for my purposes by all means please let me know.

 

[Medina Signs]

I would advise you to talk to an experienced sigh shop in your area. HDPE would be the last material I would think of using.
From what you described,
A combination of aluminum or aluminum composite, polycarb and translucent vinyl in a light box is the direction you should be heading..
FYI - nothing sticks to HDPE.

 

[Notarealsignguy]

I think you need to research just about everything over again way before you start looking at equipment because it seems like you don't have any grasp on what you want to do. There are new games and rides out there as well as companies that specialize in this particular industry. I believe 2CTmedia does or used to do a lot of these graphics? Anyways, my point is, you got the cart well before the horse.

 

[unsthable]

That's what I'm here for, I appreciate it. Would much rather find out that there's things I'm not accounting for now than after making big purchases. I've been trying to google and youtube my way around but have been having a lot of trouble finding concrete answers, and with a spouse on the way out of the state its hard to spend all day in a shop with a toddler XD. I may not have been clear so perhaps you could help nudge me in the right direction. HDPE was definitely not a certainty, I had read about plenty of difficulty with it. With my framing, I have channels for 1/4" thick sheets of various width/lengths. The desire is to make the front facing sheets backlit for better presentation than just printing off and applying standard vinyl. I know of translucent vinyl but the few videos I've seen with that aren't overly descriptive on the printing process. For starters does translucent vinyl require a specialized printer? Like I said Graphtec was the first company that I came across with good reviews for commercial vinyl, but haven't heard back from them yet through their site contact.

 

[Gino]

Let me get this straight. You're quitting one business to dive into another one..... one which you have about 99.9% no knowledge about and you wanna utube ideas, techniques and knowledge to go into one you have no direction. I can't follow what you're saying and I'm sure many others here are having the same problem. How could we be of any use to you at all ??

Most people going into business have more than just a thought about what they wanna do, especially if it involves spending lotsa money. Giving guidance on such an endeavor sounds like we'd be wrong for guessing along with you. Hopefully, someone here knows what you're talking about, but don't expect a big conversation.

 

[unsthable]

Not at all. I've adapted my current business to operate mostly remotely. The graphics making on the new business is one minor part of what I am doing. I will just be having so many graphics panels that need to be made that if it takes a $20k vinyl machine and some trial and error that's something I'm willing to do. All I am looking for is insight on preferred equipment and application for translucent vinyl so I can have backlit graphics. I only mentioned the framing, type of construction, etc to give a better visual representation but apparently that did not work.