Creating a mask for The Power
Following a recent posting in RGP, I came accross a great tool on the internet for scanning in areas of playfields to get them on the computer both in the correct size and in the right perspective. So I thought I’d use this tool to generate my first mask, which I would cut on my recently acquired Craft-Robo plotter So it was off to http://tools.reelpinball.com/ to download the photo grid.
Now it was my intention to use this methodology to airbrush the ring around The Power insert, so I cut out a window from the grid and laid it over the power insert of my recently acquired IPB playfield:
The photo grid surrounding The Power insert on the new playfield
I loaded this picture into Photoshop and cut out a section exactly 3.5 inches by 3.5 inches (as the photo grid is marked in inches) and corrected both the size and perspective:
The Power insert corrected for size and perspective
The contrast of the orange to the black inner ring and the surrounding yellow colour was high enough to allow me to easily extract the orange ring from this photo:
The Power orange ring, having extracted it from the corrected photo
Now this would have made a good mask for The Power ring if the edges of my original insert hadn’t been so damaged. Therefore in order to make sure I covered all of these damaged areas around the original insert, I made the mask a little thicker:
The new mask adjusted for thickness
This is the mask I intend to use to airbrush on my The Power ring