Dumb Question: How to print a Backer Card?

[Brown Bear]

Might sound like a dumb question, but here goes....

I've often designed my own backer cards for customs I've done but I never have luck printing them off. My local print shop doesn't seem to have anything thicker than card stock and it comes out looking too flimsy.

I'm curious how others print theirs....on what?

Thanks
Jase

[EMCE Hammer]

I use Cast-A-Way clams, so thickness isn't an issue. I've never mastered the process to make them strong enough to handle a standard bubble.

[megocrazy]

By far the easiest way. You need a pretty good printer to print on thicker stock than that. I had luck with the thinner bubbles like the cell phone accessories come in. They were thinner so they handled the thinner stock pretty good.

[mego73]

Get sticker sheets, print them and apply them to board.

[Starroid Raiders Dagon]

I did up backer cards by printing the graphics file on a printer at Staples, bought 3M spray adhesive and sprayed the back of the printed paper, and then put it on thick cardstock. I rolled it flat by getting craft foam with adhesive backing and wrapping it around a Lysol can (much less expensive than buying a brayer), and then rolling the paper flat on the cardstock.

[Brown Bear]

Thanks guys. Great advice.

[lilbrosj66]

I use Cast-A-Way clams, so thickness isn't an issue. I've never mastered the process to make them strong enough to handle a standard bubble.

I agree. I use clamshells and print the backer on matte photo paper and I really like the way they come out.

[silveralex]

I've used photo papers and clamshells also, but may try the sticker paper thing to see how it turns out.

[silveralex]

I did up backer cards by printing the graphics file on a printer at Staples, bought 3M spray adhesive and sprayed the back of the printed paper, and then put it on thick cardstock. I rolled it flat by getting craft foam with adhesive backing and wrapping it around a Lysol can (much less expensive than buying a brayer), and then rolling the paper flat on the cardstock.

Sounds interesting. what type of cardstock did you use?

[Starroid Raiders Dagon]

Michaels has various weights or paper. The one I used was black and about 2/8 of an inch. If I hadn't found that, I might have gone with comic book backing cards and glue 2 together?

[TomStrong]

I've used card stock as thick as my laser printer would handle, but I also use super clam so thickness wasn't necessarily o problem. Plus they look awesome and you can open them as needed.

[KosmiCKennY]

I put mine in clams and use regular matte card stock then laminate them so there's no chance of ink transfer to the figures and the laminating process helps to thicken the card and give it a shine

[Brown Bear]

I am very close to getting this right after a trial run today.

I went to Staples after work today and bought a pack of 15 pages of full size sticker paper for ten bucks. I then went to the self-serve copy station and printed of the front and back in a printer that uses some kind of wax coated ink.

I then went home and grabbed one of those white magazine backers and carefully applied the stickers. The end result looked perfect. I was thrilled right until I realized I'm a knob for not sizing the file properly.

The card was a half inch too big all around so it wouldn't fit in a clam. I adjusted the size tonight and am going to try it again tomorrow night.

If I get this right, I'm guessing all of my future customs will be coming "mint on card". Thanks for the help gang!

[Brown Bear]

Does anyone have a high res DC backer card scan they could post? The ones posted over in customego are great, but the DC ones have blurry faces.

[Brown Bear]

Does anyone have a high res DC backer card scan they could post? The ones posted over in customego are great, but the DC ones have blurry faces.

BUMP.....still hoping someone can post a clear DC WGSH scan for me. Thanks