I posted this in the revision feedback thread, but I suppose it might be nice to make a note here as well. So here's a summary of my thought processes and the rationale behind the various changes. Not that you have to care about
why I did anything -- since it's just the actual product that matters -- but I imagine some of you may be wondering.
I only deviated from the selected chip colors when it was really necessary in order to fit in with the set as a whole. Philosophically, I tried to keep at least the
general trend of greater complexity as the denominations got larger. Not a perfect science, but I wanted the higher chips to at least
appear to be more difficult to counterfeit (these may not be
real casino chips, but I wanted to
treat them as such).
In choosing real-world models to follow, I probably leaned most heavily on the Bellagio chips (at least tonally), with the Wynn, Mirage and MGM Grand as secondary influences. There are probably others I've forgotten as well (to say nothing of all the designers
here), but these are the ones that spring quickly to mind. (I did a
lot of referring to the pictures at
Silver State Treasures.)
Here are my comments on the individual chips as I've revised them.
- The 25¢ chip: Changed the edge spots to Plum to avoid "blue overload" in the lower-denomination set, particularly if the NCV chip is added to the mix.
- The $1 chip: Unchanged
- The $5 chip: Changed the edge spot pattern to avoid the huge swaths of Mustard.
- The $25 chip: With the $25 chip's green base color, I really wanted to suggest "money." And while the chosen colors do keep with the green-on-green color scheme, I kept coming back to the notion that it would be better suggested by a lighter green base with darker edge spots than vice-versa (as is the case on the Bellagio and Mirage chips). But given the negative response to my initial attempts, I settled on both Verde and Sherbert Green as edge spot colors. Furthermore, I changed the six-spot pattern to the 4 1/4 with 1/8 pattern; for one thing, there are changes to follow that made this necessary, but for another, I wanted to continue the (admittedly subtle) connection to four-cornered currency.
- The $100 chip: Lightened the center spot to Lime Green to brighten it up a tad. However, since (contrary to my initial expectations) this chip generated the most heated argument, I didn't made any more substantive changes.
- The $500 chip: As mizuchaud originally noted, if we go with the (default) shaped inlays, we have some instances where the edge spot patterns conflict numerically with the inlay shapes. I realize that the edge spots will not line up with the inlays (other than by random chance), but I do think it important that they be at least parallel. For my part, I felt it was more critical to keep the inlay shapes associated with each denomination (at least a vague "standard") as opposed to our exact edge spot patterns (something more open to variation). So as much as I like the 4 1/4 with 1/8 pattern, the six-sided inlay strongly suggested either a three- or six-spot pattern. The three spots (with just two colors) didn't suggest enough of a complexity improvement over the $100, so I opted for the 6 1/8 with 1/8 here (the colors remain the same).
- The $1000 chip: This one is probably the most changed, so I apologize in advance for any ruffled feathers. There was a vocal contingent that pushed for losing the Canary Yellow as a base, and in my focused feedback section, I did offer up some alternatives. But the more I compared with the casino models I was following, the more I realized that the bright yellow is the standard I wanted to emulate. However... the red and blue edge spots may have suggested more of a "primary color" theme that detracted from the "elegance" factor when paired with my particular inlay design. After much debate and deliberation, I opted to swap out the Blood Red for Dolphin Blue as an edge spot color. Since I'd adopted the 6 1/8 with 1/8 pattern for the (adjacent) $500, I went with the 4 1/2 with 1/8 pattern.
- The $5000 chip: First and foremost, I changed the 3 1/2 with 1/8 pattern to the (otherwise unrepresented) 8 1/8 with 1/8 (which forces the loss of one edge spot color, but does retain an elegance that I thought fit our highest-denomination chip). Since I was insistent on keeping the four-laurel design and 4 1/2 moon inlay for this chip, the edge spot pattern had to match numerically. Which then brought us to the colors. While I do like the chocolate color, it seemed too dark — i.e., too close to the black $100 — to give the chip enough of a distinctive identity; furthermore, I thought the colors of the inlay were better complemented by Adobe as a base. With only a single edge spot color available, (and since Mustard had at least made an appearance on the $5 chip), I opted to keep the Almond.
- The NCV chip: Since the inlay design (and tri-point inlay shape, which I'm still pushing for) is largely triangular, I changed the 4 1/2 with 1/8 pattern to 3 1/2 with 1/8. I also lightened the outermost edge spots from Dark Blue to Light Blue so as not to create such a drastic contrast, which seemed out of place in relation to the rest of the chips.
Well, that's it. I hope that -- even if you don't
like the changes, you can at least understand and appreciate the reasoning behind them. Now go ahead and vote!
