[Sidepot]

Voting phase over. Default colors set.

Thanks to everyone who participated. Below is the fruits of your contributions and participation. Not too shabby!










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Protege Contest Background and Details Thus Far

There will be 9 chips in all when we're done (25c thru $5000, plus one NCV chip), but we're still in the voting stage on colors. Here's what's finalized so far:






Inlay Design Submission Guidelines:

Important Dates:
July 1st, 2006 is the targeted inlay design submission date. This is when all of the default chip colors should be finalized.

Submission Format:
Inlay submissions must be on the default chip edge spots and colors initially, but may be changed by the designer later on in the process. All submissions should be PM'd or emailed to both Tenpercenter and Sidepot. Initial submissions must be made utilizing the Chip Factory on Sidepot. Please follow the instructions for uploading your inlay graphic to the chips. The chip factory is located at: http://www.sidepot.com/poker_chip_factory/tool.html

Will my submission be invalid due to trademark infringement?
Possibly, if it is too close to a protected image (trademarked image, service mark, person's face, etc.). With over 40 potential submitters, and designs that may change with community feedback, we can not "pre-judge" any submissions (sorry, but no upfront guarantees that you're image gets the green light), so use your best judgement and heed the following guidelines:

1. Any person's face or identity will need sign-off from that person.
2. No pornographic images (not that I even need to mention this)
3. Anything that looks too close to an existing protected image will most likely be turned down (totally at the discretion of the manufacturer, at the time a chip wins the competition)
4. Specifically, anything that looks too close to an existing casino chip will more than likely be turned down (For you "Coming to America" fans, no, McDougal-types will probably not get thru).

#3 above is probably the one that you should be most concerned with. To clarify, the issue is focused on making something too close to an existing protected image, not the theme of that image (i.e. if we take the Starbucks logo that has a mermaid, it's not that we couldn't make a chip with a mermaid, but we couldn't make one with a mermaid that closely resembled the Starbucks mermaid. And if we were naming a coffee company, a mermaid image would likely be held to an even higher level of scrutiny. But that doesn't mean mermaid images are somehow protected and prohibited from being used. Chicken of the Sea, after all, uses a mermaid for their logo, as likely do dozens of other products and companies. Not to mention, many argue that the Starbucks logo is actually a double-tailed Siren, but I digress...

What constitutes a "complete" submission?
What constitutes an adequate initial submission is largely dependent on each Contestant’s design concept. An initial submission of one design is fine for concepts where the only thing that varies from chip to chip is the denomination, while A/B design concept submissions should include two designs, one for the front and back, and multi-design concept submissions should provide 3 or more designs (whatever is necessary to adequately convey the concept). Contestants that make it to the semi-final voting round will need to complete their design submissions by including a finished inlay design for each of the decided 8 (or 10) denominations.

Are submissions with shaped inlays acceptable?
Yes, we are assuming these can be done at this point. If it turns out that shaped inlays are not possible, we will have to revert all shaped inlay submissions to round ones, so please keep this in the back of your mind. As more information on the reality of the shaped inlay situation becomes available we'll share it here.

What size inlays are acceptable?
The Cigar & Snifter mold is designed for a round 7/8ths inch inlay as it has a slight topographical depression designed to fit that size inlay . That is the inlay that will look most natural in the chip mold. Nonetheless, inlay size is entirely up to each Contestant. Any shaped inlays will have to be at the 7/8ths size. If your design utilizes a size larger than 7/8ths, the chip factory won't work for your mock-ups.

Complete Official Rules Are Found Here

Design Notes:
From Tenpercenter's initial post...
"For the inlay portion of the contest, Sidepot.com has requested a general theme for the new chip set:
Quote:

... theme should be that of luxury, style, opulence, or something signifying high class. Think Bellagio or the Palms, not Treasure Island or the Luxor. . This doesn’t mean the design has to be void of all thematic elements rather just that it does not rely too heavily upon one. The Starbucks logo is a good example of this. While their logo has a mermaid in it, people don’t think of mermaids when they think of Starbucks. They think of the experience of the coffee house.

In general the sponsor is not looking for a "fantasy casino" set, but rather a recognizable logo or theme that will span all inlays. Other than that it is completely left up to us!"

Further clarification...
Quote:

Originally Posted by OnTheButton
I commented on this reference once before.

The Starbucks logo ONLY makes you think of the coffee house experience because it says "STARBUCKS COFFEE" in giant letters around the outiside of it, and they spend millions making sure you are never far from that logo no matter where you go.

I'll bet good money that if you showed JUST that mermaid logo, in different colors other than brown and green, to 1000 people that 90% of them would think it was for pool equipment or tunafish, or anything other than coffee. That would EVEN INCLUDE THOSE THAT DRINK STARBUCKS DAILY.

This is a very valid point OTB. Of course there is a ton of branding that goes into a big brand like this and that is what ultimately creates the identity for the brand. I know relatively little about branding, so this is just my interpretation, and you could get 100 different interpretations from 100 different business people. Personally, the element that I like about the Starbucks logo is that they (IMO) use the mermaid as a sort of "beyond just coffee" placeholder for their identity, and that mermaid says more about the Pacific Northwest, the sea which is a big part of the NW, and the (this part is very important) fantasyland-like ideals that the mermaid represents. All very subtle, and all required decades to burn into the mind of the consumer. But the point is they didn't use a bean, or a coffee bag, or a coffee picker.

Ultimately, this is what we're after. The design elements should embody the mystic of gambling and poker "beyond just Las Vegas and/or a casino" in a manner similar to what the mermaid does for Starbucks. This, in part, is what the Cigar & Snifter mold attempts to accomplish.

Quote:

Originally Posted by OnTheButton

Luxury, style, opulence, and high class are all relative terms to me. A car that starts every morning might be all of these to someone here...

Maybe we should we come up with a name to kick start it?

Or can we come up with a name on our own?

Or should they not have a name at all and just contain design elements?

This is where I get confused.

The default chip line name will be "Protege", unless some other name that also embodies class, elegance, opulence, etc., and emmanates naturally from a particular chip design. Again, the brand name of this line is intentionally supposed to be merely a placeholder which we will will attempt to build the reputation of over time. And I don't really think the name of the chip line should be on the chip at all.

I understand this is a very difficult task to come up with a design concept that accomplishes what we're looking for. It's a far easier proposition to use what I'll refer to as a "theme crutch", say the country of Australia for example sake, and then just incorporate elements that embody it (i.e. Koala's, Kangaroos, Surfing, Walkabouts, etc.). These theme crutch's are what Vegas casinos were all about in the 80s and 90s, but if you'll look at the casinos being made more recently, the "theme's" are intentionally avoided. Think of the Bellagio, the Palms, the Wynn, and the upcomming Las Ramblas. The only prevalent "theme" they have is luxury. That's what we're looking for. Start at the terms luxury, elegance, opulence, and class as it pertains to popular culture (not as it necessarily pertains to your current lifestyle) and think of what images this brings to mind. Then use those thoughts and images as the basis of your design. Or perhaps just rely solely on elegant design elements like say an exotic tattoo would. Not that I'm a big fan of tattoos, but I can certainly distinguish between an artistic and elegant tattoo and a tattoo of Calvin and Hobbs pissing on something. Blah, blah, blah, ok I'm ranting so I'll stop...

Heavier chip weight:
As some of you have already hinted at, with the rollout of this Protégé chip line, we’ll have the option of making a heavier chip. The manufacturer has done the initial R&D on the Cigar & Snifter mold and they’ve got proof of concept for a much heavier version of this chip. Many of you may know this already, but even within a single line of chips the weights vary from color to color. In clay chips, some colors are heavier than others. We did tests on one of the lightest colors in our InPlay Clay line and achieved a weight average for that color of between 9.6 and 9.7 grams. They’ve reproduced this 100s of times, so this is not just speculation. We expect the set average should be slightly higher than this.

Note that there are additional and somewhat substantial costs to making these heavier chips, so for the contest participant pre-buy you will have the option of buying standard weight chips (roughly 8.8 gram weight average, like our existing InPlay Clay line) at the $0.79/chip price per the contest Letter of Agreement, or at the heavier (9.7+ gram) weight for $0.89/chip.

True shaped inlays (95% confidence)
We’re in the early stages of financing the R&D on this new development, and we will know more around the end of June. In a nutshell, we’re trying to bring back true punched/shaped inlays (Not printed shaped inlays where color matching is an issue, but true punched inlays) on our Cigar & Snifter mold. Our manufacturer went back to their original source and they literally pulled out the original schematics from decades ago. We have about a 95% confidence that these are a go at this point, but we don’t want to say it’s a done deal until we have proof of concept in our hands (which explains the end of June time frame). I was reticent at mentioning this at all until we knew for sure, so please understand that THIS IS PURELY AN ATTEMPT AT THIS POINT. If it can’t be done, well that’s too bad, but we know many members of the community expressed interest in it so we got our manufacturers to agree to give it a shot and we covered the cost of the R&D.