CUSTOM ENAMEL PIN HOW TO GUIDE
Pin it to win it!
NEED A REFRESH OR SOME POINTERS ON MAKING YOUR OWN CUSTOM PINS?
Our designers can help transform your artwork into the pin of your dreams!
TL:DR?
- We love AI file formats
- Minimum line thickness 0.1mm
- Minimum enamel fill area 0.3mm
- Pay the extra $20 if you plan to make keyrings in future (it’ll save you money later!)
- Minimum 6pt font
- Use our handy-dandy colour guide found HERE
THE PROCESS
We start the manufacturing process by creating a metal mold of your pin design. This mold is then used to cast the ‘skeleton’ of your pin, which is later plated, filled with enamel colours and polished to create the finished product.
Once this mold is in place, you can elect to mix & match enamel and metal colours within the same order at no extra cost, provided no change to the metal mold (inc backstamp) occurs – minimum 20 pcs per variation.
You can also choose to leave the pin without enamel fill, if you would prefer an all-metal, badge look.
Thinking of making keyrings in future? We highly recommend paying the additional $20 fee for the first mold – this allows us to cast a larger mold with space for the keyring loop. (If you elect to change a pin-only mold to keyring later on, a full new mold fee will apply.)
MINIMUM RAISED METAL LINE THICKNESS
Each enamel colour of your design needs to be separated by a line of raised metal, which acts as a barrier, preventing colours from mixing together.
These lines should be no thinner than 0.1mm (0.15 or 0.2mm is better!)
MINIMUM AREAS OF COLOUR
The enamel colour part of the design is hand painted; therefore the smallest area of colour is 0.3mm.
MINIMUM TEXT SIZE
The smallest text that we recommend is 6pt. This is based on a simple, easily legible, san serif font such as Arial. Our designers are more than happy to help assist if you need help on sizing suggestions.
PANTONE COLOUR MATCH
With over 800 pantone-equivalent colours available, you are sure to find the perfect shade of enamel!
We also offer Glitter and Glow in the Dark options for an additional fee. These are available for soft enamel products only.
You can download our Colour Chart HERE
Please note: We use pantone colours as a reference. All colour shades are estimates only as the colours themselves are also hand-mixed.
HARD ENAMEL VS SOFT ENAMEL?
There are two types of enamel available – Hard Enamel and Soft Enamel. Don’t let the names fool you, both enamels dry hard and will look fabulous!
Soft enamel pins have a more textured, 3D effect where the enamel sinks into the valleys between the metal lines. This allows for more vibrant colours; the addition of glow in the dark or glitter toppers; and is the only option suitable for our Rose Gold or Dyed Black metals.
Hard enamel pins are overfilled with enamel, then polished back to create a flat, 1 dimensional pin with more durability. Due to the polishing process, hard enamel is unsuited to very detailed pins with fine lines and text, as these can be sometimes lost.
If you are unsure which enamel type is suited to your design, our team can advise.
ARTWORK
Whilst we can generally convert all types of images to pin design form – we do prefer Adobe Illustrator files as these are easiest for our team. Vector images are also welcome.
Depending on the format provided, we may charge a minimum of $40+GST artwork fee to convert the provided files to a viable pin artwork. Hand drawn images etc will incur higher charges due to the time it takes for our designers to complete.
You can find an example of an optimum pin set up file HERE. (Adobe Illustrator is recommended)
Don’t forget to indicate your colour choices in your artwork!