Thanks, that's what I was afraid of. I could tell they might be confusing just from the picture so I thought I would ask.

I would but I'm not even old enough to walk into a casino much less buy 400 of their chips.

Thanks I'll take a look at them.

Edit: The Veneratis look really nice. You wouldn't happen to know a site where I could order them, racks, and felt all at one place would you?

Any other suggestions?

DEFINITELY buy a few of each before you commit. I have hundreds of unused chips because the colors just didn't work together.

[nit]

I haven't done exhaustive research on this, let me say that right up front. Also, ceramics offer FAR more graphical flexibility than clays. Custom clays will restrict you to a label/inlay that's only 3/4" or 7/8" diameter, whereas ceramics allow you to design the graphics right out to the edge, and onto the edge itself, of the chip.

But, while the inlays on a CLAY chip are printed on a state-of-the-art, high-resolution, paper printer and basically stuck onto the chip during manufacture, the graphics on a CERAMIC are somehow printed onto the chip itself. I'm not familiar with the technology, but all the ceramics I've seen have a slightly low-resolution quality to them. Lower dpi, if you know what I mean. Paper is simply a better medium for taking fine detail.

I'm not saying don't get them. They can look great, they hold up extremely well, most casinos these days use them, all that. Just had to object to the specific comment that they offer "clarity". Clarity to me means resolution (dpi).

[/nit]

I find the quality of the print on my ceramics QUITE nice. Vector graphics in - with plenty of curves - and no stairstepping, etc. out on my chips at all.

Here's a 1200dpi nice detail section of one of my chips...



And a 2400dpi closeup of the curve of the "1" and the circles in the crown element...



Those represent VERY fine detail elements of my chip.

Any of the blotches/etc are mostly fine dust on the scanner. The scans are close enough that you can see the ceramic's texture. You can see fine bleed on the black/white transition, but that's under a microscope.

Choose a good chip-seller.

Get samples.


This isn't to say that you don't get good print quality from other sources. But, here's 2400dpi close-up detail on a Pharaoh's chip. You can see the difference.

...and yes, I have some people to thank for samples, but I haven't finished destroying them yet -- so, keep your pants on

absolutely, it can never be said enough.

I love your chips, P. I'm not trying to cut them down at all. Very nice work, and they've always looked sharp to me.

I can't find my ceramic samples to do a side-by-side. Maybe I gave them to a friend. Your photos show that the Paulson is screen printed (tiny dots of varying size), whereas the ceramic is some other technology that blurs fine edges together over some tiny distance. My impression, from memory, is that those edges end up looking not quite as sharp. It's a subtle distinction, for sure. I said I was being nitty.

I'll see if I can find a ceramic. If you post (or email me) one of yours scanned high-res but so I can see the edges, I'll scale some clay photos to match exactly to illustrate, and perhaps prove that I'm completely wrong.

sorry, i3, to get miles away from your question

The Pharaohs label is from one of the new China sets...

I've got TONS of ceramic samples here - mine, Chipco, Nevada Jacks, some casino examples, etc. - and I'll do some 2400dpi scans of detail elements on them all once the wife is awake again. [The scanner is a noisy beast...]

I've got some where the dots are very obvious, and some where they aren't -- obviously it's a matter of different print methods.

if your two "2400 dpi" images above are scaled the same and just cropped, maybe I can show you right now:



this is your ceramic simply rotated to align the black stripe with a similar feature in the Pharaoh inlay. Don't look at the round object at the top of the frame, the source graphic has some sort of blue dropshadow. Look at the horizontal black stripe running through the middle.

To me, the distance from the full black to full white is smaller in the Pharaoh -- the ceramic has a little more "transition" grey. If you think this is minor, you're right. I keep saying I'm nitty.

It's just that I'm a graphics professional of sorts, and this sort of thing tilts us. That extra little bit of resolution is expensive, and we like to justify doing it the fancy-pants way so when someone comes along and says "look, this has more clarity!" it hurts a little.

it's a little bit complicated because of the dots, too. Here's another photo with a "median" filter over everything, which averages each pixel according to the pixels around it. Sort of what your eye would be doing. At a reasonable viewing distance, you don't perceive the dots. Maybe this helps you see how the ceramic is just a tiny bit blurrier:



But of course, your customs rock in almost every way over those Pharaohs.

I'm not trying to stake a claim -- just responding to:
I know that's a drop-shadow on the Pharaohs chip, and I'm not suggesting that's bleed or misaligned print or something -- I was just pointing out that you can see the print process on them, and that, for all intents and purposes, there's no "low resolution" action happening on my chips. The tiny beveled surface of my ceramics has more detail than the print.

Somewhere I have an email from ASM saying what dpi printer they use. That computer is out of commission at the moment. I sound like a disorganized wreck, don't I? A BCC sample I have has VERY nice printing on it.

I can't remember, do the Pharaohs have a label instead of an inlay? A label is glued on, where an inlay is stamped into the chip in a hydraulic press. The inlay process puts a clear layer over it, and sometimes stamps in a texture. A texture does obscure the graphics slightly (but improves the feel of the chip dramatically, imo), and the clear layer can't help.

...although, I'll have to wait for later scans, that's the top of the "P" in the scan. That might be an artifact of a three-color print process on the edges...

Who's a nit now

...sticker.

If you have money, Paulsons are the way to go. I have gone through quite a few different chip sets and samples, and my cash Paulson set is clearly the best chips I have ever owned, they are expensive about $1 per chip, but boy are they nice.

[QUOTE=The Palimax;16836031]The Pharaohs label is from one of the new China sets...

I've got TONS of ceramic samples here - mine, Chipco, Nevada Jacks, some casino examples, etc. - and I'll do some 2400dpi scans of detail elements on them all once the wife is awake again. [The scanner is a noisy beast...]

I've got some where the dots are very obvious, and some where they aren't -- obviously it's a matter of different print methods.[/QUOTE

I wasn't happy with my Nevada Jack Samples, I am still looking at samples for a tourney set. Does anyone know who makes Borgata's chips?

Veneratis here.

Felt and racks are usually pretty cheap on ebay, but they have them at a slightly higher price on the above website.

You can take home a casino's Paulson chips for less than the price of buying Paulson chips

I love them; they're the best -- but I demand complete customization, which leaves me with something like ASM or Ceramic.

Here's two side-by-side same-resolution ceramic samples where one clearly shows the print process, and another doesn't.

The first is a sample Chipco Oyster (25c...who needs those! - heh)
The second is a VERY dirty Casino Arizona $5 chip I found laying around.





On the other hand, the print on the Paulson $5 "UFC 100" chip from Mandalay isn't so much showing a resolution issue, so much as it's showing that it's from a 4-color print process, and that it has to use CYMK (or similar, that looks like CYMK to me) to do whatever they're doing in print.



I assure you, that chip look STUNNING when it's not under the microscope. Being able to zoom in and see the print process isn't exactly how you tell if a chip is good.

If you're doing vector graphics in CYMK or RGB or Panatone, you probably want to match them to what your printer can do. These are the subtleties of custom printing.

A shame. Presumably you could contract a "better" process-matching printer for any non-ceramic chip that you do -- in that you're just putting your own sticker on them. I wonder if I've got an ASM or Blue Chip sample anywhere in the house.

So, anyway, different chip-makers use different print processes. Pick a chip-maker that can print what you want (pictures, graphics) and have it look good on the medium you've chosen (paper, vinyl, ceramic, etc.).

Now if you'll excuse me, I have go to finish gaining the Dwarves' support for fighting the Darkspawn...

WHAT THE...!!

Sold enough 50 centers to buy 100 of these babies...at retail! ARGH!!

I would take that one as a spare, seriously.

I was thinking of getting a sample of these, they look really nice too.

Friend of mine just bought some. I like my Chipcos more, but these are pretty darn nice chips.

Look, all of the replies above are nice but let's cut to the chase...

Here's where to go to buy a tournament set:

Pharoah's Club Chips for 32 cents a chip.

I have 1,000 of these and they are as close to Paulson's as you can get w/o buying actual Paulson's (over a $1.00 a chip).

Just my opinion man...

^^I can't argue with this. It's a good option, too. Just depends on your preference.

.25 to .32 cents per chips may seem like a lot, but you'll be playing with these for many years to come. If you have the money, you won't regret it. Like the old saying, a low price gives you a minute's satisfaction, but quality satisfies for years. Or something like that...

Yeah, as much as I want to make my own tourney set, hard to beat that one. Good quality, nice artwork, variety of edgespots, and the colors coordinate fairly well.

I agree that they're a great set, but something like ASM is a lot closer to Paulson chips -- and all of the China-clay-type chips feel fairly similar, giving you a few other options (Progen/Nextgen/Nextgen Classic) - and the ability to customize.

Pali, what was the cost per chip of your set?

Oh wow those do look nice... I'm really thinking about getting 400 of these bad boys... If I got 400 what kind of denominations would be best? like 100-$1, 200-$5, 60-$25, and 40-$100 or something to that effect? Also what would be the best way to get racks for them because I don't really have a case of any sort and I'd hate to pay 12 dollars in shipping for something that's going to cost 5 dollars.