Double shot replacements ROUND TWO!

[Fwiffo]

So, you basically want two-color blanks? Instead of legends, just a colored circle or rectangle?

[fssbzz]

i wonder anyone will be interested with Glow in the dark Blank Key cap. by SP
ABS.
they cant do 2 shot on Glow in the dark material, but they have the blank 1 available.
and no PBT available.

[muchadoaboutnothing]

Only thing I've seen thus far that I'd give serious thought to purchasing would be the blue on black. Not a fan of the purple to blue fade either.

fwiffo, I read the reply from a couple pages back from Melissa @ SP. So is the trollface not feasible? I'm really ****ty with understanding dimensions in general...

[johnnysasaki]

I think you'd get plenty of hits doing a bunch of blank black sets just because they are no longer sold by EliteKB and because they'd work for any layout without hassle. Also, I am not sure if this is implied but hopefully orders can be made for flat/normal keys instead of domed ones for the Windows keys. Mac and Linux users will be happy to be on level terms. Plus, the domed Windows keys are ugly anyway.

[kps]

I'd buy a set or two if and only if they have spherical tops, like Signature's SA, SS, or DSS.

As far as colours go, my preference would be a common legend colour and three different base colours: alphabetic, non-alpha printable, and non-printable.

[woody]

So, you basically want two-color blanks? Instead of legends, just a colored circle or rectangle?

I am just proposing something that more people could agree upon, and is cheaper. Put some colour choices, and you might have satisfied customers, even sell to OCN guys. Even put GH or trollface as the legend.
Myself, I'm ok with my Filco, but if I see sensible choices, I might hop in.

[Phaedrus2129]

You absolutely love blues on black.

More like this:

[Kairxa]

More like this:

That song was kinda great

[Kaishi]

Red legends on black keys would look hot.  Blue legends on black keys would be nice too, but I prefer LED-blue, so a backlit board would be more my style.  I don't much care for LED-red.

I know it would be cheesy, but another idea I had was to try to make an american flag key set.  I don't know if anyone would want to own such a thing (I wouldn't) but I would get a kick out of seeing it.  I'm thinking a block of blue keys with white legends, and then alternating rows of red and white keys, with black legends.

[Fwiffo]

Only thing I've seen thus far that I'd give serious thought to purchasing would be the blue on black. Not a fan of the purple to blue fade either.

fwiffo, I read the reply from a couple pages back from Melissa @ SP. So is the trollface not feasible? I'm really ****ty with understanding dimensions in general...

It seems like a consensus is emerging around blue on black. Although I think the fade looks rad, I guess it's not very popular. :tsk:

As far as trollface, I'm in the process of evaluating that. The thick lines in the art are safely over the 0.008" limit. The fine lines are not. I'm going to see if adjusting the art to remove some of the fine lines and replace some with thicker ones is going to still look good. It's really pretty borderline.

If not, the simpler artwork of Awesomeface would work easily.

[zefrer]

Personally I think the fade is the best so far.

[johnnysasaki]

Has anyone thought of stuff like a ? mark box or mushroom or star or Goomba or 1Up à la Mario as possible artwork? I suspect that a keyboard of all keys printed with the ? icon (like this http://cl.ly/372u3r2f3n2y2b0h3Z3x but without the color) would be awesome.

[microsoft windows]

I definitely wouldn't prefer that.

[JBert]

Like this?

Show Image

I was pondering this design for a while but I fear that the double shot might easily break.

[RoboKrikit]

i wonder anyone will be interested with Glow in the dark Blank Key cap. by SP
ABS.
they cant do 2 shot on Glow in the dark material, but they have the blank 1 available.
and no PBT available.

Too bad, double-shot glow-in-the-dark would be baller.  I had suggested that some pages back.

What do the glow-in-the-dark blank keycaps look like?

[fssbzz]

something like


from Cherry Raptor K1 gaming keyboard

but SP one will be the key cap are made by Glow in The Dark Material.
only blank and ABS available.

[manfaux]

I think I would prefer a Black set more so. Black on Black like the Ducky keycaps, with some colors for certain keys.

Show Image

nice, id like a set of these as well~

[RoboKrikit]

That is black print on black keycaps.  I don't know if black on black doubleshot keycaps make any sense.  The lettering would be completely flush with the key.  I can picture gray keycaps with black lettering, or vice-versa, though.

[johnnysasaki]

If the entire set was blank then the international booster keys wouldn't stand out. Throw in a geekhack key and something like a novelty meta key... I'd be in. Having said that, it doesn't have to be this time, I'm sure that there will be a geekhack otaku set at some point so I can wait.

edit: @bakageta. Oooh nice! Not sure about black and green though, makes it look like an xbox peripheral.

Please! @ a geekhack otaku set.

[TheSoulhunter]

The MX relegendables don't look as nice as the ML ones.

Actually I didnt mean relegendable caps, but double shot caps with pictograms

[TheSoulhunter]

Here's red:

Show Image

I really start to like the red on black idea, tho with a different font...
But I got another one -> Green on black with some terminal font -> The Matrix board :P

[Fwiffo]

Some more news from Signature...

The only blanks they generally stock are overruns from other orders and they generally don't have complete sets. Any blank sets we want would have to be run custom. Small numbers of sets are insanely expensive, so it would have to be 25-50 before it becomes affordable. They also have to purge the machine after each run of each color, so every change costs an additional $25. So we could get a bunch of blanks sets if there were at least 25 people or so interested in the same color. We can probably get that many who would be happy with black blanks. I myself would like an otaku set in addition to the new double-shot set.

I've played around with trollface, I think it can meet the manufacturing limitations with a little fudging and still look pretty great.

I'm ordering a color sample ring. I'm not going to try too hard to decide on color schemes until I see what the colors look like. Complicated color schemes that require several color changes will probably be significantly more expensive.

[Mr. Perfect]

Actually I didnt mean relegendable caps, but double shot caps with pictograms

I know this isn't what you mean, but that just screams Egyptian Hieroglyphic key set. :hat: To cool.

[woody]

Show Image

Some random symbols I snatched off the net:


And the following have such a style:


Imagine Otaku with all keycaps with the same symbol. Anyway, just some ideas.

[Parak]

I had an idea on the symbol thing a while back, where the symbols are simple geometric shapes - circles, triangles, squares, and so on. For example, all of the regular keys might be circles, backspace might be something like "<<<" with triangles, tab " ", function keys are square, and so on. Tooling costs are likely to be prohibitive though, even if the shapes are simple.

Another thing that I'd be quite interested in are 1x2 and 1x1 keys, blank or symboled for matrix or programmable boards. The ones that are available commercially generally have weird profiles. In fact I'd love to see 1x1 alt/ctrl/win/menu/tab keys; I bet signature makes them for pos applications all the time

[dizzyone]

I got a bit bored and decided to create a 3d model to show my designs (actually I just got bored and made a 3d model, my designs suck).






Got a bit lazy putting the letters on there, but meh, I'm considering to join this round, as long as theres some colored keys in the deal

[Phaedrus2129]

The red on black might look nice with the red PCB of the RK-9000.

[2084]

Nice, I like the first and last best. Especially the first blueish grey one. Wine-red would look nice as a highlight key, but that might be hard to get right and could be a risk if not done well by signature plastics

[Sov]

The second example with the dark blue keys dizzyone posted looks good as well - not really a huge fan of the blank keys, but the color combo looks great.

[dizzyone]

The second example with the dark blue keys dizzyone posted looks good as well - not really a huge fan of the blank keys, but the color combo looks great.

I didn't save the colors, but yeh, heres something similar with lettering:

[zefrer]

Wow, I really like the blank sets dizzyone posted. Would be down for anyone of those except the green one.

[johnnysasaki]

I didn't save the colors, but yeh, heres something similar with lettering:

Show Image

This looks really great (though I favour the blank version)! What software did you use to model this?

[dizzyone]

Autodesk Maya and MentalRay. You can have the file if you like.

Anyhow, I made a few more (extremely bored), I was trying to do an old skool nintendo theme, and just ended up doing a couple of quick renders:



Personally I'd really love to have a nintendo like theme, it just looks badass.


Edit: I forgot that I also did the blue keyboard with black lettering:



To be fair, I don't know which colors Signature Plastic have available, but I'm really just trying to go for a basic impression of different color combinations, and maybe even get more people excited?

[db_Iodine]

Actually that dark blue keys with black lettering looks amazing. I'm not sure I like the different color WASD-keys but that color scheme is amazing.

[guilleguillaume]

The Pink-Blue combination it's awesome

[tjweir]

Autodesk Maya and MentalRay. You can have the file if you like.

Anyhow, I made a few more (extremely bored), I was trying to do an old skool nintendo theme, and just ended up doing a couple of quick renders:

Show Image

Personally I'd really love to have a nintendo like theme, it just looks badass.


Edit: I forgot that I also did the blue keyboard with black lettering:

Show Image

To be fair, I don't know which colors Signature Plastic have available, but I'm really just trying to go for a basic impression of different color combinations, and maybe even get more people excited?

Oh my, oh my.  The first and second Nintendo colourschemes are amazing.

I'd take either of them.  Great idea.

[zefrer]

Actually that dark blue keys with black lettering looks amazing. I'm not sure I like the different color WASD-keys but that color scheme is amazing.

Seconded.

[Fwiffo]

Can you do some with black keys and colored lettering?

[2084]

Hell yea Nintendo theme! Finally someone with some design-sense

[fssbzz]

why not use the original font by SP?
here i got.




SP on left, DAS on right

[Fwiffo]

I have confirmed with signature that there is only one choice of font (italic/futura is a no-go), but there are options for size and location. Since we did big, centered, retro style last time, I plan to go for a more modern placement this time - that is, smaller and in the upper left corner of the key. So the font size and placement would be similar to Filco, but it wouldn't be the fancy italic font.

[fssbzz]

the one i show on pic is italic font?
i tot is more like San Serif font.
That's what i got from SP, that's their default font

[Fwiffo]

No, you showed the signature font. A lot of the mock-ups people have posted are using the Filco font or something similar, which is not available.

Also, if people are concerned about the thickness of the plastic, the only alternative is to find a different manufacturer that can make thicker keycaps. I am open to suggestions if anybody knows of one.

[dizzyone]

Can you do some with black keys and colored lettering?

Sure, it would be better if I redid the font to look more like the ones SP use, anyone have any idea what font looks similar? I tried identifying it based off of fssbzz's pictures, using WhatTheFont? and identifont, but no luck in finding anything close to it.

[Fwiffo]

A basic sans-serif font like Arial or Helvetica is going to be your best bet. Probably you won't be able to get an exact match.

I'll inquire more about the plastic thickness. It may be only possible with a different profile family or something like that.

[johnnysasaki]

Autodesk Maya and MentalRay. You can have the file if you like.

Anyhow, I made a few more (extremely bored), I was trying to do an old skool nintendo theme, and just ended up doing a couple of quick renders:

Show Image

Personally I'd really love to have a nintendo like theme, it just looks badass.


Edit: I forgot that I also did the blue keyboard with black lettering:

Show Image

To be fair, I don't know which colors Signature Plastic have available, but I'm really just trying to go for a basic impression of different color combinations, and maybe even get more people excited?

Count me in for something like the top left or bottom left Nintendo designs! They is stylin'. Not sure whether the Awesome face really works with the Nintendo theme but it'd be pretty hot either way.

The business style ones  are more drab but also really slick. Can't really go wrong with classy blue, black, and grey.

By the way, is this batch going to be made up of profiled keys or are they going to be all the same type? If they aren't profiled for each row, you can bring the costs down I imagine and people can customize the layouts even more upon delivery. I imagine many people want profiled ones though... Just a thought.

[fssbzz]

erm.. The thickness of the key cap will affect your typing speed?
i don't know why people whine about the thickness of SP key caps.
what so big deal about it?

[muchadoaboutnothing]

erm.. The thickness of the key cap will affect your typing speed?
i don't know why people whine about the thickness of SP key caps.
what so big deal about it?

Durability, I believe

Still, I broke one Filco keycap and it was absolutely negligence on my part.

[Sam]

Although the texture of brand new keys is nice, my NIB Cherry Doubleshots got shiny in a year - ABS plastic is not all that tough.

Your keys got shiny just sitting in a box?  I always thought they only got shiny from actual use.

[itlnstln]

Keyboard gnomes.