Customizing Your Tournament Edition Fightstick

I went to a pawn shop looking for a used fightstick. Low and behold, I found one. It was only 15 bucks! But it was painted blue all around the the buttons & balltop was painted red. The original casing was black, the ball top use to be yellow, the stick use to be black and the buttons were yellow and some white. The gorgeous cover was tortured with a sticky blue paint. This thing was UGLY! But I knew I could turn this guy around.

This is the mess that I found when I took the stick apart.This is the mess that I found when I took the stick apart. ALL BETTER NOW! I cleaned it up and it’s ready to put back together.

Concept and Design
So here is my plan. Keep the casing the blue that it is. Make an akuma template cause his gi is already dark blue. Buy new buttons and ball top.

Here is my design idea.

I used screenshots of the game to help me with colors and style. I added the purplish flames to the floor and his back just like the game. I put akumas symbol in the background too. I took out the SSFIV logo and placed in the MvC3 logo.

Cutting the template was a hard task when I made the DAN stick. My circles where terrible and I was lucky the buttons covered them. So I do some research on youtube looking for circle cutters. Then I found this Martha Stewart circle cutter.

It is an awesome tool! I used it and made perfect circle cut outs. Martha is a very smart lady. I used thick and thin paper to practice on first. It feels a little funny when you first start. Try not to push too hard down on it. The blade is already sharp enough. Just a little pressure will do the trick.

I used and EXACTO knife to cut out the edges and the small rectangle on the upper left corner. I was very pleased with my work. I thought it looked clean.

Well, I’m waiting for my PLEXI GLASS cover to come in from TEK INNOVATIONS. It takes 14 days just to receive a confirmation that the product will get shipped. That is HALF A MONTH!!! C’mon guys, I’m sure somehow, someway you can improve your turn around time. Oh well. I need them and will consider them regardless of if the Plexi turns out marvelous.

So, I’ll end with my final picture that I just took.