This week I thought I would try something a little different. What about creating some office wall art based on the Avengers? Heck yes! Totally cool right? Well, I thought so. Then I also thought what colors should I do them in. I have been wanting to use the fluorescent colors on a project and they ended up being a perfect match.

What Color Vinyl

Dilema, What color should I use for each hero? Both Captain America and Thor use blue, but for the fluorescent colorsI wanted each hero to have their own color. So here's my product lineup:

What Design

This took a lot of thinking about the office space and how complex I wanted the design to be. After researching I came across some great designs that can be found here at Etsy, (you can get these in a bundle or separately).

The design pack came with all 5 characters: Captain America, Hulk, Thor, Iron Man, & Hawkeye.

This 5 pack allowed me to resize the design to what ever size I needed. I chose to size these to 11" wide and 20" tall. This would allow me to use the full width of the vinyl which makes it as large as I can get it without having to cut two sheets of vinyl and overlapping them.

I also went to a local cabinet maker and got some scrap wood. The wood was unfinished, so I simply sprayed it with some lacquer to finish it up and give it the natural look I wanted. The wood came in different shapes that I had to cut down to size. So I took some sticky note to mark where I wanted the vinyl to be after I measured it. I could have used a pencil mark, but because the wood was finished, I didn't want to leave pencil marks or have to erase any marks on the wood.

Cutting The Vinyl

After downloading the Avenger file from Etsy, you'll need to unzip the file. Once the file is unzipped, then you can open it into the Silhouette Studio. By clicking on the corners of the image, you will be able to adjust the size to the dimensions you need. Load the appropriate color vinyl into the Silhouette machine and select "Send To Silhouette". It will walk you through the next steps within the program.

Applying the Vinyl

When applying the vinyl it is advised to use the transfer paper. Sometime you may be tempted to use one sheet for multiple transfers but I don't recommend it.

Also take note on the vinyl that have large sections cut out that you don't stretch the vinyl which will lead to bubbles and wrinkles. A great example is the Hawkeye file. It has a large area cut out and it could stretch, even on the transfer paper.

After applying the vinyl I needed to cut the wood to the right size. Due to the saw blade tearing up the edge of the wood when cutting the wood, I cut the wood upside down. I didn't want to slide the vinyl on the work bench because it would scratch it, so I used a sliding table and cut it upside down. If you don't have a sliding table saw, just cut the wood to size before you stain it and apply the vinyl.