Hawaiian Print Skateboard Graphics

Super sweet aloha graphics (without messy expensive silk screening) are possible with some simple materials.

You will need:
1 roll of "removable" contact paper (also known as shelf liner)
Exacto knife
Carbon paper
Spray paint
Pencil
Sharpie
Scotch tape
A print out of a hawaiian graphic (this technique will obviously work with any graphics) :)
One skate deck preferrably with at least one coat of clear lacquer

Essentially this is a masking/stencil technique - it takes time to cut out the image but the results are fantastic.

I enlarged my hawaiin print graphics so they were full size because I wanted to see how the final product would look but you can do spots (i.e. one flower at a time, just make sure you mask off the areas where you don't want paint) 

Note: before I spray painted the deck I applied a black wood stain and one coat of "Deft - Clear Coat" water based lacquer.  I am pretty sure this will work with raw wood but the lacquer enables the contact paper to stick better so I'd suggest using a clear coat lacquer before you do the graphics.

Cut out enough contact paper to cover your entire board.  Peel off the backing and apply it to the board starting at one end and slowly working your want to the other (make sure to smooth out all bubbles.)

Cover your board with carbon paper (black side down) tape it lightly to the deck with Scotch tape.  Then lay the graphics sheet over the carbon paper - stick it down lightly with Scotch tape too so it doesn't shift.  Use your pencil to trace the lines of the graphics so that the contact paper transfers the image to the contact paper.  Once you've traced over the image then remove the graphics sheet and carbon paper and you should have a faint image of the graphics transfered to the contact paper.  Now you'll need to ink in the image with a marker so you can easily see what you need to cut out.

Cut out the part of the image with the Exacto knife.  Only cut out what you want the paint to go through.  The paper is very thin so you don't have to push very hard.  The knife will cut into the wood a little but that's okay because the paint will fill in the cuts. 

This is the fun part - once all the image is cut out you get to lay down the paint.  Apply about 3 light coats of spray paint (follow the instructions on the can, the one I used said re-coat every 5 mintues, dry to touch in 30 min) Note: to do more than one color you can put a piece of paper over individual flowers then spray them with different paint.

Now carefully peel off the contact paper and batta-boom batta-bing you now have a killer Hawaiian print skateboard deck!  Last steps are to apply another coat of laquer then apply grip tape, trucks, wheels etc etc and then shred like a Hawaiian King!