Tagging Your Wakeboard Made Cheap, Quick & Easy

by Team, April 8, 2010

Summer is just around the corner.  Time to dust off yo’ ride and give it a lil extra flavor.  In this tutorial I will show you a cheap and effective way to tag your board.  You can apply this technique to  just about anything you want  – rails, boots, boats or even your girlfriend’s tiny dog!

First, the essential tools…

1. spray paint – I use Montana spray paint.  You can find them for about $9 a can which is about $5 more than you’d be paying for “regular” spray paint but I’m willing to spend that cause it dries quicker and lasts longer both in the can and on whatever you spray

2. x-acto knife – We’ll be using this to cut out our design

3. 1 side of a manila folder – This is used as our stencil

4. Painter’s tape – Used to keep our design in place while we cut it out of the manila folder.  You can also pick up some M3 Super 77 spray for a couple extra dollars.

5. design – This is what we’ll be cutting out.  You can print the design out on computer paper, do it freehand or even place a photo over the top to trace out.

Step 1

Grab your design and tape it to one side of your manila folder or use the Super 77 spray to do so.  I decided to use Jake Pickle’s icon because he showed me this technique.  Thanks Jake!

Step 2

Cut out your design using the x-acto knife.  This part takes a little practice, especially when cutting around corners and arcs.  It helps to use your fingertips to rotate the knife subtly as you cut instead of applying heavy pressure to direct the knife.  You might need to re-cut parts of the design that didn’t get sliced on your first go around.

Step 3

Now onto the fun part.  Grab your spray paint, stencil and tape (optional) and place your stencil on the surface you want to spray.  I chose to grab a proto of the Oracle cause it had a nice white surface.  If you want your stencil clean & precise then I would recommend taping it to the surface you want to spray.  Sometimes you can get a cool burned/blurry look if you just hold the folder with your hand.  Make your sprays light and use a sweeping motion.  Heavier sprays tend to smear your design when you take off the stencil.  If you want that popular drippy look to your design then hold the spray can in place about 2 inches above the surface you’re spraying and hold the spray for about 3 seconds.  For the drip effect make sure you spray inside the design, with the stencil removed, or else you’ll end up botching the design….Doh!

That’s it! Remove your stencil, grab your shred stick and start ripping.  Your stencil should last for about 30 sprays.