You used a graphite paper? I don’t how thick that stuff is but I remember cardstock is a pain-in-the-butt to cut with X-acto knives! Stick to thin material; it’s much easier to cut than anything as thicker or thicker than cardstock paper. Besides, you should only use cardstock if you can’t or don’t intend to cover the art with a plexi. In that case, you’d have to laminate the art or get a special sticker created through an online printer. With lamination, you could really stick to thinner paper, too. Cardstock is overkill…
Most people mod art on TE’s and HRAP’s witth the plexis that cover the final art… The plexiplates can be used as templates to cut the artwork… You tape the artwork down on a cutting mat, then tape the plexi on top of that, and then carefully cut according to all the spaces and boundaries of the plexi. (On the HRAP’s and TE’s I don’t bother to cut the buttonhead capsocket holes; I just twist in a drillbit that’s just a bit smaller than capsocket screw that will secure the plexi. One less thing I have to cut with an X-acto knife!)
Your other option is using the actual (metal) faceplate as a template but this doesn’t always work well for a variety of reasons –
a) Most mass-produced cases have joystick mounts welded onto the bottom of the faceplate so you’d literally have to flip your art (or graphic design) upside down, flip the faceplate so that it’s lying on the EXTERIOR side and then cut from the interior side of the plate (that has the joystick mount welded to it). You have to be very careful to line up the button hole templates well (which depending on paper/material thickness may not be easy)… Much easier to do this with a plexi but plexis aren’t an option for all joysticks!
b) Guesstimation comes more in play when you have to flip the faceplate for the reasons stated in Point a).
c) The Mad Catz SE’s were not designed for easy art removal nor is there a plexi for this case design… yet. The problem is the built-in curve to the faceplate/palm area. Yes, it makes the stick more comfortable to handle BUT it also complicates art creation for this case because of that bend; several plexi guys like Art Hong say they will probably never make a plexi for the Mad Catz SE case because there’s little chance they’ll figure out a way to bend plexi to fit that case without cracking the plexi.
