"Different" PCB's

[itcamefrommars]

Picking the brains of some experience I hope -

I'm designing boards that are more on the aesthetic side and am ready to manufacture my pcb's.
3 questions - pcb shape, trace paths shape, and color:

1) Is there any concern when designing odd shaped pcb's?
Such as 5"(13cm) round with a perforated 2"(5cm) center circle?
I've put out some questions to a few pcb manufacturers and got no response with some, misunderstood response with a couple of others.

2) Also looking for any advice concerning traces with more curves and interesting shapes in contrast to the standard 90dg turns of straight traces.

3) Then there's the question of the soldermask color - where to get a purple soldermask?

Thanks all!,
I really don't know any other place on the interwebs to ask this,
and that makes this forum pretty special!
- mars

[alphabetter]

You might find this useful on strange PCB shapes:
http://todbot.com/blog/2011/06/06/from-illustrator-to-eagle-vector-graphics-in-circuits/

I thought I saw another post about it too recently but I can't find it again.

I think the Purple resist is a special for the DorkbotPDX service. There is a comment somewhere about them mixing other resist colours to make it.

I don't see why "curvy" tracks should be a problem. I've seen a few examples of "artistically" etched PCBs.

[mikeselectricstuff]

Odd shapes shouldn't be a problem. bear in mind the standard cutter will be around 2mm, so tight internal corners can be a problem.
Trace shapes can be whatever you like, but different PCB software will handle these more or less well.
As regards weird resist colours, the issue is whether you are running enough boards for the PCB supplier to want to get or mix a special ink, and you may pay a 1-off cost for any change from standard (to cover cleaning etc.).
An alternative to special inks may be to do 2 resists of different, but more standard colours, which will still be a cost adder but could be less than nonstandard inks.

[westfw]

I was hoping someone with more actual experience would chime in, but you might want to look at what the EvilMadScientists say about their "BulbDial" clock: http://www.evilmadscientist.com/article.php/bulbdial3

My general impression is that many of the low-cost prototype houses now use a CNC router to cut final board shapes, so complex external shaping is probably OK (see arduino or even mintyboost.) Internal routing may or may not be allowed, but I'd expect that if it IS allowed you would be restricted to using the same router bit that they use for the external routing.

Or you can find someone with an LPKF or similar. Cutting shapes is the easy part there...

[itcamefrommars]

Fantastic responses! Thanks so much.

I did see the dorkbotpcb service and read about their work to get that color...
My company logo and theme is purple, so that's why I asked that particular color. I think I'll contact dorkbot and ask them a few questions... perhaps use them for some short run prototypes.

The todbot link is excellent too as I'm a loooong time designer in vector graphics. I should probably also contact emsl... as I'm impressed with their use of pcb in the eggbot frame! I remember when I opened it and my daughter was the one that actually recognized it! HAHA! Her first solder work was on a 3set spokePOV btw at age 7. At least it wasn't the lol shield.

Cheers! Again thanks to all!
- mars