QUOTEHere we go guys... I have begun the process.
First, let's look at the sexy, sleek, yet slippery DS before pictures.
Yes it is so perfectly clear that my camera can focus on the lamp in the reflection. One more for good measure...
Now for the torture devi--I mean, deglossing tools. I thought sandpaper was going to do more than degloss, so I got these nify nail file things.
The grain looks nasty here but it's so zoomed in. It actually hardly feels scratchy at all to the touch.
This is the buffering tool, it seems like a rubber of some sort. I figure if it's good for making nails smooth it'll be good for my DS. Yet this one has another aspect on the sides...
A middle process, it looks grainy like the other in this picture but it's even more fine grain and feels nearly as smooth as the rubber side. The nail file seems to leave a few tiny scratch marks still, this helps blur them before the smoothing out.
Now, what do these little nasties do to the casing?
Well at first it looks like this. It's a bit unsettling, as dust from clear plastic looks white, so I wondered if maybe the black was just a coat of paint over white plastic, but that doesn't seem to be the case.
See if you wife off the dust it doesn't look so bad, though the intense light from the lamp and macro picture is bringing out the scratches more than you see with your eyes.
Midway through the process you might be a bit worried because it looks pretty inconsistent and ugly. Some parts are getting scratched away, but some parts haven't gotten through enough gloss so they look darker and the whole effect is splotchy, scratch marks are also still pretty apparent. But have no fear, you just have to work through a little more of that gloss evenly over the whole surface. I took the stylus out because it seems to scuff worse than the system. Now for technique...
Eventually dust cakes on the file, leave it there. Making quick circular motions and the dust help to work away the gloss but evenly and with less noticeable scratches.
Now we're making good progress. The scratches are starting to become less visible, the texture is smooth and has good grip, fingerprints evaporate right off of it. You see the upper right area is just about where you want it, much lighter-looking than the gloss but evenly matches with the hinge/inner plastic of the system. Plus the lamp lighting is still making it look brighter than it really looks.
Ok well this is going to take a decent amount of time and my camera's batteries are low. So I'm going to continue working on this and let the batteries recharge and update you guys later. The lamp is screwing with things so I'll take some daylight/ambient pictures of the top of the system before deglossing that to get some good comparison shots when I'm done. And for the record when filing near ports I'm going to have the port facing down to help prevent dust from getting in there, and I may use a kneaded eraser to remove the bulk of it instead of wiping it off as a further precaution. I won't file directly over them because thats a bit too risky and I don't want to scratch off the paint signifying headset/volume.
