In this guide
How a card stunt works
Every person in the display area holds up one card at the same signal. Seen from far away, the cards blend into an image, like pixels on a screen. American college football calls it a card stunt or card section; supporters groups call it a card display, a mosaic or a choreo.
Most card stunts show one still image. Advanced ones switch between two or more images: each card has a different colour on each side, or every seat gets a numbered set of cards, one per step.
Know your resolution
The resolution of your picture is the number of seats. A sector of 30 rows with 40 seats each is a 40 by 30 pixel image, smaller than an app icon. Before you design anything, get the exact grid.
- Count the rows and the seats per row; most stands get wider towards the top.
- Mark aisles, stairs and blocked seats. They are holes in your image.
- Note the angle: a steep stand is seen almost straight on, a flat one looks squashed from the opposite side.
Design at the real resolution from the start. Shrinking a detailed design at the end always loses the parts you cared about most.
Choose colours that survive distance
- Use three to five colours. Each extra colour adds cost, sorting work and mistakes.
- Pick colours that differ strongly in brightness, not only in hue: red and green have a similar brightness and blur together on TV.
- Prefer matte cards. Glossy surfaces reflect floodlights and sun and turn white on camera.
- Keep white for highlights and text; large white areas look grey in shadow.
Shapes and text
Thin lines disappear. Make every line at least two seats wide, and leave a gap of at least one seat between shapes.
- Letters need about five to seven rows of height to be readable from the opposite side.
- Use a simple, bold typeface with straight strokes built on the seat grid, not a scaled-down script font.
- Fewer letters are better: a date, two or three words, or initials.
- Check that text reads in the right direction for the people looking at it, not for the people holding the cards.
From a logo or photo to seats
Turning a crest or a photo into a card stunt is a reduction: the image has to fit a coarse, irregular grid with only a few colours. An automatic conversion gives you a first draft; the final design is always a human edit.
- Simplify the image first: remove gradients, shadows and small details.
- Map it onto the real seat layout so curved rows and gaps are respected. TifoMaker places the image on the stand's real geometry, which avoids the distortion of a plain rectangle.
- Reduce it to your palette and fix the edges by painting seats directly.
- Look at it in 3D from the opposite stand and the TV camera position, then adjust.
Instructions every row understands
A perfect design fails if people hold the wrong card or raise it at the wrong time. Every seat needs to know three things: which card, which side up, and when.
- Put the card on its seat with a label: sector, row and seat number.
- Print the instruction on the card or on a slip: the signal, and how to hold the card (above the head, straight, facing the pitch).
- Give section leaders a printed plan of their rows so they can fix gaps on the spot.
TifoMaker exports print-ready, seat-by-seat instructions per row, together with the colour counts for ordering.
Check and rehearse
Before match day, check the design in 3D from every viewpoint that matters, print a test of the instructions for one row and walk the stand with the placement teams. On the day, check each sector against the plan before the gates open.
Frequently asked questions
Written by Demetrios VlassisDemetrios Vlassis is the founder of TifoMaker and works in software development in Sofia. An Olympiacos supporter, he built TifoMaker to help fan clubs and event organizers plan tifos seat by seat.
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