Empire Car Graphics

What

The Galactic Empire logo from Star Wars and “ISB PATROL” in “Aurebesh” font.
(Imperial Security Bureau, as seen in the excellent Disney Plus TV series “Andor”.)

When

September 2025.

Why

My car bonnet paintwork was bubbling and flaking off. And because SOME of Star Wars is awesome. Not all of it. No, absolutely not.

Development & Progress

Before settling on the bonnet graphics, I had played with AI ideas that wouldn’t have been easy, cheap or legal.

I was originally going to do rear, roof and side graphics too. I still could at some point.

I already had the empire logo from at least 2009, but I had to break it down so it could be cut on a machine that could handle 300mm x 300mm.

The central “cog”, along with some 5s and 6s, that I was going to update my wheelie bin numbers with. (See below.)

I aligned the cut black vinyl on a print out of the emblem.

There were a bunch of steps involved with getting the black vinyl onto the cream vinyl.

This was some sort of alignment step. It was a bit confusing then, let alone now some months later.

Anyway, I got to a point where I had a disk of backed cream vinyl ready to stick on.

Applied! And luckily, the cream vinyl was barely any different from the actual colour of paint on my car.

I still had to do the lettering, but it wasn’t too difficult.

Ready to go on patrol, in the name of Lord Vader.

Current Status

Still okay in November 2025.
Considering that it was my first attempt and the base was uneven from dodgy paint, I don’t think it’s too bad. I don’t see a car as my pride and joy anyway. It’s just a piece of equipment. So it’s good enough for me, and it’s better and more interesting than before.