Most people associate precision-cut metal with industrial floors, manufacturing lines, and controlled environments. The Brutal Stencils program starts from a different premise: that the same technology capable of producing components for complex engineering applications can, and should, travel on a tour bus.
This is the story of how cadout partnered with Italian symphonic metal band Temperance to produce a custom three-piece kit that demonstrates exactly what laser-cut precision looks like when it leaves the workshop and enters the world.
The Program: What Is Brutal Stencils?
Brutal Stencils is cadout's dedicated initiative for the music and artist community. The premise is straightforward: heavy metal and the broader alternative music world are built on visual identity. Logos, aesthetics, and iconography are not secondary to the music; they are inseparable from it. Bands invest in artwork, stage production, and merchandise because their audience reads imagery with the same attention they give to sound.
cadout identified that intersection as a meaningful opportunity, not as a promotional exercise, but as a genuine product-market fit. The materials and production methods that define cadout's core offering (tight-tolerance laser cutting, multi-material capability, small-to-medium volume runs) map directly onto what artists actually need: durable, custom-designed physical objects that carry a brand identity into real-world environments.
The Brutal Stencils program formalizes that relationship. Each collaboration produces a custom kit designed around a specific artist's visual identity, manufactured to cadout's standard production quality, and delivered as a functional set with multiple distinct use cases.
The Collaboration: Temperance
Temperance are an Italian symphonic metal band with a decade of releases, a loyal international following, and a visual identity refined across multiple album cycles. Their logotype, with its angular and fractured letterforms, presented a production challenge that made them a strong first candidate for the program. If the stencil process could render that level of typographic complexity cleanly, at scale, across multiple material formats, the proof of concept would be credible.
cadout initiated the collaboration directly, proposing a custom kit built around three distinct product formats. Each targets a different context of use and is manufactured from a different material.
"Thanks to cadout we discovered something we never thought of before. We never considered stencils for our tour gear until now."
- Marco Pastorino, founder of Temperance
The Kit: Three Products, Three Use Cases
The Temperance kit was designed to serve three distinct functions simultaneously: tour gear branding, everyday multi-use, and fan merchandise. Each product targets a different surface, user, and context, and each is manufactured to a different material specification.
01 — Large Metal Stencil: Tour Gear Branding
Specifications: 38.0 × 13.5 cm | 0.8 mm steel
The large stencil was built for the touring environment, specifically for application onto flight cases, road cases, and equipment boxes. The kind of gear that gets loaded, unloaded, stacked, and thrown into vans across hundreds of dates.
At 0.8 mm, the steel is thick enough to hold its shape under repeated use without warping at the edges. Applied with spray paint, it produces a clean, sharp transfer of the Temperance logotype without bleed or edge distortion. The stencil can be wiped down and reused across a full tour cycle without degradation to the cut quality.
The 38 cm length accommodates a full logotype treatment across the width of a standard flight case lid. The format was specified with that application in mind, not as an arbitrary dimension.
02 — Small Metal Stencil / Coaster: Multi-Purpose Format
Specifications: 13.5 × 5.0 cm | 0.5 mm steel
The smaller format operates in two modes. As a stencil, it works on personal items, merch, smaller cases, and accessories: any surface where the full-size version would be disproportionate. As a coaster, it functions as a standalone object, a precision-cut piece of steel bearing the band's identity that sits on a desk or table and holds its own as a designed object.
The 0.5 mm gauge is intentional. It produces a piece that is light enough to carry and handle without effort, while retaining enough rigidity to lay flat against a surface during stencil application. The dual function is not a marketing afterthought. It reflects how cadout approaches format decisions: what else can this object do?
03 — Acrylic Keychain: Fan Merchandise and Collectible
Specifications: 6.9 × 5.0 cm | black through-dyed acrylic, matte and gloss finish
The keychain steps outside the steel format entirely and demonstrates cadout's material range. The acrylic is through-dyed black, meaning the color runs through the full thickness of the material rather than being applied as a surface coating. Scratches and normal wear do not reveal a lighter substrate underneath. The piece maintains its appearance over time.
The finish plays two sides: one face matte, one face gloss. Both expose the same precision-cut Temperance logotype. The contrast between the two surfaces on a single object is a deliberate production choice. It shows how the same cut file reads differently depending on material finish, and gives the end user a tactile, dual-sided object rather than a flat tag.
Three objects. Three materials. Three contexts. The same band identity expressed across cadout's full production range.
Built for Real Conditions
A stencil that works once in a controlled environment is a prototype. A stencil that works across a tour is a product.
The steel formats in the Temperance kit were specified with reuse in mind. The 0.8 mm large stencil will hold its edge geometry through dozens of applications; the laser-cut tolerances on the lettering ensure that even the fine internal details of the Temperance logotype transfer cleanly without bridging or dropout. Steel does not flex under the pressure of spray application the way thinner materials do, which means the output is consistent from the first use to the fiftieth.
The acrylic keychain addresses a different durability question: appearance over time, not structural performance. Through-dyeing is the correct material choice for an object that will be handled daily. Surface-coated alternatives discolor and chip at points of contact. Through-dyed acrylic does not, because there is no surface to remove.
cadout's process does not change between a production run for an engineering client and a run for an artist collaboration. The tolerances, the material sourcing, and the cut quality are the same. What changes is the application.
What the Temperance Kit Demonstrates
The Brutal Stencils program was designed to make a single argument: that cadout's manufacturing capability is not sector-specific.
The same laser-cutting infrastructure that produces functional components for technical applications can produce objects with equal precision for creative ones. The material range is the same. The production quality is the same. The minimum viable quantity for a custom run is accessible to an independent band operating without a major label budget.
The Temperance kit is a proof of concept for that argument: three products, designed and manufactured to cadout's standard, delivered into a context that has nothing to do with traditional manufacturing and everything to do with what precision actually makes possible.
Work With Us
For bands and artists: The Brutal Stencils program is open to applications. If your band has a visual identity worth putting on a surface that lasts (flight cases, merch, accessories, collectibles), cadout can produce the kit.
→ Apply to the Brutal Stencils program
For product details: The full specifications for the stencil formats and acrylic options used in the Temperance kit are available in the product catalog.
For custom projects: If you have a brief that does not fit a standard format, cadout works directly with clients to spec and produce custom runs.
cadout is a precision laser-cutting and manufacturing studio. The Brutal Stencils program is cadout's ongoing collaboration initiative with artists, bands, and creative brands.