I’m wanting to make a shadow box for my granddaughter who plays softball . The pics I’ve found so far look really thin. It looked almost like plywood but the last time I used really thin wood with the shapeoko the wood just chipped and tore and didn’t look right . Any suggestions as to what kind of thin wood that I could use for the shadow box ? I figured that I could ask you guys and you all would lead me in the right direction 
I think of a shadow box as an extra deep picture frame. Can you give an example picture of what you’re trying to do?
I’ve had good luck with the 1/4" thick (true dimension) “craft boards” from Lowe’s/Home Depot — they have red oak and poplar at most locales, and usually enough stock to allow one to sort through and get knot-free pieces (and for poplar, clear pieces w/o the green tinge which makes painting the best finish for typical poplar projects).
What dimensions would you want the piece to be?
Might want larger/thicker stock — ash would be a traditional choice for a softball themed project (historically having been used for bats) and is sometimes affordably available (from trees cut down because of the emerald ash borer).
How would you want to do the joinery?
My guess would be that the pink part of the flag in the background and the painted silhouette of the player are laser cut, probably 1/8" ply.
What goes on a display like that? Rings?
Why not use .5" hardwood. There are places you can order .5" or if you have a planner it is easy to cut .75" down to .5". With hardwood you will likely prevent sagging over time. You could still paint it. Poplar is a good wood to paint. As @WillAdams said above sometimes poplar has a purple/green tint. I have been told that you can lay that type of poplar outside in the sun it it changes the color. If you paint it does not matter what the color of the wood is underneath. If you do paint always prime. Without priming it takes 1-2 more coats to cover the grain of any wood. Many paints have the primer already in it.
TigerPLY™ EDGE 1/4 inch Premium Plywood. I got some at Menards. Great stuff for small things. Cuts very nice with a 1/8 compression bit. Can use hardwood settings in Carbide Create or do a full depth finish pass. Very stiff for 1/4 inch with zero voids. It probably would look best painted/stained for that application.
Yes and they also could be used to hang medals on I’m assuming…thank you
Thank you for that information. We have a lowes here where I live so ill make a trip there
Thank you for your insight. It would be great to able to make this for my granddaughter!
If the whole thing will be painted, then it doesn’t necessarily have to be wood. It just has to be ‘paintable’.
consider other thin materials that you can paint, and that will be durable enough. Hardboard, HDF, paintable plastics.
I like wood, so would likely design it to use 3 different species of wood for the 3 colors.
The top could be acrylic/plexiglass, or even glass with the player etched in reverse on the backside of the glass, Or reverse painted on the back of the glass.
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Those are some great ideas as well. I’ve cut pvc on my machine and it worked well and doesn’t weigh as much as wood. I’ve never cut glass …I don’t have a bit for that and not even sure if my machine is capable of that. I’ll have to do some more research . Thank for the help
Since you said ‘really thin’ wood, I assume you mean really thin. Like 1/16" thick or less? I routinely cut 1/32" birch plywood and abs plastic sheets.
Do you use a down-cut or an up-cut spiral end mill? The nature of rotary cutters is that the flutes tend to pull the work into the bit, which with (really) thin wood and an up-cut endmill that means the wood flexes quite a bit (and sometimes a lot more than quite a bit).
My suggestion is to use down-cut spiral endmills for thin work. Plan B (if you only have up-cut spiral endmills) would be to use a lot more double-sided tape to hold down the work.
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Thank you for the advice . I’ll be posting my results soon !
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