Paintballs are small gelatin balls filled with polyethylene glycol, other water-soluble substances and dye. Early paintballs were made of oil based paint and glass which made the stains on the clothes impossible to wash out. On the contrary, stains caused by modern paintballs are easy to remove from most materials and they can be washed from human skin by plain water. The color of gelatin shell, which is designed to break upon impact, doesn’t always have to be the same as the color of the paint inside.

Since the paintballs are covered with gelatin shell, they may get deformed if exposed to heat and moisture. If a paintball game takes place outdoors on a very hot or humid day, paintballs should be stored in a cooler.

The whole process of manufacturing paintballs is quite simple. At first special paint is made out of mineral oils, food coloring, calcium, ethylene glycol, and iodine at a paint manufacturing plant, and then transported to the encapsulating plant. Here, gelatin capsules are produced by mixing and heating sorbitol and various sweeteners together. Gelatin is added as the last ingredient. When all substances are melted, they are mixed for about 30 to 40 minutes. Then gelatin mix is cooled a little and rolled to make thin strips.

Next, two gelatin strips are moved through a special encapsulation equipment where they are transformed into two half a round paintball shells. As the encapsulation equipment closes them together, it injects paint into the cavity and the two gelatin halves are then sealed together. At this point, the paintballs are still warm and soft.

In order to cool and harden paintballs, they are put into a tumbling machine which cools them down by shaking. The tumbling process also helps the paintballs to get hardened to a uniformly shaped balls. When the paintballs are cool enough, they are put on shelves where they continue to air dry. Necessary time for drying them completely varies from plant to plant.

Before packing and shipping the paintballs, they have to be visually inspected for any obvious imperfections. Then they are loaded into special packing machine called hopper. Once packed in boxes, they are ready to be shipped out.

In general, the better quality of material used for manufacturing paintballs the better quality paintballs are produced. Since paintballs are made of non-toxic and biodegradable materials, they are very environment friendly products. Plus, they are edible, so if swallowed by mistake, they won’t negatively affect the human body.