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Playing Card Chat ♠ ♥ ♣ ♦ => Playing Card Plethora => Topic started by: Don Boyer on April 26, 2012, 01:19:19 AM
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This info comes to me courtesy of Ncyclopedia/Victor:
http://52aces.zeixs.com/
Another collaborative art deck with some truly out-there gorgeous art. Comes in a foam-padded metal box instead of a tuck case. Limited print run of 999 decks. $28/deck plus shipping.
Discourse Deck people - perhaps this will inspire you to new heights?
Damn, I wish my wallet was a lot thicker...
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Thats what i call art, unlike stupid merz deck
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I want!! but no money at the moment D:
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It's actually 28 euros. Total with shipping to the US for one deck would be around $52.
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Smokes! The face designs are awesome and I am a total sucker for custom designed decks in tin boxes! Unfortunately with all the releases lately I don't have the extra funds to get one of this. It's 40 freaking euros!
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$54.28 as of this morning shipped worldwide. Probably priced at the market given the amaizng art, packaging, and 1000 deck run. Too rich for me but a very sweet looking deck.
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For those who want to see normal pictures and to follow this German project: http://on.fb.me/xI60BF
I don't have their 1st deck & I can only propose this link about it (but you can see how the box can look): http://www.zeixs.com/non-books/limited-editions/52-aces-full/?lang=en
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I am a huge fan of this art. For 38 euros shipped, it isn't too bad. The whole site's in German, and I am not seeing through whom this will be printed. USPCC I'm guessing.
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I would definitely buy them if they were around $10 but that isn't really realistic. I just wish that the back design utilized all that art skill.
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I am a huge fan of this art. For 38 euros shipped, it isn't too bad. The whole site's in German, and I am not seeing through whom this will be printed. USPCC I'm guessing.
What makes you say that? Most times, if someone uses USPC, they say so. Plus it's a German project and there's no shortage of top-notch EU printers out there. Some of the Phoenix decks are USPC, but others are printed domestically by another print house.
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I am a huge fan of this art. For 38 euros shipped, it isn't too bad. The whole site's in German, and I am not seeing through whom this will be printed. USPCC I'm guessing.
What makes you say that? Most times, if someone uses USPC, they say so. Plus it's a German project and there's no shortage of top-notch EU printers out there. Some of the Phoenix decks are USPC, but others are printed domestically by another print house.
I don't know. Although the artists need to get paid, I thought that 38 euros shipped is a lot for a non-USPCC deck. JMO
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I am a huge fan of this art. For 38 euros shipped, it isn't too bad. The whole site's in German, and I am not seeing through whom this will be printed. USPCC I'm guessing.
What makes you say that? Most times, if someone uses USPC, they say so. Plus it's a German project and there's no shortage of top-notch EU printers out there. Some of the Phoenix decks are USPC, but others are printed domestically by another print house.
I don't know. Although the artists need to get paid, I thought that 38 euros shipped is a lot for a non-USPCC deck. JMO
Nathan, 38 euro is a lot for ANY deck that isn't made of a precious or semi-precious metal, regardless of who made it...
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I am a huge fan of this art. For 38 euros shipped, it isn't too bad. The whole site's in German, and I am not seeing through whom this will be printed. USPCC I'm guessing.
What makes you say that? Most times, if someone uses USPC, they say so. Plus it's a German project and there's no shortage of top-notch EU printers out there. Some of the Phoenix decks are USPC, but others are printed domestically by another print house.
I don't know. Although the artists need to get paid, I thought that 38 euros shipped is a lot for a non-USPCC deck. JMO
Nathan, 38 euro is a lot for ANY deck that isn't made of a precious or semi-precious metal, regardless of who made it...
I disagree. There are 52 different artists working on this deck, unlike most decks nowadays made by 1 person. It is obvious the work took longer than almost any other deck on the market, which explains its price. The artists need to get payed. Say the decks took 5,000 hours total to be designed. Divided by 52 is, lets round, 100 hours per artist. 999, or 1,000 decks sold. 38 euros per deck = 50$. 50/52 cards/artists = about 1$ per artist per deck. So if all decks are sold (which I doubt), each artist will have made 1,000$. 1,000/100 hours of work = 10$ an hour. That's BARELY MORE THAN MINIMUM WAGE! That's really not a lot, especially if it is their only source of income. That's NOT INCLUDING the printing, shipping, and web hosting fees, as well as the advertising for their work of art, which would remove another 10-20%. You're saying that they don't deserve 8-10$ per hour for this amazing work? What do S&M v1s, Gold Arcanes, or Gold Monarchs have that make them worth 10x more?
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I am a huge fan of this art. For 38 euros shipped, it isn't too bad. The whole site's in German, and I am not seeing through whom this will be printed. USPCC I'm guessing.
What makes you say that? Most times, if someone uses USPC, they say so. Plus it's a German project and there's no shortage of top-notch EU printers out there. Some of the Phoenix decks are USPC, but others are printed domestically by another print house.
I don't know. Although the artists need to get paid, I thought that 38 euros shipped is a lot for a non-USPCC deck. JMO
Nathan, 38 euro is a lot for ANY deck that isn't made of a precious or semi-precious metal, regardless of who made it...
I disagree. There are 52 different artists working on this deck, unlike most decks nowadays made by 1 person. It is obvious the work took longer than almost any other deck on the market, which explains its price. The artists need to get payed. Say the decks took 5,000 hours total to be designed. Divided by 52 is, lets round, 100 hours per artist. 999, or 1,000 decks sold. 38 euros per deck = 50$. 50/52 cards/artists = about 1$ per artist per deck. So if all decks are sold (which I doubt), each artist will have made 1,000$. 1,000/100 hours of work = 10$ an hour. That's BARELY MORE THAN MINIMUM WAGE! That's really not a lot, especially if it is their only source of income. That's NOT INCLUDING the printing, shipping, and web hosting fees, as well as the advertising for their work of art, which would remove another 10-20%. You're saying that they don't deserve 8-10$ per hour for this amazing work? What do S&M v1s, Gold Arcanes, or Gold Monarchs have that make them worth 10x more?
I don't get it. How does 1 artist take a longer time to design a card than 1 that designs a whole deck? I don't think the time frame here is what explains the price. I'm sure it's just that there are more artists to take into account and it's also another pretty limited quantity deck.
If you were to calculate that way then let's say we take the Actuators. Lance got like 10$ per deck rite. All that goes to him. At 2500 decks it'd be 25000$. 350h(illustrations) means about 70$/h/deck and about 1.30$/card. This is just a simple example.
Then the real calculation based on that for this deck would be, 50$ per deck. 50x1000=50000. 50000/350h(lets say it takes the same time though it should be lesser)= about 140$. 140/52= about 2.50$/h.
It's already more than what Lance gets eventhough he works on the whole deck for a longer period of time.
P.S. If by any chance my calculation or whatever is wrong, by all means tell me. It's like 4am here and I'm pretty sleepy and stuff. :-\
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Nathan, your numbers are wrong on so many different levels.
Just as 54 people assembling one car don't take as long as or longer than a single person doing the same job, 54 artists working on the same deck, each on a single card, don't take longer than one guy making a deck of the same level of detail.
As far as the payment and costs and such - they CHOSE to artificially set the number available at 999 decks. They could just as easily have made more, with a simple outlay of more cash, and the cost per deck would be lower; more money for them while at the same time lower prices for us. This might dilute the "collectibility", but in this market that whole concept is a little overworked these days, with this being just the newest example. And you're not factoring in at all the ancillary profits that can be made - marketing posters, t-shirts, selling art prints, etc.
Don't get me wrong - I understand the work involved and believe that the artists worked hard and should get their due. But as a collective, they decided it was more important to them to make this a limited edition "fetish" item rather than a real deck of cards. Let's call this what it really is - an art project, not a true deck of cards.
Here's the bullshit of the market: at one time in history, deck designers HAD to make a deck in a limited edition because simply put, they couldn't afford to print more. Young upstarts either beg and borrow to start a deck design business or they run to Kickstarter with a dream and a plan, they make their deck and, if they have the right stuff, it sells out and is a success in terms of being sold out, if not always being profitable. (And yes, sometimes it is indeed profitable, but not always.)
But collectors have pounced on this, pushing the concept that it's the rarity and not the design that's pushing the value of the deck. Which frankly, the designer shouldn't care so much about - they're not seeing any of that money in after-market sales, right?
But in a bizarre way, they at least think that they are. They may be right, it's hard to say. The money they see doesn't come from that first deck that was a short-run design which sold out fast and sells for a premium today, if you can find it. It comes from the market's perception that the second deck will ALSO become the uber-rare and highly-sought rare fetish item that the first one became, and push for it to be made. The artist makes it, it sells out, lather, rinse, repeat - and voila, you have companies like the D & D Playing Card Co.
But the artists don't need to feed the collector machine. Ellusionist doesn't, not to the extent that D&D does. (And I'm only using those two as examples - they aren't the ONLY examples in the marketplace.) Most of what E sells isn't rare - in fact, none of it is, because they don't even sell the rare stuff except for the one experiment with the red Artifice deck. They GIVE the rare stuff away! And people still want their cards, but they're easier to get because they aren't limited editions - they just BUY them, and E collects the cash, not some speculator who buys cards waiting for the value to increase...
I'm going to stop my rant there. I need to take a nap...
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My calculations are a bit off. But the point I'm trying to get to is that these aren't like a T11 deck, as much more work and effort was put into it. By buying some, you aren't getting a deck, but you are supporting artists and their art.