PlayingCardForum.com - A Discourse For Playing Cards
Playing Card Chat ♠ ♥ ♣ ♦ => Design & Development => Topic started by: Helshawk on March 19, 2016, 08:29:31 PM
-
Started working on a set of Pirate Cards that will have famous pirates for the court cards. Here are the examples with what I have thus far.
-
I'm trying to attach the back but I keep getting the error that the file size is too big even though it is smaller than the previous post. >:(
-
Here is the back.
-
And a pipped card.
-
A few observations - constructive criticisms, intended to help you refine the deck into a better version of itself.
The spot card 8 of Spades looks fine - if you're using gold for the black suits, what will you be using for the red suits?
File size errors are common - five graphic files to a post maximum, at not more than 1,000 Kb per file. One-megabyte images are plenty large enough for web page display, but it is annoying to have to reduce image sizes when your file's too big; been there, done that, bought the T-shirt...
For the back design, consider a brighter shade of yellow to provide greater contrast. A low-contrast, mostly-dark design will end up printing like mud if you aren't careful. Also insure that the level of detail you're putting into the design can be accommodated by your printer, because lots of fine detail can also be lost, especially when you factor in that your print surface, likely to be an embossed playing card, isn't entirely 100% flat and level, leaving the chance for distortion in reproducing ultra-fine details.
Black Bart bears a striking resemblance to Mel Gibson! Be careful - if you used a Mel Gibson image to make the card, especially if it was from a movie he appeared in, you could be opening yourself up to cease-and-desist letters from whomever owns the intellectual property you repurposed, unless of course you have permission in writing, which usually costs a hefty chunk of change.
For the King of Clubs and the 8 of Spades, pull back the center image a bit - it's too close to the index. Push the index as far into the corner as you can without getting too close to the die line. Avoid a script font for the index - they're not as easy to read. Perhaps a font resembling the lettering carved into the aft of the ship would look nicer and be more easily read?
Why are you using lines suggesting an aged scroll framed around the king's image while the image itself is a color image closely resembling a modern photo? Pick one style and run with it rather than mashing two incompatible styles together in the hopes that they'll stick to each other. A popular and attractive trend is to leave out frames on the court cards altogether - it allows you to make the art larger and removes the claustrophobic feeling a frame can create.
Is your image really that of "Black Bart?" Or is it just some image of a pirate face you created? If it's the latter, don't bother with the name - the image looks less attractive with the name like that in the first place. It's like putting up a picture of me and calling it "Redbeard." Redbeard the Pirate was a historical figure with a real face, and it certainly isn't my face!
-
Yes, I've always thought Mel Gibson would make a good Blackbeard or, in this case, Black Bart. When I first started this idea, I just used Gibson to flesh it out but I would never use it in any reproduction capacity. I am lining up other models to use in the court cards, as seen in the attached. Since there are very few images that provide a true likeness of most of the pirates, I'm using models to represent them. Whether I stay with the photo-realistic examples here or go to a more stylize, abstract version, I haven't decided. As for the index font, some of them I really, REALLY like but others I don't. It may come down to where I create my own personal font set but I appreciate the comments, suggestions and critiques.
-
Helshawk - So it looks like your spade and club is gold and your diamond and heart is gold. Look like you have a wonderful art deck going on...
-
Helshawk - So it looks like your spade and club is gold and your diamond and heart is gold. Look like you have a wonderful art deck going on...
He's made them both gold, using black and red borders to distinguish them from each other. I would suggest using that style in the center pips and going for solid red and black for the indices - this gives you easily-identified indices while still having your artistic vision in the center of the card.
I don't know how well the photo-realistic images will work - I think going for more abstract images might work better, much like how most decks use recognizable but somewhat abstract images for their court cards. Try both and see which looks better to your eye.
-
Here is a revised version of the 8 of spades. I'm liking this better but i've done a version where all the pips are black with gold trimming as shown and I'm liking that as well. have to play with a couple red cards to see how they match up. Your thoughts?
-
Here is a revised version of the 8 of spades. I'm liking this better but i've done a version where all the pips are black with gold trimming as shown and I'm liking that as well. have to play with a couple red cards to see how they match up. Your thoughts?
All-black with gold trim looks very good - better, I think.
-
Usually, the text is within the ribbon. In this case, it looks like a wood plank.
-
Yes, I've always thought Mel Gibson would make a good Blackbeard or, in this case, Black Bart. When I first started this idea, I just used Gibson to flesh it out but I would never use it in any reproduction capacity. I am lining up other models to use in the court cards, as seen in the attached. Since there are very few images that provide a true likeness of most of the pirates, I'm using models to represent them. Whether I stay with the photo-realistic examples here or go to a more stylize, abstract version, I haven't decided. As for the index font, some of them I really, REALLY like but others I don't. It may come down to where I create my own personal font set but I appreciate the comments, suggestions and critiques.
I'm sure you know this already, but be certain to obtain model releases, even if you are going to alter the art to an abstraction of the original life-like image. Legally-speaking, it's better to cover your ass than leave it swinging in the breeze... :))
Many custom playing card designers PREFER using an original font. It's far more unique and appealing than using something that Joe Sixpack can find when he installs Microsoft Word!
Test out using the pirate images on the courts with no frame at all. I think you might actually like the results - and it will allow you to enlarge the image size and really show off how they look.
If you're not going for images of real, historical pirates, I'd leave out the "name plank" altogether. It will look nicer without it, especially if you can pull off a true "double-headed" court image - your own take on the standard playing card design for courts.
-
Yes, Don, model releases are a must. As much as I'd like to do a set featuring realistic images of famous pirates, they tended to be a very shy group that didn't have their images captured very often. Imagine that. Plus, I totally agree using a common font for something like this is short changing the project. It's been ages since I've created a new font. So, with those points in mind, it might be I'm leaning in the direction you've suggested, to forget using the names altogether.