10K views & update

The blog just clocked 10,000 views and still counting! Great stuff, thanks everyone for checking it out :-)

I've been away for a little while so I haven't been doing any design work or adding anything to the blog but I'm back now and looking to get stuck into some more polished back designs as soon as I can get my head into it, watch this space!!

Cheers

Revised v1 Raptor backs...

Added pop and circular symmetry with a quick but effective revision...

What to do with those empty circles though?!?

Ideas?

Raptor back - draft v1

I finally got around to drawing the new concept out onto a piece of paper as a (very) rough draft. Initial revisions will need to be:

• make the fleur-de-lys in the corners more prominent
• make the feathers in the raptors' wings slightly more distinctive and seperated
• do something with the centre circle, currently made up of the raptors' fantails, maybe put some legs and talons over the top
• make the circles more obvious and distinctive from a distance
• make the background flourishes fade into the background a bit more, bring the raptors out into the foreground a bit more

Very sketchy initial rendering of this new concept, but it's definitely a worker once it's had a few revisions and some detail and attention put into it.



Back design geometry and symmetry

Model showing the symmetry and geometry template for the new look Raptor backs...

New Raptor box

New box art and colour scheme from left to right for blue deck, red deck and black deck Linoid Finish Raptors.

These are gonna look sick!

Back design's hopefully getting drawn up during the week so watch this space.

Ace of Spades concept v2

This would require me drawing the eagle out and dropping it in there to replace this photoshopped version which I have included only as a concept, what do people think? I'm running with a finalised version of this or the skull beneath. Probably this.

Thoughts?

Ace of Spades v1

The skulls are back in town the skulls are back in town...

The Ace of Spades is the death card though right? So it fits.

Raptor is the name of the deck since the back is going to feature birds of prey, and the faded wings around the edge tie in with this theme as well.

There is another Ace of Spades concept on the way shortly...

Poll results...

Artwork on the aces?

Just the Ace of Spades - 24 votes (vs. all aces - 11 votes)

Tuckbox: 1 colour or 2?

2 colour - 17 votes (vs. one colour - 16 votes)

New colour scheme on fronts or traditional?

New colour scheme - 26 votes (vs. traditional scheme - 8 votes)

High Court

This is actually a 7 colour face scheme compared to the standard American faces which are 3 colour. I really went to town on the detail, with faces and hands, fingernails, hair and eyes all receiving their own unique colour. I want these picture cards to wow everyone who looks at them because of their beautiful colour scheme, but also to impress upon closer scrutiny once all the details are taken in.

The Jack and Queen of Spades are both holding something black to show their allegiance to their king, as the Jack and Queen of Hearts are both holding something red.

The colour scheme is based on a European style deck but the addition of the racing green was an idea of my own that I haven't seen anywhere else and I think works incredibly nicely.

I will get to work on the Ace of Spades (which I have sketch designed) and the Jokers very shortly and complete the full set of face cards before returning to the back designs.

With a splash of green...

Looking good?

Or not?

Thoughts?

Another colour scheme...

Slightly European in its origins, I really like this one too. The standard faces are again included on the left for comparison.

Face Recolours...

I have decided to add a subtle skintone to the face and hands of the picture cards, and add a light grey to the hair on the kings and queens. Take a look at these examples...



I'm pleased with this look, and I will start colouring all the cards to this style.

Turns out in the end the deck will have custom faces all the way through! Sweet :-)

New dress?

Sick colour scheme concept based on a Japanese casino deck I just dug out of my shoebox of magic tricks earlier this evening. I've included the standard cards on the left for comparison. You have no idea how sweet this colour scheme looks on a deck of cards in real life...

Thoughts?





Polls polls polls!

Some poll results for y'all...

Skulls:

An overwhelming majority of people voted against the use of skulls in my back design, with 23 no vs. 11 yes that's more or less a 2 to 1 majority, however, I have had several people on the forums and elsewhere tell me they would welcome skulls cautiously if and only if they were done right and added something to the design and weren't just in there for the sake of it, which is how I feel anyway, so the skulls still have a chance...

Favourite colour for a deck:

Incredibly even on this one, with no majority preferences to speak of, bar the odd result, red, blue and black all seem to be evenly loved, with the results: 8 red vs. 9 blue vs. 9 black. From a design perspective this means the first run of my deck can go on any of the three colours, although I was tending toward blue myself and possibly black for neutrality reasons (so hard to choose red over blue or vice versa!), the remaining two colours would be second edition print runs.

Tallys or Bikes:

As expected, a majority of people would prefer the deck to be printed on tally stock rather than bike, with 13 tally vs. 4 bike, a 3 to 1 majority. It's definitely gonna be tallys...

*NEW POLLS*

Now going up

Legal approval and design updates

The USPCC legal department have just approved my tally-ho style tuckbox design, there was potentially an issue with it being very similar to the existing tally box which is obviously a deliberate homage on my part given the stock I will be publishing the deck onto but I have just been given the all-clear to use a tally-style box which is great news :-) although the name and design will be changed slightly if I run with the eagle concept and not the gears n skulls, I'm almost certainly gonna be using a tally style box. Love it! It has always been one of my favourite boxes, and I think it will make a welcome change to all the custom bike designs/boxes there are out there at the moment.

On a design front, I have started concept-designing in a different way and have had immediately pleasing results, I will post my first and second drafts and a slightly developed mock-up version over the weekend, the eagle-back concept has become much more streamlined and aesthetically pleasing now incorporating the circle-heavy symmetry I've always wanted my deck to exhibit. I'm excited! I'm also gonna start vectorising my artwork at this stage in the design process and move onto the Ace of Spades, Joker, and Artwork card designs asap. I am toying with the idea of working up a slightly embellished ace design for each ace, not just the ace of spades, although I'm not sure. What do people think? I'll make a poll...

More on the way soon guys...

Imperial Eagle concept

OK, this took a few attempts to get to anything even halfway respectable. The first 2 iterations were horrrendous. This is looking promising though. What do people think? It doesn't have any skulls in (yay)!

The next iteration of this design will look a heap better by:

• bolder more prominent wings with less feathers reaching all the way out to the side borders and set to a new circle aside from the circle the eagle sits in
• less scribble detail, slightly bolder overall
• revised legs and scroll details
• fleur-de-lys weapons revised to look how they're supposed to!
• Wing feathers in a radial flourish in the centre circle to complement the wings in each quarter

This is pretty much it now. I'm gonna revise this to the point where it's a runner and then work this and the skull design up into a polished print-ready image and decide which one I want to develop at which point I will only develop the ace, jokers, artwork card and tuckbox for the design I have chosen and put the pedal to the metal towards getting the deck published. The other design I will work up in my own time and maybe publish at a later date once the first one has sold thousands :-)

New Concept!

Forget everything you ever thought you knew...

I've just had a completely new design concept, which I've spent the last hour or two researching and sketching and working some preliminary things out for, and it rocks.

I'm gonna work some designs up over the weekend so stay tuned, oh, and there's no skulls!

2 Tone box concepts

Little bit of flavour

Box mocks

Even though the back design is far from finalised, I decided to put the box into a net template and see what it turned out like. I'm enjoying this look, and can't wait to see the finished product!!!

I get ahead of myself sometimes...

Ace of Spades, Joker, Artwork card all need to be designed now, and the back design still needs finishing off, and is still in need of something in terms of revising the gears etc. to give it more pop.





Sign the Tally Ho petition!!! Please!

http://www.petitiononline.com/ctc1c1/petition.html
I just found this, please everyone who reads this GO THERE AND SIGN IT!!! This is very important for anyone who loves their playing cards.

Thanks

Tallys no good no more?!?

I just heard some incredibly disturbing news: apparently tallys from the new factory are horrible!!!! This is terrible news, and means I will most likely be printing on bikes now, which means a re-design for the box :-( and none of the added prestige or quality from printing onto what has always been a slightly superior playing card brand.

!!!!! Bollocks!!!!

Oh well, onwards and upwards...

Edit to add: I just got my hands on some of the new factory tallys and they spread and handle like a dream. I'm not sure what all the fuss is about? They appear to be perhaps slightly thinner than their predecessors, although not drastically so, but they fan supremely and are cut at the edges nicely etc. etc.

Does anyone have anything to add?

Distance test...

What do they look like from a distance? The overall shape and symmetry impression, artwork and intricacies aside, is incredibly important. These are looking good in my opinion, perhaps could be improved slightly though. Will get on it later in the week...

Notes to self:

• do something more interesting with the central gear/circle
• try filling the peripheral gears white and see what it looks like
• try different blade arrangements coming off the central gear with and without skulls

Border test...

What do they look like with 5mm white borders?

Slight amendments to latest skull design

I faded the wings out, put some lines over the skull so it wasn't so white, added a double border, and set the design off to the official pantone red and blue colours used by the USPCC for their Bicycle decks, although judging from the look of the boxes in front of me the tallys may be printed in a slightly different shade of red and blue, so I will have to look into this.

To be honest, I mocked up a design based on this but with no skulls, and it looked terrible, I mean so bad I don't even want to post it. It needs some serious work even to get it looking OK, so maybe that's for another time. Tonight was a slightly fruitless design session in that respect, although I am wise enough to know there's no such thing, it still feels a bit that way.

I like the skulls though, I think they add interest, I'm thinking of keeping them although I haven't made my mind up yet.

Design Features/Black Deck

Hey everyone :-)

I'm getting a lot of pageviews, and a bunch of responses to my polls as well as interest in various forums I've been posting in, but it would be nice to get some feedback here on the blog, so here's the thing:

I'm currently running with the idea of making the black deck the special magicians' deck, and leaving the red and blue decks as regular decks, in much the same way the tally ho decks are right now. This would mean including a double-backer gaff in the black deck that wasn't in the blue and red decks, possibly reworking the box design slightly to indicate this difference, and potentially coming up with one or two other cool little design features that would make the deck slightly different from the regular.

What would you like to see in this deck? What special features or ideas would you enjoy or do you think would benefit you with whatever it is you use your decks for? Performing, flourishing etc.

I'm aware of the current crop of joker and box reveals, smudged spot cards and the like, I'd be interested to hear what you guys would like to see in a new deck. Comments are open to anyone, you don't have to be a registered blogger. Let me know if you've got any ideas and we can shoot the sh*t :-)

Alex

Developed Tally Ho style box design

This is the developed design for the Tally Ho style box. I'm not saying anything, but this would look sick.



Sketch box designs

Here you can see my sketch box designs for Bicycle (left) and Tally Ho (right). I have provisionally named my deck Grinder after the gears and cogs on the back design. I like the idea of having a bit of recognition with my name on the Tally Ho design, that would be nice :-). I have always preferred the tally box to the bike box anyway, and since I've received the great news that I can print onto linoid finish tallys, I probably won't be developing the bike box.

Tally update...

Tallys are a go-go!

Sick...

Tally Ho Linoid Finish

I've just been in touch with the lady at the USPCC who I've been talking to over the past couple of weeks to find out how much more it would cost to publish this deck on tally stock rather than bikes. I have designed an awesome custom rework of the tally box and having the deck on tally stock would add that extra prestige and appeal to the mechanics and deck collectors. Personally, I would love to print onto tallys, so I'll see what costs come back to me.

I await with baited breath, and will post my box design soon...

Skull concept v1.3

This evening's effort, despite a lot of time and stuff, came out looking horrible. The wings are now too prominent and need to dip back into the shadows somewhat, they've made the design far too busy and drowned out any nice symmetry the cogs were presenting. The flourishing looks nowhere near as good as the last attempt, the cogs have bigger teeth which was an intentional experiment on my part but it looks naff, the skull features are too white and need to be broken up somehow, etc. etc. etc.

Aaaarrrghhhh!!!

(edit to add: with the addition of 24hrs this design is no longer quite so bad to my eyes, but still needs big improvements)

There's a perfect design in there somewhere, just need to tease it out. The next revision will be that step closer to looking how I want it... hopefully

Skull concept v1.2

The 2nd iteration looks something like this. I guess I went in more of a gothic steampunk direction with the interlacing cogs, it just felt right. The wings now fade in behind the machinery and hang down at the side of the skull as well as spreading out toward the centre. I tried making the flourishing more in keeping with the tone of the piece by making it thorny/tribal weave.

Notes to self: in order to improve the next revision will have :

• skulls placed slightly closer to the centre
• a central cog ever so slightly skinnier
• slightly bolder and more prominent wings
• revised flourishing
• different spoke finish to the central cog
• spoke centres in the smaller cogs

I'm enjoying the circle-heavy symmetry in this design, it should look good in the hands of a flourisher. I have this thing about a magician's deck having a back design that almost hypnotises you when the cards fan...

Skull concept v1.1

Same design as before, slightly different take, opting for slightly more Tally-like proportions than Bike. Although this version was an amendment of the first, I actually prefer the first for a number of reasons. I am confident with some working this design will be a runner, although only the first of a handful...

Skull Concept v1

Cracked out the black marker pen this evening and got to hand-drafting a version of the first skull concept I came up with. Mixed feelings about this design, part of me loves it, part of me knows it needs a lot of work before it's looking how I want it to (and part of me knows it's got skulls on it).

Buddhist Symbolism

In preparation for my drawing session this evening, I spent some time looking at various bits and pieces that I thought might be worth including, and couldn't help but notice the striking resemblence between the Buddhist mandala and the Tally Ho decks...

These playing cards are pretty much mandala back designs. Notice on the fan backs (the top deck) the circle in each corner around the central design and how similar it is to the Tibetan mandala above...

I have always considered tallys to have the most beautiful and transcendental of all playing card back designs, and this kind of makes a bit more sense when viewed from this perspective. I wonder if the artists at USPCC were aware of this when they designed the deck all those years ago?

Hello America! ! !

The USA has just overtaken the UK as my largest audience base, so if you're reading or following this in the states: hello! :-)

Of course, a big hello and thank you if you live anywhere in the UK, Canada, Australia, Germany, Denmark, Singapore, Greece, Ireland or New Zealand as well! People from all these places are checking my blog out and it's good to have you all on board, I hope you're enjoying stopping by :-)

I've had a few days of concentrating on other stuff, but I plan to get cracking with some more design work tomorrow and will be updating the blog accordingly.

Onwards and upwards! !

My hot shot cut with "hand land"...

Quite possibly the hardest sleight I ever pulled off, the face-up card reveal landing on the back of the outstretched palm from a hot-shot cut. Does this earn me any sort of respect with the hardcore cardmen? I'd probably need a few takes to nail it nowadays though...

Some other traditional style back designs I like

Besides Bikes and Tallys, these are some popular traditional style back designs I quite like, particularly the kem arrows (bottom), which I think are incredibly pretty.