Would /ic/ consider this a good illustration?
It looks like the love child of both corporate Memphis and cal arts style.
>>7239918it's surrealist, you wouldn't get it
>>7239918Early MtG art is based beyond belief, modern MtG art has a chronic lack of sovl.
>>7239918heh. i see that hidden dick in there. good one.
>>7240115peak 90s fap material
This is now mtg art thread.
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OUTTA THE WAY FUCKING SHITS
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>>7239918YesOne of the very for mtg illustrations I actually remember. I like that it feels like there's some kind of actual occult energy behind it. 99% of mtg is just generic boring fantasy concept art crap but this, this one feels like it will kill you in your sleep.
>>7240176Fuck off WotC nobody likes your current soulless slop.
>>7240145>posting the massacred rereleaseDie
>>7240210>>7240214A dire case of shit taste.
>>7239918Yes of course. Good, realistic proportions. Simple yet effective use of color. Clear depiction. I love this
boy this generation is fucked. language erosion is real
The intention of card art was to spark the imagination when Magic was a duel between powerful wizards.
At one point this was elevated to the players being planeswalkers. That went away when WotC decided to ape marvel and treat planeswalkers like superheroes for their branding, putting them in cards by coming up with a handwavey "you're calling in a buddy and he fucks off if he takes too much damage" excuse. But things were falling down in the leadup to that.A quest passed down from daddy Hasbro mandated the gradual removal of authenticity in order to push beyond a critical mass of core audience.
>>7240159Cute feet
>>7239918Depends on your criteria. It's an unconventional image to use as a fantasy illustration (even in the context of early, style book-free MtG), but considering the subject is a partially abstract game mechanic, a partially abstract image isn't particularly unfitting.Anyway, I'm not sure this lady was even an "illustrator" as such. She's mostly a fine artist and Garfield's aunt and did this single piece as a favor iirc. Commissioning like 300 pieces must have been a major part of the development costs and every single one counted I assume.
>>7240176>one model copy and pasted 30 timesThis is fucking awful.
>>7239926Nice buzzwords
>>7240141Nice.
>>7240224>the gradual removal of authenticity in order to push beyond the core audience...and the masses fucking loved it. While the players complained but still spent ungodly amount of money on secret lairs and collector editions and universes beyond basically telling wotc they're doing the right thing.Now WotC resorts to AI.This reflect in card design as well>bland generic realistic art>retarded as fuck game balanceAnd the consumers gobble it the fuck up and would die defending the absolute state of this game.If any lesson can be taken from this is that the general quality of the art, always reflect the quality of whatever it goes with.
>>7239918That is embarrassing. Both artist and art director have no clue. I can excuse a pseudo primitive spin on an illustration, but this one does not refer to the subject of the card,which is why the illustration is needed. Unless the picture actually makes sense if you are familiar with the lore of the game's story,I see no point to it.I tried my hand at acrylics once upon a time, and one project that was laughable at the attempt. I had a friend who was a professional artist who did science fiction and fantasy book covers, and she did all sorts of odd stuff her extensive contacts threw her way: Lazer tag cartoon coloring books based on a show,and this gig,a start-up sci fi card game. You could whip up ten or more separate square illustrations themed around your own alien race,and sell them as a set. Possibly big money,and bigger money if the game takes off. This was my first illustration attempt,and compared to OP's picture its the fucking Mona Lisa! But it wasn't my medium,trying to paint in my cartooning style,but I know how to salvage it. I could drag it into Photoshop, and tweak the colors,mute them,and add special effects. And have it all background for a charging alien soldier,the missing element that makes it work. Or "something" in the foreground, the storytelling aspect is intriguing, and as someone very interested in selling more storytelling illustrations for new cards,I think carefully about composition. The second illustration I had planned was a family scene:a High Prince and family sitting moments after taking a hologram official portrait hologram, all looking at the results projecting before them. But,I gave up on painting fairly soon.
>>7241139>This was my first illustration attempt,and compared to OP's picture its the fucking Mona Lisa!Believe me, it is not.
>>7241119What's the point of your pic? It isn't AI-generated. Is that supposed to be an example of "bland and generic"? As opposed to the picture you were replying to? Surely, you can't be serious.
>>7241144>it's not bland and genericHow many more illustrations do you need with the same pose but slightly different to call it bland and generic?>as opposed to the picture your were replyingThat old art can be excusedBut since mtg went into the same realistic fantasy style, the quality has suffered greatly.If you focus on the "rendering" as the value of quality, you are completely off point.
>>7240176>>7240174>>7240167>>7240166>>7240162>>7240159>>7240156>>7240145>>7240126Look, another one in the same pose but with the arms posed slightly different and almost blank expression.Completely devoid of any characterization and personality.How is this not bland and generic?
Mtg art is the equivalent of naked anime girl floating in the void
Wow look, another one standing in some background with the arms posed slightly different and a blank expression
Wow lookthe same fucking image again, but in a different skin
>>7241172Okay, I was writing a fucking essay, trying to genuinely tackle your previous point, but I can now see you're either delusional or just plain trolling. Thanks for saving me the trouble of taking you seriously. Yes, modern art bad and soulless, old art good and soulful, and all those works you tagged indeed look exactly the same (soulless slop). God it's fucking unbelievable how retarded some people are.
>UUUUUHM I WAS GOING TO WRITE AN ESE BUT UR RETARDED HEHE GOTCHAYou no draw wotc shillgtfo my board and take your retarded ass unbalanced game designed by crossdressing monkeys with a typewriter with you
>art in a game is bland and generic>game also sucks major ass, cards are extremely badly designed and it's turning into fortnite to milk retards dry>LotR expansion>everyone gets raceswapped into brown peopleThe quality of the art always reflects quality of the product it is in.
wow lookanother front facing character without any facial expressions flailing their arms
>>7241139I would rather have cards with illustrations like yours than the over-rendered edgy mush.
Wow look80 dollars
>>7241183this is interesting at least for the flat-olor parts. Though the little quote is cringe.
Wow lookThe same fucking image
>meanwhile jap mtg artworks
And that rendering and realism and they're literally getting mogged by fucking generic-anime illustrations on expression and illustrative storytelling
>>7241192>>7241194is this supposed to be any better? Cuz it's not
>>7241195Epic argument
Wow look, how odd, i found the same image for the 6 millionth time againTotally unique and original
Wow is this another fantasy character but in a frontal 3/4 view with his arms pointing downwards and has no face?I have never seen this before
>meanwhile japanese exclusive mtg cards
>>7241205Wow, generic anime girl #60493993? I have never seen this before.
>>7239918I always liked the old esoteric artwork that depicted the gameplay mechanic and the flavor text. Blue always had the most of those but a lot of the older sets had cards that were like riddles. Was never a fan of the epic dark fantasy artwork cards
>>7241195I think the other anon's point is that a good chunk of the current card art lacks much in the way of storytelling, because the characters aren't really doing anything besides existing there. Their faces aren't expressing anything. For the most part the ones he's been shrieking about look like they need to be minimally-edited for use as ads or can work as-is as a baseline reference for figurines.And yes I know most of those are supposed to be>le evil hive mind phyrexiansbut the characters are, per the lore, supposed actually have personalities which don't really show in the art.The secondary criticism seems to be about the character designs, which seem to be a combo of "cosplay-ready" and just adding bits and bobs to act as visual noise, which blends together at card res. Again some of this is due to phyrexians being part-mechanical, but honestly WotC dropped the ball with taking the newer phyrexian designs more towards asian-horror or surrealism and away from grindhouse zombie movies.Compare the above to this one, another legendary. We have a very focused expression and a demonstration of one of Volrath's weird as fuck powers. He's also part of the (old, pre-Modern frame) Phyrexian faction, but his shapeshifting is his unique ability.>>7241229Most of those are only slightly better, they just have improvements in visual clarity. Top left even has the same issues of "standing there posing."Top Middle is an actual scene though. Bottom right is fine but doesn't feel like Magic. Bottom left is a little more expressive than the non-variant version of the card it's a promo for, but not by much.Bottom middle and top right just feel phoned in though. I'm pretty sure I've seen the other card arts they used as references for the posing.
>>7241247>Top Middle is an actual scene though.That's the worst of a bad bunch imo. Looks pretty clearly traced over badly-posed 3D models.I just dislike the anime and Arstation looks equally. Your pic is good, OP pic is good. (I do not play magic)
>>7241247Yes,the sci fi card makers would see what "story" there was in the composition and assign its card abilities to match in the context of the game. Never saw it myself, but the card version of Pokémon was gaining popularity and spawned many sorts of collectable card games,but few survivors.
>sol>sol less
Well, anyway, all of MtG art gets absolutely mogged by Runeterra art. It's not even close.
>>7241247>I think the other anon's point is that a good chunk of the current card art lacks much in the way of storytellingThey are genuinely the same image, the same pose, just with different characters.While the stylization is homogenized across the board.Such illustrations are like 90% of the artworks and it is impossible to not notice.That's the only thing i pointed out and nothing else. Pic related>wow another angel creature doing the same weapon holding pose as the other 16541654165 angel creature illustrations.... but this one has no facial expression! Amazing!That these illustrations get chosen to be printed should tell what kind of brainless retards work at wotc.
>>7240115I have like 4 of these cards.
>>7241298The initial release made by sixmorevodkas sure, then they started working with other studios and the art got a bit worse.I mean, it's still good, but it was definitely better before.
>>7241302>While the stylization is homogenized across the board.That's so that WotC can shrink the amount of artists they call during slow parts of the business cycle and then hire new ones for less when they need more. People would notice more if the look of a set drastically shifted due to budget cuts, but when everything is samey they can just quantify "artists" as a fungible metric rather than individuals.Honestly shit started to fall apart when Jeremy Jarvis was promoted to Art Director.
>>7241302>brainless retards work at wotc.The old AD (Joe) doesn't work there anymore. He stopped working there when algenpfleger started doing magic cards art, which is what set the style for what we get now.The old AD actually bought a couple of my artbooks but said my work was too fashion oriented for magic. Which is a bummer because he contacted me first and I always wanted to do a magic card.
>>7241172>Brom skeleton bikers>blandNigga pls
>>7240162why is seb so based
YuGiOh gen1 art SOLOS
>>7242382Well, according to some goof, these are just generic action poses, while the crayon drawings by juvenile nineties artists are the real deal.
>>7241119>>7241168>>7241173>>7241188>>7241247I like the designs of the new phyrexian stuff. Just the shell around the body's look pretty cool. And I don't mind surrealism when it's applied well.But the game itself as of 2024 gets no criticism despite have broken cards.Yugioh gets a lot of heat recently but I must give it to them that there artwork is music more consistent and less annoying then magic.
kinda insane how detailed and cool this stuff is when its just on a card. same with yugioh. makes you want to collect it just for the art alone
>>7244556I'd also like to add that I think for the new phyrexians, there expressionless because it's a fucking monster performing human sacrifice. But there are some really ugly ones desuI also have to say that not all vintage magic art looks good. The early stuff from alpha looks like first day of paint school shit. Urzas legacy is peak mtg art.
>>7242385The cards up to phantom darkness have dope art honestly. Lob is immensely overrated desu. Metal raiders had cooler artwork like barrel dragon and summoned skull
>>7242465honestly I said he was based because I love his most naive drawings, less those with advanced rendering and complex perspectiveI love op's card art because of the same reason I think, seb sucking john bauer's soul saved him from becoming generic
>>7244556>Criticism>in 2024You're in the wrong universe, buddy.
>>7244556>I like the designs of the new phyrexian stuff. Just the shell around the body's look pretty cool. And I don't mind surrealism when it's applied well.Hard disagree. Phyrexian Reaper was peak Phyrexian.
>>7246437I really like the album covers for Clann.
