Picture 3 Comments

1. What is the Visual Content of the Image?
The FACE at the top. THE ARM at the bottom. The Hand, lending support. The TWIGS growing form his arm and the indistinct blue BACKGROUND behind him.

2. Name 3 design elements...
The crooked LINEs of the twigs. The COLOR of the background and the SHAPE of the face and arm all add to the overall look of the piece. There is almost no depth to the piece as the background is hard to fathom. Is it near or far? Who can tell...

3. Name 3 design principals
I think this has an asymmetrical BALANCE to it, with the face at the top and the arms at the bottom bracketing the central area.

For me, the twigs growing out of the man's arm are the main EMPHASISof the piece. THe face is looking at them and thearm at the bottom stops your gaze like an imaginary horizon.

The UNITY of the color and mood of the various elements really work together here to give this piece a similar "feel" The somber face, the pale blue background and the unearthly "twigs"

4. What color sceme is used?
The colors here are somber. THey inspire thoughts of winter, night time and isolation, very effective.

5. What could be improved in the image
I have to agree with another poster. It would really add to the mood if the glass behind him were a rainy window and we could see more of where he is to get better context of what is happening. Is he in a hospital in the city? The future? or is he at home? Of course half the fun is perhaps not knowing those answers...

6. What wins on this page
I see the face at the top of the image, which is of course where one naturally reads a page. Then the arm and the strange "twigs growing form his arm. Finally the background - where is he? When is he?...

7. Do you like this image?
I like it because it is unnatural and i enjoy art that is unnatural. Although it is not something that I would choose to frame and hang in my dining room to stare at while I eat.

The Making of a Background

In the first cards (shown in earlier posts) I chose a background from a Nasa photos of a galaxy. That was pretty easy as I just looked for the right photo and color adjusted it. For the next background the designers asked me to create a sort of hypnotic swirl. I really couldn't find anything online, so I just made it from scratch. So I here is the process I went through..

No 1: I created a black pointed "spoke" that a replicated and started to arrange on a central point.
No.2: I got the spokes all arranged and started to adjust the color. They wanted something that was comic book like.
No3: I copied one set of spokes and layered it on top, then rotated it. I used colors that were reminiscent of a circus tent.
No 4: I then used the distort tool to "twist" the rays in a circle. I played around with the lighting effects, but found it was easier and quicker in this case to just use the airbrush tool with a really big brush. I then imported it into the card template and added the text and images for the card.

Creation of an icon

So I thought it might be interesting to break down how I come up with the icon designs.
I have to design 66 icons for use in this card game and have been looking at clip art, books and online image searches for ideas. Sometimes the idea for a card is obvious and I just sketch it up, ink it, scan it and start coloring it and adding effects.

Here are two examples where i "found" the idea. Its very obvious these inspired me to create the card image. The moon icon is very close to my finished design in many ways though there are differences in the face, shape, size of the star and the color "blue moon" So my question for the rest of you is, is my version a "steal' or is it 'inspired" by the jewely photo? I'd love to know what you think...

The other image is a little less obvious, but the photo of the 4 hands pointing in different directions obviously inspired me to create the confusion image. I wanted it to be a little more "creepy, so I added the eyes and the tentacles to create a sort of strange 'compass".

Its a real challenge coming up with 66 images, but I am making progress. I have about 10 done so far 9though not all have been approved by the games designers yet. Only 56 more to go...