"If I Had Only Known When I Started This Deck That ......"

tarotbear

"Nothing in the world can take the place of Persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent."

~ Calvin Coolidge
 

Twize

If I had only known when started....."How much wasn't based on modern myths"

Should I've trusted all sources in my work, its easy to feeling wise after some time.
I know one thing and that's we need more skilled researchers involved in all kind of areas where tarot or if you prefer trionfi has been used and developed through the history.

There's a bit too many questionmarks in telling we're on the safe side in all this.
If it wasn't like this, I'm pretty sure there wouldn't be as many who asked for support.
 

tarotbear

There's a bit too many questionmarks in telling we're on the safe side in all this.

I'm not sure I understand your post; can you clarify, please?
 

tarotbear

I thought I would add an update or two to this thread.

Quite by accident I was able to get as close to a 'layer' effect as possible with MS PAINT! I created the sky background, then I created the character image leaving the background white (uncolored). I copied and pasted the image and used the 'transparent button as I pasted the image over the background. It needed a little touching up - and I did have a bizarre problem trying to save it (got through that one, too!) and created the final image without having to color the sky first, then clean up the lines where I might have 'oooopsed!' and then color the figures in.
 

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tarotbear

My other new addition to this thread:

The current (#5) version of the Aeclectic Collaborative Tarot is using finished images 750 pixels by 1225 pixels, which will be centered over a 900 x 1500 pixel template. By doing this the borders can be colored something other than white, and the large top & bottom border leaves enough space to add numbers and titles without having to have them incorporated into or onto the image - they will be sized to fit the border within the trim lines. :thumbsup:

It's an alternative way of thinking about this.
 

Vanchica

Thanks a MILLION

This thread has probably saved me more hours of work than I can calculate- and reduced my risk. I'm planning to publish a deck (it may morph into an oracle deck) and there's SO much to consider. Thanks a million to all who've contributed here so generously. This place truly ROCKS!
 

tarotbear

On behalf of all the contributors to this thread - you are very welcome and we wish you success in your deck publishing endeavors!
 

frejasphere

White out for mistakes? Brilliant. I was not allowed to make mistakes, lol, working on frosted mylar, white out would have shown. So I just held my breath every time I drew a line haha.
It actually was not a Sharpie. But it was a fine line permanent marker by Pentel :) they discontinued them so I bought every one I could find online, cleaned a few places out of what little stock they had, just to make sure I could finish the deck, as they were the only thing that worked right on the mylar I bought to use. Then I painted them with India inks and a paint brush. I bought a set of cheap paintbrushes from the back of a magazine, that are actually pretty good, very tiny, for people who paint model trains and such.


... Oh I relate to the breath holding! Especially with long continuous lines... deep breath in and slowly, slowly exhale through nose as pen makes its way down the paper :)

@tarotbear - what a great thread you started, with so many varied and supportive comments, it feels like there's advice to be discovered for a wide range of 'journeys' :)

I too second (or does it become 'third' ;)) the suggestion to acquire Photoshop or GIMP and get started on the hair-pulling and mountain-climbing... Yes, it takes time, but it is absolutely worth it :) Every hour you spend learning about layers, brushes, masks, tools etc - are hours that will free up your digital painting, allowing you to explore, create and ENJOY the artistic process :)

For me personally (as I work both traditionally and digitally), I love that seamless transition between pen on paper - and digital drawing and painting (on tablet) - where each method has its own attributes; but the eye hand movements and 'technique' mirror one another (does that make sense?) ... That said, there are times where after painting for hours (in Photoshop) and switching to pen & ink drawing (on paper), my left hand flies out to hammer Ctrl Z on the table :D

Planning ahead (to a certain extent) is good advice too. As far as the artwork goes I need the freedom to refine, adapt, change... but as far as size (printing) goes - it makes a lot of sense to work this out in advance. I must admit I didn't do this in the beginning (I was too eager to get started on the drawings), though luckily the 'measuring phase' coincided with the phase where I went back over the artwork to finalise each card... IF I had been the kind of artist who completes each artwork before moving on to the next, discovering at the END that every card was the wrong size - I expect there would have been tears and unprintable words :)

And... the advice to 'never give up' - or keep to an 'art' schedule... is brilliant too :)
 

tarotbear

How are everyone's decks going? :surprise:
 

JOdel

Well, like I said at the time. I posted mine back in July.

Still not found my way out of the land of As Soon As to post a downloadable .pdf of the cast list and capsule interpretations though, although it can be added to the download page easily enough once I have it.

The fact is; I'm a bit undecided as to whether to just lay it out for letter-size, and do it the easy way, or to make a booklet of it and expect people to find a duplex printer and a stapler which can reach the center of a 11x8.5 sheet to fold into a 5.5x8.5 booklet. Even though there would be enough pages for there to be a bit of edge creep once folded.

Which begs the question of where the person printing it is located, and whether the standard is even letter-size -- or A4 -- wherever they happen to be.