Best size to create your originals?

Ive read that originals should be no more than twice the size of your intended final output size... is this true? A friend of mine is creating a deck. She is using her sketch book to finalize the cards... then I guess scanning will be next down the line. Any feedback or tips would be really helpful.

I'd say it depends HUGELY on the level of detail and the quality of the scanner.

I would scan them in at least as high as 600pdi that way you keep allot of options open when it comes time to edit or publish

Thanks for the info... the deck is still in preliminary stages but it's good to check on these things... I believe she is drawing on 6" x 8" paper...

HerzogIsGod said:

Thanks for the info... the deck is still in preliminary stages but it's good to check on these things... I believe she is drawing on 6" x 8" paper...

Click to expand...

That should work fine; as starlight says - scan as high res as you can, but one thing some people have not thought about to their cost is that a 4 foot high oil painting is a BITCH to scan. So 6 x 8 sounds good. A4 is as large as I would go (because that is the max my scanner will take !)

Create your originals bigger, because they always look better when they are reduced in size. But remember that that if your cards are extremely detailed, details will get lost if the cards are too small as well.

I made four decks that use the original size as the size of the cards, and one where the originals are a little bigger than the card size.

And I do think that reduction helps to hide any flaws in the art. In the other decks all the flaws are there to see.

And 600 dpi is great for scanning. 300 works too, but the higher the resolution the more you can really play with the sizing.

Thanks again... I will pass on the information to the artist

yeah.. imagine a pen line that looks great in your drawing, but shrink it down to 1/2 its thickness for reproduction, and it looks weak and thin. Things change when they are reduced in size, the way you read them changes.

Since the work for this one is already done, it might be a good idea to proof-print and be ready to ajust the art slightly if needed.

A good artist can do very detailed work and working oversize to compensate for clumsy linework doesn't always work. But the other thing is that it's more comfortable and natural for most artists to work fairly large and free. Thank goodness for digital drawing tools, we can use a combination of approaches to get the best results.

Her drawings are roughly 6"x8". This should give us enough to work with when we reduce them down. The images themselves are clear and bold. When I scan them they maintain their look. It's a very cool majors only deck