Silhouettes Tarot / Silhouettes Tarot Negative

My 2nd standard edition came in warped directly out of the shrink wrap as well. Wrote to the artist and he said it was printed by printerstudio.cn (A HK company which has a branch in the US as well). It used the 300gsm casino paper for sure but the lamination was unevenly applied by some factory they outsourced to, and the execution was sub-optimal. What a shame.

I have tried some curious cures in youtube to unbend it, to no avail so far...

Apart from the card stock and its problems - how is the deck for reading? I like silhouette art and the color scheme of this deck, but the figures all look like toys. I'd love to hear about the longer-term experiences with this deck.

mydearruby said:

My 2nd standard edition came in warped directly from the shrink wrap as well. Wrote to the artist and he said it was printed by printerstudio.cn (A HK company which has a branch in the US as well). It used the 300gsm casino paper for sure but the lamination was unevenly applied by some factory they outsourced to, and the execution was sub-optimal. What a shame.

I have tried some curious cures in youtube to unbend it, to no avail so far...

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Ok, this does not sound too promising... I'm still on the fence about buying a second copy. I would really like to see cards from both editions side by side. It is so difficult to judge the colors when seeing pic of only one version online.

Nemia said:

Apart from the card stock and its problems - how is the deck for reading? I like silhouette art and the color scheme of this deck, but the figures all look like toys. I'd love to hear about the longer-term experiences with this deck.

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Well, I have the first edition for more than one year. For me, it is definitely a deck I purchased as a collector, not as a reader. I use it from time to time, but usually on lighter topics. It is uplifting and has a really nice display of colors, but in the end I find it a bit too superficial. Still, sometimes it is the right deck to fit my mood and needs, and then I'm happy to have it at hand.

Thank you, that's what I expected, I regret to say.

I come from a country where silhouette fairy tale movies (Lotte Reiniger and others) were popular, I saw them all as a child... Fairy tales definitely have hidden depth and lots of dark shadows - that's why this deck attracted my eye. The artist is Chinese, and Lotte Reiniger was inspired by Chinese silhouette puppets. It's an interesting medium, no doubt.

I'm still on the fence... I love the colors... but too cute even in the not so cute cards.

This is interesting.

I have the second edition and don't find it cutesy at all. I find this deck reads really well for me. There are so many layers of depth in the images, I see new things in these cards every time I use them. I tend to use this deck more for deeper questions (I'm inclined to use my Steampunk or Sideshow decks for lighter readings)

And I guess I'm lucky, but I haven't experienced any warping yet - very glad, as this deck is definitely my favourite so far!

Oh, wonderful, I'm tempted... I guess the borderless-ness and the similarity in size of the figures lets the cards flow nicely. It's always so hard to judge from websites...

Linfang said:

Mhm, I have the first edition, and I like the pictures better than the second. But still I'm thinking about ordering the second, since I like it borderless. But I'm not sure that the colors and cardstock will be equally good.

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I'm not a subscriber and can't attach images, but my opinion is that you should stick with your first edition. I have the second edition, standard version. I was expecting a deck with bright, vibrant images that popped and made a gorgeous contrast against the blackness, but.....ugh. I find the colors of this deck to be flat, dull, and drab. Nothing like what I was expecting from the online images. Plus, as others already posted, the cards were significantly warped right out of the shrink-wrap. I'm sorry to say that the Silhouettes tops the list as one of most disappointing deck purchases. Haven't even bothered to read with it yet.

Thanks for your feedback, RiverRunsDeep! I had thought mainly the negative version was affected by the warping, didn't know the standard edition had this problem as well.

I've been trying to connect and read with both the Silhouettes and its negative version (2nd edition for both) for about three months or so now, but there's very little connection or rapport there. The art is very gorgeous and the colors are rich, but if I could put a personality to the cards, I'd have to say they're rather flat. I get little information from the cards, and what information they give are given rather grudgingly, it feels.

So I caved and bought a set and I am not thrilled. I cannot connect to the deck, it came warped out of the packet, one card has a giant scratch over it, came like that and the laminate is coming up on one of the cards to the point where I have had to retire my deck, I am not willing to destroy something that cost me $60.
I love the art and the cardstock is good, the way the artist has interpreted some of the cards is amazing and the little white book isn't too bad. But Alas... at least now I own it and it can stop stalking me.