Conjure Nation

[quote="Jeff Haas"]Hey...nudge.[/quote]I have to do a major adjustment to all the court cards and then I'll be content creating final versions of gaffs from those.

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Hey...nudge.

[quote="Jeff Haas" post_id=79311 time=1518730888 user_id=178]
How are things coming along?
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I'm working on it today! Gotta trim down to what I actually want for 1.0 (magician's set) and go off that. I have an alarming tendency toward "mission creep". Time has been extra short for me lately, but it's a three day weekend so... :)

https://www.rapidtables.com/web/color/purple-color.html

Orchid would work well as a contrasting back, I think. But the back design would probably have a profound effect on how it read. Lavender would look pretty good in designs with large patches of color and little whitespace.

How are things coming along?

I already have a nice golden (not the horrible yellow used by USPCC) shade locked down that I will eventually test print to make sure it works. Light purple would be the only way I'd go with that particular shade.

I've noted that in the commercial Rainbow Deck USPCC makes the yellow and purple cards don't work. The yellow backs are impossible to see, and the purple is so dark that it's not distinctive. A light purple would make a good other color between black and red.

One thought I've had is (once I nail down the 4-6 primary colors for the back I've already created on the ones that will follow) is to perhaps create sets using the same exact colors but in either a more pastel way or perhaps a higher saturation set. This (and perhaps adding some colors like orange and ugh, maybe purple) could be instrumental in obtaining a nice rainbow deck at some future point.

[quote="Denis Behr" post_id=79174 time=1512204234 user_id=205]
Hm, I never liked text on a back design. I find it distracting. Also, with multiple colors on the back one has to be very careful (see all those ugly design decks), but the red-blue-black WPT back is not too much in that regard.
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I also have really mixed feelings that sort of text use. I mainly see it used by casinos or for casino typed (gambling competition) decks. I might experiment with it a bit, but it's probably not a high priority.

I don't know if I've ever seen a card back that had more than two or three colors that I thought didn't look like crap. For me, two colors is sort of the max I'd be comfortable using in terms of keeping a clean look. Backs should be nice, but not some kind of garish distraction (though you wouldn't know that from looking at all the decks produced these days....) I'm also sort of leery about overuse of gradients, though I have seen a few well done examples of that.

I agree with Denis about writing on cards, but I'm cool with Logo Text.

Hm, I never liked text on a back design. I find it distracting. Also, with multiple colors on the back one has to be very careful (see all those ugly design decks), but the red-blue-black WPT back is not too much in that regard.

That's my jam right there. The best looking and handling cards since the foil wrapped Arrcos back in the 80s

I really like the deeper red of the WPT cards, and if you're worried about people wondering if you're using a trick deck, WPT cards seem more legit than Bicycles.

Something looked odd to me about those WPT cards - I realized those are the KEM kind, which are all plastic and only a single color. The ones I've got have a few more colors on the back, like this:
[img]https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0200/7616/products/playing-cards-bee-wpt-1_grande.png?v=1474345375[/img]

I haven't quite figured out how to do it nicely yet, but I'm trying to create a patterned back, where the pattern fades gently into the white border. Thought it would be easy, (which it is in photoshop or gimp but it's still kinda stumping me in Inkscape - which is where it needs to be).

[quote="Bill Duncan" post_id=79169 time=1512092892 user_id=453]
i would vote for light/medium gray or tan or even orange over black. I've had Bicycle black backed cards that were almost indistinguishable from standard blue in normal room lighting. In a darker venue the difference would be pointless.[/quote]
As long as they're not ugly, I'm open to any colors in the default set. I think I've already got 4-5 that are locked. I'll keep black (in addition to blue) because the blue can be lightened if one wants to use them at the same time. Otherwise I see instances where one might want to use black [b]in lieu of[/b] blue or vice versa.
[quote]
As for designs, I've always been partial to the World Poker Tour look: bordered Bee style backs with a logo in them. It might be fun to make a couple fo casino logos with magic references in the names.
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Like these? (pattern would vary a bit, as I won't copy any existing pattern, but this would be really easy to create otherwise).
[attachment=0]KEM-WPT-SM.jpg[/attachment]

I actually already have multiple patterned backs (white bordered) that are ready to go and would just have to add the areas (which I could probably shape more nicely that the simple WTP test box) for the customized text. I'll probably only include the simplest of these patterned back in the public set and the best ones will be reserved for the magician's set.

i would vote for light/medium gray or tan or even orange over black. I've had Bicycle black backed cards that were almost indistinguishable from standard blue in normal room lighting. In a darker venue the difference would be pointless.

As for designs, I've always been partial to the World Poker Tour look: bordered Bee style backs with a logo in them. It might be fun to make a couple fo casino logos with magic references in the names.

My other goal (for the backs I'm creating) is to have at least two of those (probably the first two) have clear elements that can be easily replaced with custom text/graphics. Would be nice for pro magicians I think, who might not have the time/money to create a more custom deck for themselves.

I've had a change in my thinking concerning the public release, which entails me making some changes that I want to finish before I tackle the magicians set. I'm about half done with that public offering currently, which is mostly tweaks to the sixteen face cards to make them a bit more unique (unlike the magician's set) from other cards out there.

For the magicians set, my main goal is to have enough goodies for rollout by the spring. This includes at least two completely nice backs (in addition to the one and its variant that I've already completed) in various colors (4-6). Once I do that, I need to standardize the gaffs I want to include. Minimally, mispipped cards, split faces (vertical and diagonal) with some specialty gaffs (52 on 1 which is pretty much done, poker ranking card - etc.).

I might change my mind, but the magician's set will probably only be offered on a "request only" basis with first (and perhaps only) priority given to members of the forum who can give me some idea how they want to use them.) Though I will provide some guidance on how to use them, I don't want to be inundated with basic support requests on how to use inkscape to edit them. That being said, I did find (and successfully test) [url=https://obsproject.com/] a very nice screen recorder (open sourced) program [/url] that I can use to create a few basic youtube videos (which will be on a private, not unlisted channel).

Long term goal that I've added is to create enough backs (with color variations) to be able to print up a nice (and original) rainbow deck. The only deck of this kind that I've been happy with is the one from magic makers (yeah, I know) which uses a nice mix of USPCC backs. I wouldn't mind something of equal quality with original backs, but that' s going to be a more aspirational goal once I get the main set up (two backs to start). I could create a lot of generic backs (in various colors) very quickly (sort of like the Josh Jay rainbow prism deck) to accomplish this, but I'm not terribly fond of that look either.

Holidays are killing me time-wise right now.

How goes the release?

I'm really excited to be pushing out the 3.0 (public) release soon, as that will free me to do the really fun gaffs, create exclusive card backs, etc. for the magicians set (still planned as a "CN members only" offering).

Before I do that, I'll have to adjust the current set to more closely match the pip spacing of standard decks so that the face gaffs will work well. That process will frankly suck, but once it's done, it'll be full speed ahead on gaffing and so on.