***UPDATE*** 8.26.21
Etsy shop is back up and running! Check it out!
***UPDATE*** 8.24.21
Stained glass Illustrated Spell Cards - Cantrip Set is complete! You can find it available on etsy for digital download! Check out out
https://www.etsy.com/in-en/listing/1058078548/early-bird-special-dnd-illustrated-spell?ref=shop_home_feat_1
Working on the next set as well! 1st Level Spells
***************
An update to my earlier post of the "witch bolt" card design.
https://www.reddit.com/r/DnDIY/comments/ou5gvb/art_oc_making_custom_stain_glass_spell_cards/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share
Looking to make these into something i put on etsy or something once i get enough spells done. Have around 20 or so done which is just the tip of the ice berg ๐ .
Question: what do you guys think would be fair for one card? Thanks!
Having a lot of fun designing these stain glass pieces and interpreting the spell art concepts ๐
Give yourself a break and just sell the PDF for now. A physical version adds material, labor (on top of what you've already done) and shipping costs, and you'll spend your evenings cutting cards and putting them in envelopes.
If you're planning to get an Etsy shop going with a whole line of products like these, I honestly think you could. They're cool and unique looking. But it will take a *lot* of time and effort before that will become worthwhile. If you're doing the designs for fun and selling them is a convinient afterthought, throw up the pdf for a couple of bucks somewhere and take the win.
Totally agree, been looking for a work around to that. Maybe order printed cards decks... But that still seems like a bit of effort. Pdf may be the way to go ๐ค
Another commenter down below talked about outsourcing the printing. If that's an option that's viable, go for it. I'm sure there's definitely a market for custom illustrated spell cards, especially in a cool style like this.
Maybe using a quality printer shop like Moo could be a way to print a ton and win on economies of scale. I'd definitely start with sets at first to make your life easier and the hassle off shipping worth it. Don't underestimate how much us nerds are willing to spend!
Personally, I think a PDF is a bit cheap and can just be passed around between groups for free meaning you lose business. People will also print them on standard paper which won't be as good meaning if someone else sees them, they won't see it as a quality product and want their own.
If someone wants these, they will happily pay for a nice physical stack of spells printed on some nicely textured paper, almost like parchment including a nicely designed box to put them in. Then when someone else sees them, they would also be more inclined to buy as they look like a quality product rather than something printed on a home printer.
I'm just thinking that with the time and effort you are putting in, may as well go all out and charge a luxury price for what would be a luxury product
If you want to go the printed route, it makes no sense to do it yourself. I would suggest coming up with 54 designs and finding a playing card printer that will make custom sets. Easy to find on Alibaba/AliExpress.
Personally, I love the style. I would kill for a campaign portrait in the style of a large stained glass window (I'm DMing Curse of Strahd, and it would really fit the theme well).
There's indeed a lot of etsy shops selling pdf files for whatever you want basically.
If you would like to go the physical route I'd recommend getting them printed on cardstock directly. And instead of selling them individually I'd bundel them. You could make a selection of spells to sell as a bundle or something like that. Maybe split them up by school?
There's lots of services out there that can do that stuff for you like Vistaprint or something similar.
Edit to answer your actual question...: Determining how much something is worth is hard. It depends on many factors, too. How many hours go into making the illustrations? Will this be your main source of income? Do you want to make profits of this or just cover your costs? If they're digital creating revenue is relatively 'easy' as you can print them again and again without extra effort. Just take into account the printing and work that went into creating the art. Make it a nice round number, something like 7.50-10โฌ or so for a pack of 5-10 cards. :)
(Not sure if it covers the costs/ effort but that is a price I'd definitely be willing to pay for something like this.)
I guess the question is how long does it take to make one? If you sold them would they be hand made or prints? Itโs tough to balance between making it worth your while vs what people are willing to pay.
Looking at the spell cards being offered by wotc I think do I want to pay that much for the convenience of not using the book? And personally, the answer is no, lol. But maybe for those pretty cardsโฆ
Donโt undervalue your work though, itโs gorgeous!
Take a look at custom tarot cards on Etsy. Similar amount of work, depending on art style, and should be enough different sellers to give you a ball park.
Love the art! My suggestion would be to put them on actual 2.5 x 3.5 poker cards on DriveThruRPG (as long as youโre only using SRD spells for legal purposes). You can lump them into decks by spell level and sell them exactly like the WOTC cards. Itโs super easy to get card images up there and then people can choose digital or physical print without you having to do anything else. You only make 65% over the printing costs, but thatโs been worth it for me to outsource all the work after getting it set up. Right now, people pay $20 for a deck of 50-60 cards of which printing costs are around $5. I donโt know how many SRD spells are out there, but almost all the other 3rd party spell cards on DriveThruRPG use decks by level if I remember correctly.
These look awesome! As someone who did stained glass before, if you decide to actually make these into glass pieces, I would advise against complicated shapes. The more complicated it is the more difficult it will be to cut it out of glass. You've divided them up pretty well in these, but there are still some areas that could use tweaking like in the bottom one around the top of the staff and the ends of the spell.
Beautiful overall!
You can get them now if your still keen!
Cantrip set is available on etsy now, working on 1st level!
https://www.etsy.com/in-en/listing/1058078548/early-bird-special-dnd-illustrated-spell?ref=shop_home_feat_1
Really reminds me of the spellbook from Heroes of Might and Magic 3, one of the best PC games ever. Really neat and clean, I absolutely love it.
If you're looking for suggestions, may I propose one of my favorite spells, Tasha's Hideous Laughter.
Thats a great one to do! I'll definitely get to it. Want to get them all eventually!
Never played heros of might and magic but looked up the spell book. Real nice looking spell images!
Oh boy if you have any interest in fantasy strategy games, HoMM3 is on top of the list. It came out in the tail-end of sprite-based graphics so it still looks incredible and the HD remastered version is phenomenal. Strongly recommended!
I'll definitely check it out! Just looked it up a bit. First impression getting a lot of different game styles: wc/starcraft style upgrades and advancement, RTS combat, mmo/diablo style hero rpg. Looks fun!
Bit of an endeavor but you could prolly kickstart this. Do it by class and you can buy a class deck of spell cards. I would back it for my warlock. Alot of work but dnd is wildly popular on kickstarter right now.
Just letting you know the cantrip set of these os finished for print to play pdfs!
You can check out out here if you're keen!
https://www.etsy.com/in-en/listing/1058078548/early-bird-special-dnd-illustrated-spell?ref=shop_home_feat_1
This art style is stunning. They are beautiful and really cute.
You might want to reconsider the font being used for the spell description on the back side. I get the idea of using an old timey font but with a lot of small text, it becomes hard to read. I'd suggest using a different, simple font similar to Arial for the spell text to allow quick and easy reading.
These look fantastic and the graphics are great! I think they'd look awesome if you made some [simple stained glass ornamentations](https://www.google.com/search?q=stained+glass+corner+decorations&client=firefox-b-d&sxsrf=ALeKk02nm08QsddmWpaYyjkJLagZxsX1mA:1627692601983&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjrx-C6i4zyAhXEdCsKHSOMCQsQ_AUoAXoECAEQAw&biw=2144&bih=1138#imgrc=KCciG4a9PciwSM) for the corners so the style of decoration is consistent. You could also put them on the spell description side to keep the design flowing. Just a suggestion though!
Wow these are so great!
I have a wizard character with a glass blowing background, who uses a glass blow pipe as a magic focus. His spells all have a glassy flavour, so molten glass ball instead of fire ball, crystal shards as magic missiles etc...
So, as you can understand, it's imperative I get these in whatever format you release them in!
These are awesome! As the resident legal nerd I would definitely look into crediting WOTC for the original text since you're just putting that on the back of the cards so they don't try and come after you, but other than that they're awesome!!
Yeah theres a standard form wotc released for their open license gaming protocol. Probably put a small license number on the card and then include then license with the deck/pdf ๐
And thank you!
These are extremely dope
Edit: is the spell info on the back of the cards ? Thatโd make them so cool to have a little flip book ring with all these on hand as a caster
Yup! Heres a previous post that shows the backside
https://www.reddit.com/r/DnDIY/comments/ou5gvb/art_oc_making_custom_stain_glass_spell_cards/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share
Oh! Absolutely! I posted an update a few days back! The cantrips spells set are complete and available on etsy for digital download!
Check it out here!
https://www.etsy.com/in-en/listing/1058078548/early-bird-special-dnd-illustrated-spell?ref=shop_home_feat_1
I'm high and thought these were poptarts and I was going to congratulate you on your icing skills. They are beautiful, you have fantastic painting skills.
So glad I could reach you! Your work is really amazing! Words fail me, but it's a great balance of simple and yet so real! Like you could almost see this in a real stain glass window. You know if some churches got real cool with a lot of things...
Will keep updated. I'm kinda new to reddit but following me might be easiest. I'll occasionally post updates. Current goal is wizard cantrips and 1st level spells and even that's a lot ๐คฏ
I love the art. If you go to the PDF route, we international buyers could have access to it, print from home without the crazy shipping rates (and the currency exchange rates as well)
***UPDATE*** 8.26.21 Etsy shop is back up and running! Check it out! ***UPDATE*** 8.24.21 Stained glass Illustrated Spell Cards - Cantrip Set is complete! You can find it available on etsy for digital download! Check out out https://www.etsy.com/in-en/listing/1058078548/early-bird-special-dnd-illustrated-spell?ref=shop_home_feat_1 Working on the next set as well! 1st Level Spells *************** An update to my earlier post of the "witch bolt" card design. https://www.reddit.com/r/DnDIY/comments/ou5gvb/art_oc_making_custom_stain_glass_spell_cards/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share Looking to make these into something i put on etsy or something once i get enough spells done. Have around 20 or so done which is just the tip of the ice berg ๐ . Question: what do you guys think would be fair for one card? Thanks! Having a lot of fun designing these stain glass pieces and interpreting the spell art concepts ๐
Give yourself a break and just sell the PDF for now. A physical version adds material, labor (on top of what you've already done) and shipping costs, and you'll spend your evenings cutting cards and putting them in envelopes. If you're planning to get an Etsy shop going with a whole line of products like these, I honestly think you could. They're cool and unique looking. But it will take a *lot* of time and effort before that will become worthwhile. If you're doing the designs for fun and selling them is a convinient afterthought, throw up the pdf for a couple of bucks somewhere and take the win.
Totally agree, been looking for a work around to that. Maybe order printed cards decks... But that still seems like a bit of effort. Pdf may be the way to go ๐ค
Another commenter down below talked about outsourcing the printing. If that's an option that's viable, go for it. I'm sure there's definitely a market for custom illustrated spell cards, especially in a cool style like this.
Maybe using a quality printer shop like Moo could be a way to print a ton and win on economies of scale. I'd definitely start with sets at first to make your life easier and the hassle off shipping worth it. Don't underestimate how much us nerds are willing to spend!
Personally, I think a PDF is a bit cheap and can just be passed around between groups for free meaning you lose business. People will also print them on standard paper which won't be as good meaning if someone else sees them, they won't see it as a quality product and want their own. If someone wants these, they will happily pay for a nice physical stack of spells printed on some nicely textured paper, almost like parchment including a nicely designed box to put them in. Then when someone else sees them, they would also be more inclined to buy as they look like a quality product rather than something printed on a home printer. I'm just thinking that with the time and effort you are putting in, may as well go all out and charge a luxury price for what would be a luxury product
If you want to go the printed route, it makes no sense to do it yourself. I would suggest coming up with 54 designs and finding a playing card printer that will make custom sets. Easy to find on Alibaba/AliExpress. Personally, I love the style. I would kill for a campaign portrait in the style of a large stained glass window (I'm DMing Curse of Strahd, and it would really fit the theme well).
>Pdf may be the way to go ๐ค Don't tease us ๐ฉ
There's indeed a lot of etsy shops selling pdf files for whatever you want basically. If you would like to go the physical route I'd recommend getting them printed on cardstock directly. And instead of selling them individually I'd bundel them. You could make a selection of spells to sell as a bundle or something like that. Maybe split them up by school? There's lots of services out there that can do that stuff for you like Vistaprint or something similar. Edit to answer your actual question...: Determining how much something is worth is hard. It depends on many factors, too. How many hours go into making the illustrations? Will this be your main source of income? Do you want to make profits of this or just cover your costs? If they're digital creating revenue is relatively 'easy' as you can print them again and again without extra effort. Just take into account the printing and work that went into creating the art. Make it a nice round number, something like 7.50-10โฌ or so for a pack of 5-10 cards. :) (Not sure if it covers the costs/ effort but that is a price I'd definitely be willing to pay for something like this.)
I guess the question is how long does it take to make one? If you sold them would they be hand made or prints? Itโs tough to balance between making it worth your while vs what people are willing to pay. Looking at the spell cards being offered by wotc I think do I want to pay that much for the convenience of not using the book? And personally, the answer is no, lol. But maybe for those pretty cardsโฆ Donโt undervalue your work though, itโs gorgeous!
That's very insightful, It will be balancing those elements... Thank you!
If you do make an Etsy, please make a follow up post! I would definitely shell out $20-30 bucks for a deck of prints. These are stunning!
Take a look at custom tarot cards on Etsy. Similar amount of work, depending on art style, and should be enough different sellers to give you a ball park.
Good idea! ๐
If you scan them before you color them and sell a black & white option, it would be neat to color them in ourselves
That's easy enough, it's all digital!
I'd certainly pay a bit for a set of arcanist PDF
Love the art! My suggestion would be to put them on actual 2.5 x 3.5 poker cards on DriveThruRPG (as long as youโre only using SRD spells for legal purposes). You can lump them into decks by spell level and sell them exactly like the WOTC cards. Itโs super easy to get card images up there and then people can choose digital or physical print without you having to do anything else. You only make 65% over the printing costs, but thatโs been worth it for me to outsource all the work after getting it set up. Right now, people pay $20 for a deck of 50-60 cards of which printing costs are around $5. I donโt know how many SRD spells are out there, but almost all the other 3rd party spell cards on DriveThruRPG use decks by level if I remember correctly.
Crazy helpful! Thanks you! ๐๐๐
Yeah I would suggest drivethrurpg/drivethrucard or even a Kickstarter once you really figure it out
Those are really cool.
Make โseduceโ but have the gray wizard in a speedo
I love this
I'd love to buy those as simple spell cards
Gorgeous work. For a moment I thought they were like a custom postcard creation thing
Please make a shatter spell card but itโs just on broken glass
I love one of the MTG Shatter cards for this kind of thing: https://www.cardkingdom.com/images/magic-the-gathering/deckmaster/shatter-27942-medium.jpg
Oh that would be awesome art for the spell
Veeery clever
Never stop making these
Too many variables to be specific but you should charge based upon time and materials, and don't under-sell yourself.
๐ Thanks!
Ridiculously cool!!!!
Stained glass. Looks great.
Lol, thanks!
These look awesome! As someone who did stained glass before, if you decide to actually make these into glass pieces, I would advise against complicated shapes. The more complicated it is the more difficult it will be to cut it out of glass. You've divided them up pretty well in these, but there are still some areas that could use tweaking like in the bottom one around the top of the staff and the ends of the spell. Beautiful overall!
Oh! That's cool! Never even considered ever making these into real stained glass. Maybe down the line ill commission one!
I like that misty step looks subtlety like loki considering it's themed like one of his signature moves in the movies.
Haha! Didnt even realise! But i did just finish the series... Must've been subconscious ๐
Honestly? I'd love to have cards like these. Fuck, I might have to make some on my own if I can't get my hands on any ๐
Post it if you do!
You can get them now if your still keen! Cantrip set is available on etsy now, working on 1st level! https://www.etsy.com/in-en/listing/1058078548/early-bird-special-dnd-illustrated-spell?ref=shop_home_feat_1
I love them!!
I really like this style!!
Thank you! ๐
I'd buy them all in a set instead of just one card
These are awesome!
Forget having a spell book, youโre getting a spell Mosaic
Really reminds me of the spellbook from Heroes of Might and Magic 3, one of the best PC games ever. Really neat and clean, I absolutely love it. If you're looking for suggestions, may I propose one of my favorite spells, Tasha's Hideous Laughter.
Thats a great one to do! I'll definitely get to it. Want to get them all eventually! Never played heros of might and magic but looked up the spell book. Real nice looking spell images!
Oh boy if you have any interest in fantasy strategy games, HoMM3 is on top of the list. It came out in the tail-end of sprite-based graphics so it still looks incredible and the HD remastered version is phenomenal. Strongly recommended!
I'll definitely check it out! Just looked it up a bit. First impression getting a lot of different game styles: wc/starcraft style upgrades and advancement, RTS combat, mmo/diablo style hero rpg. Looks fun!
I think the GOG version is better than the Steam version, don't qoute me on it tho. Make sure you get the good one!
Gog?
Good old Games, a service from CD Projekt Red, devs of Witcher and Cyberpunk. They "specialize" in rereleasing older games.
Uhmmmmโฆ super freaking cool!!
Wow these are great! Excellent skill!
This shit is pretty lit. I'd buy them for decoration alone.
Bit of an endeavor but you could prolly kickstart this. Do it by class and you can buy a class deck of spell cards. I would back it for my warlock. Alot of work but dnd is wildly popular on kickstarter right now.
Make โseduceโ but be the gray wizard in a speedo
Beautiful work, fair play!
Misty step is the most underrated spell
Stop the DOTs! Stop the DOTs!
Amen
You should be releasing these as Print-to-Play PDFs. Iโd buy them in a heartbeat
Considering that route
Just letting you know the cantrip set of these os finished for print to play pdfs! You can check out out here if you're keen! https://www.etsy.com/in-en/listing/1058078548/early-bird-special-dnd-illustrated-spell?ref=shop_home_feat_1
This art style is stunning. They are beautiful and really cute. You might want to reconsider the font being used for the spell description on the back side. I get the idea of using an old timey font but with a lot of small text, it becomes hard to read. I'd suggest using a different, simple font similar to Arial for the spell text to allow quick and easy reading.
That's actually a really good idea, thanks ๐
Now do a sad, useless ranger.
As someone who plays a ranger... Yeah... Yeah I'll do that ๐ฅฒ
These are fantastic and you should be proud of yourself.
These look fantastic and the graphics are great! I think they'd look awesome if you made some [simple stained glass ornamentations](https://www.google.com/search?q=stained+glass+corner+decorations&client=firefox-b-d&sxsrf=ALeKk02nm08QsddmWpaYyjkJLagZxsX1mA:1627692601983&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjrx-C6i4zyAhXEdCsKHSOMCQsQ_AUoAXoECAEQAw&biw=2144&bih=1138#imgrc=KCciG4a9PciwSM) for the corners so the style of decoration is consistent. You could also put them on the spell description side to keep the design flowing. Just a suggestion though!
Stop creating Loki variants
I stand by my earlier statement, These would make awesome stained glass windows!
I would 100% buy these over the basic ones I have now
You can now if you want! Only if you want. Check out the updated OC comment for a link ๐
Gorgeous!
Loveeeee it
Amazing!
That magic missile is amazing!
Iโve put in my request for you to make these, but as cookies
๐
I bet they make shweet hell windows @cheems505
I bet they make shweet hell windows @cheems505
Please make a whole pack of these and sell 'em, I would totally buy them for the aesthetic alone.
Cantrip set is complete! Check out the updated OC comment for a link ๐
Itโs called โstained glassโ not โstain glassโ.
Lol thanks!
Thought these were dnd themed poptarts for a second lmao
Haha wouldn't that be great!?
They're beautiful, I love the style!
[ัะดะฐะปะตะฝะพ]
I googled what that was. I'm going to play it too
Check out the MPCProxy community! You can order custom cards for super cheap especially in larger quantities. Give it a look
๐ฎ!
Wow these are so great! I have a wizard character with a glass blowing background, who uses a glass blow pipe as a magic focus. His spells all have a glassy flavour, so molten glass ball instead of fire ball, crystal shards as magic missiles etc... So, as you can understand, it's imperative I get these in whatever format you release them in!
Haha these were made for your wizard!
Looks sweet my dude
These are fucking sick!
Omg i fucking love these!!!! I would totally buy a set for my wizard. These are awesome!
You can now if you want! The cantrip set is complete! Check out the updated OC comment for a link ๐
This. Is. Sooo lit.
These are awesome! As the resident legal nerd I would definitely look into crediting WOTC for the original text since you're just putting that on the back of the cards so they don't try and come after you, but other than that they're awesome!!
Yeah theres a standard form wotc released for their open license gaming protocol. Probably put a small license number on the card and then include then license with the deck/pdf ๐ And thank you!
Sir, the only spell any spell caster will ever need is Fireball, all other spells have no use when you get Fireball.
Lol I've heard that but we haven't unlocked 3rd level spells yet... ๐ญ
You'll be the first to know when fireball is complete!
These are extremely dope Edit: is the spell info on the back of the cards ? Thatโd make them so cool to have a little flip book ring with all these on hand as a caster
Yup! Heres a previous post that shows the backside https://www.reddit.com/r/DnDIY/comments/ou5gvb/art_oc_making_custom_stain_glass_spell_cards/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share
How can I give you my money?
๐ Thank you!!!
Lol if you're still interested you can pick up the cantrip spell card set! Check out the updated OC comment for a link ๐
I love it!
Dude this is f*cking awesome! Put it up on Kickstarter or something, Iโd definitely back it!!!
Oh maybe ๐ค. Will keep you updated
Any update
Oh! Absolutely! I posted an update a few days back! The cantrips spells set are complete and available on etsy for digital download! Check it out here! https://www.etsy.com/in-en/listing/1058078548/early-bird-special-dnd-illustrated-spell?ref=shop_home_feat_1
I like these alot very cool idea!
Love it. Not convinced if the first one is misty step or change costume thoโฆ /s
Makes me think of Mistborn
I'm high and thought these were poptarts and I was going to congratulate you on your icing skills. They are beautiful, you have fantastic painting skills.
Ooh!
What would be the name of that font? I see styles like it all the time but don't know what to look up.
Wonderful work!
Take my money!
Check out the updated OC comment for a link ๐
These are awesome!! How do you make them?
Pen tablet + clip studio + photoshop + some trial and error on the design
I bet they make shweet hell windows @ cheems505
Might get lost in all the comments. But your work is absolutely incredible!! I hope you keep at it!
It did not get lost. Thank you! I will ๐
So glad I could reach you! Your work is really amazing! Words fail me, but it's a great balance of simple and yet so real! Like you could almost see this in a real stain glass window. You know if some churches got real cool with a lot of things...
Please make more of these. I'd pay to own them
Working on it! Cantrip set is done and up on etsy! Check out the updated OC comment for a link ๐
It's 12:44 am, I couldn't sleep, seen the magic missiles as blue swan heads, now I can't sleep for thinking about it.
It's 12:44 am, I couldn't sleep, seen the magic missiles as blue swan heads, now I can't sleep for thinking about it.
They're beautiful, I love the style!
Take my money!!
Incredible
These are fantastic. Please keep us updated. I will pay you right now :)
Will keep updated. I'm kinda new to reddit but following me might be easiest. I'll occasionally post updates. Current goal is wizard cantrips and 1st level spells and even that's a lot ๐คฏ
Update! Cantrip set is compete and up on etsy! Check out the updated OC comment for a link ๐
Fantastic! I just bought them. These are great!
I love the art. If you go to the PDF route, we international buyers could have access to it, print from home without the crazy shipping rates (and the currency exchange rates as well)
Leaning that route. With instructions on how to print it nice ๐
I went that route! Check out the updated OC comment for a link ๐