The Bohemian Gothic Tarot

[baba-prague]

Seven of Cups

So, here is one quick example that relates to the discussion immediately above. This is the original photographic postcard on which we based the woman in the Seven of Cups. The stairs, by the way, are from "Kelley's Tower" which is round the corner from our studio - it's supposed to be the site of Edward Kelley's alchemical laboratory (it probably isn't, but that's an entirely different discussion). The sky is one of our photographs - we have an image library now of hundreds of photographs of the sky so that we have different seasons, weather, lunar phases, times of day and night etc to draw on. The rooftop towers are actually from a very old photograph in a book of Czech historical landmarks - but we've treated it to be more "legible".

The hand added is mine, clutching a green Bohemian glass (it's a good reproduction) filled with red wine. We had fun photographing this as Alex kept telling me to try to make my hand "more elegant" - that may well be the reason I ended up tucking in my little finger, he did not like the look of it stuck out.

Hey ho. Sometimes I wish we could find an easier way to do this - but on the other hand (no pun intended) I like the sheer craziness of it all.

Okay, I've also just added a close-up of the eyes, which will make it easier to see the over-painting that we do (well, not "we" - this is Alex's domain). Without going into a tutorial about the use of old photographs, you can see that the basic issue is that the original is very spotted and faded in places. On top of that, we just felt that the face was not all that "Gothic" - beautiful as it is.

So first we smooth it all out by painting - by hand - over the whole. This also helps to make the new photograph and the old blend together (and no, no we don't use the ghastly "blend" filter in Photoshop, which would solve nothing and just blur it all out) because the new photo is very sharp and looks quite different. We also do some highlighting, both to help get the lighting right, but also to add some drama - this in part is where the "oil painting" look comes from. Then we work on her lips and eyes, to get the atmosphere and expression we need - for example, we've closed up the eyes very, very slightly so that she looks more mischievous than in the original. Close up, the work on the eyes looks very heavy, but it needs to be so that it achieves the necessary "look" in the final card.

By the way, we found that it was eyes that we very often had to change - that heavy-lidded and almost kohl-rimmed - dark shadowed - look adds a lot to the atmosphere of the deck, although we needed it to be unobtrusive. So many, many of the original photos had their eyes very much redrawn.

I hope this is interesting!

 

[Skydancer]

You hope this is interesting??
It's absolutely spell-binding!!! Thank you so much for writing this out - fascinating. DO wish Mr. ALex would make an appearance some time. (hint)

YOUR hand, eh? .... curiouser and curiouser .... ....

 

[baba-prague]

You hope this is interesting??
It's absolutely spell-binding!!! Thank you so much for writing this out - fascinating. DO wish Mr. ALex would make an appearance some time. (hint)

YOUR hand, eh? .... curiouser and curiouser .... ....

He is in Yalta right now. But I doubt I will ever get him to post here - he is uncomfortable with the whole idea of forums.

I do more of the early concept/content/approach work, less of the production artwork. I suppose that's the easiest way to explain it. Alex has recently started telling people that "Between us we have know-how - she is the 'know' and I am the 'how.'" LOL, I suppose that isn't so far off. My experience is more in doing art direction than final production, though I've always worked very closely with production people and have the highest respect for them. I was once memorably told off for that when I worked in a very high prestige design agency - they said that as I was a "consultant" I would lose status in other people's eyes if I hung around with the people doing the actual nitty gritty artwork - ROTFL, ridiculous!

Anyway, hope that sort of explains it. Alex and I are both designers, but we work quite differently so we do compliment each other nicely.

 

[baba-prague]

I'll explain this a bit more when we get around to talking about See of Logos - which will be a few weeks now and of course a new thread. But for now, it makes a good illustration of how we work.

So, I just spent a long time thinking about why some "See" cards we have done do not, in my opinion, work, and so over a couple of days I came up with a rather different way of approaching the style. I then got some examples, both historical and contemporary, of the kind of thing I had in mind, and sat down with Alex. He discussed it with me, looked at my examples, made sure he understood what I was suggesting, and then we agreed to try it out on three card images. At that point, we worked together very closely, with both of us pulling out potential source material and discussing like crazy what might work.

But he was the person doing most of the Photoshop work (okay, I often grab the mouse too, even at sketch stage, as often it's easier to show than to describe the "look" I'm after). We then end up with some sketches and discuss again if my new ideas about styling are going to be good. If so - and in this case, YES, we both really like the new approach - we then go on to talk about any gaps we can see in the source material. At that point I'm most often the person who tries to plug those gaps by sourcing whatever we need - for example finding fabrics (we are using fabric patterns as part of the graphics), searching places like AbeBooks and online Czech antiquariat sites and so on. I also do any research that's needed - e.g. which Egyptian symbols one might want to incorporate into the Isis card etc.

All this only works because by this stage I have a very strong visual image of what we're looking for - and I understand the type of technique/resolution/colouring etc that will and won't work (for example, I might be able to find a gorgeous photo, but if it's SO faded that it's hard to see, then it may be impossible to restore it enough to work in a card). If we asked someone else - a non-designer - to find material the chances are that it would be very interesting but unusable. You have to be able to SEE the cards in your head to think, "Oh yes, this pattern/photo/graphic may work on this card."

Then we pull everything together and start in again until eventually (and it can be months) we get to the stage of finalising some cards. At that point, a lot of my visual/design work is finished - I will only be maybe 20% involved, as Alex draws much better than I do. So he will do the final integration and drawing and I will just throw in some comments and suggestions.

So you can see, it's very closely intertwined, but we do have different roles.

 

[Pao]

He Can I ask how it played out in your reading Pao?

it played out WONDERFULLY! you see my friend had cancer in High School and as a result they had to remove her middle finger on her right hand (same hand she's holding the glass), so she has only 4. She was the one that noticed it and screamed "oh my God that really is me!" and the rest of the card made perfect sense, but it was that image alone that was very powerful.

I was scared I couldnt read with this deck, because I tried it on myself, but this reading was uncanny. We still have goosebumps today. she loves this deck!!! Thank you!!!!

 

[Aerin]

This is fascinating....

And I am beginning to 'see'.

It must be wonderful to work with someone who can turn your ideas into reality (well, not real reality but at least visual reality).

Aerin

 

[firemaiden]

Baba -- the evolution of the seven of cups from photographic source to finished card as shown by the attachments you posted was absolutely fascinating. Thank you!

 

[baba-prague]

And I am beginning to 'see'.

It must be wonderful to work with someone who can turn your ideas into reality (well, not real reality but at least visual reality).

Aerin

Yes, I was burbling on about that to a friend last night! I mean, I can do these things myself, but not to anything like the standard Alex can. On the other hand, he says that I am the person who gets things started and develops a kind of "picture" in my head about how it could all look (again, he can do these things, but I am better at that end of projects). It works incredibly well

 

[Briar Rose]

Yes, thank you, too.


I don't like the look of the pinky sticking out either. Glad you tucked it in.

The card is interesting.

 

[baba-prague]

Baba -- the evolution of the seven of cups from photographic source to finished card as shown by the attachments you posted was absolutely fascinating. Thank you!

Note that I left out the photos of me waving the wine glass around. I seem to remember I was still in my dressing gown!

We are forbidden also to show the whole Devil sequence as it is my back, Vassa's head and our friend Dita's shoulder (my shoulder was deemed not elegantly bony enough - humph!) Dita is not that keen on being shown in the exposed shoulder shot, in which she was in fact sitting in her shop and saying, "I hope no-one comes in right now." She says she now shows people the deck and tells them that she is the devil's shoulder.

Vassa also says we made her look nasty. Well, I have to say that's true, she actually has a very sweet expression mostly.

By the way, my hand can be seen once again starring in Strength. I like it there - I suspect it's not that well-shaped in reality though (well, not since I was eighteen.) Oh - and those are some of my ring collection in the Four of Pentacles - I had a "big Finnish ring" thing at one stage. I could go on and on. But I won't - I may be giving away far too many trade secrets here

Alex can be quite outrageous. In the early autumn we met one person we knew only slightly and he took one look at her long, dark hair and hissed in my ear that he needed photographs. I had to explain to her that he was not being oddly fetishistic. I can't remember now, but I think she may be the Hair of the Moon.