Tuesday, March 28, 2017

And Finally, Ghibli Deck, Wands Suit

And here's the last suit!  Since I didn't blog each suit as I went along you don't realize how long it took me to do each suit, but each one was wildly different. It took weeks to do the swords suit, but I knocked this suit out in a single day, just today at the office. Wands aren't too difficult, and I knew from the beginning  that the Catbus was the eight of wands. That was an easy choice, and I like it. I just need to throw the box design together and this thing is ready to print! God, I love my nerdy decks.

**Fun side note: The elemental symbols at the bottom of each card are actually the symbols for the different elemental attributes creatures can have in Studio Ghibli's video game Ni No Kuni. But no one will pick up on a detail that small unless I tell them. It just makes me happy.








Sources

ace. http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?mode=medium&illust_id=41934731
2. official art
3. official art
4. http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?mode=medium&illust_id=16047305
5. http://hetiru.deviantart.com/art/The-rain-of-sadness-and-happiness-587599231
6. official art
7. http://stabat.deviantart.com/art/mononoke-354937576
8. official art
9. http://tiny-mint.deviantart.com/art/The-Cat-Returns-392374726
10. screenshot
page. screenshot
knight. http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?mode=medium&illust_id=24413655
queen. official art
king. http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?mode=medium&illust_id=31803546

Ghibli Deck, Cups Suit

The cups suit is my favorite suit in tarot, I just really connect to the emotions of the cups. And I always think that making the cups suit in these decks should be easy but somehow it never, never is. I always struggle with it. Aside from the more romantic cards at least. I can find couple artwork easy, it's the rest of the suit that throws me. But I eventually got it, and here it is.









Sources

2. been deleted from pixiv
5. screenshot
6. screenshot
7. screenshot 
page. artist pon00000, deleted from pixiv
knight. artist name Neptune, can't find the source
king. deleted from Pixiv

Ghibli Deck, Pentacles Suit

So, when I first started thinking about this deck I had a vague idea of having each suit focus on one of the four biggest movies, Howl's Moving Castle, Spirited Away, Princess Mononoke and.... ummmm... well, I hadn't decided on the fourth one yet. But after I looked over my fanart collection I realized that it would be very very difficult to come up with enough specific artwork for the cards, and I didn't want to struggle with it. So I just picked whatever art I felt like worked. But if you look at the royalty of the suits you can see some of the suits had some definite leanings to which movie would have gone with each suit.  Pentacles flowed pretty easy, I didn't have too much trouble with this one. I hadn't originally intended to include the Tale of the Princess Kaguya in this collection since I hadn't seen it when I started, but instead I just bought the movie for my daughter for her birthday and watched it. I really liked it. And that moment fits the five of pentacles really well.









Sources

3. concept art
6. screenshot
8. paimonerra.deviantart.com, no longer exists on deviantart
10. deleted off of Pixiv
page. official art

Studio Ghibli deck, Cups Suit

First of all, you should know I changed the High Priestess card for the majors.


You know, same character just better artwork I think.

And now, starting with the suit that I always expect to be really difficult and somehow it never is. As I started working on this suit, I had a tragic realization. I had planned to ignore the movie The Grave of the Fireflies because that movie is depressing as FUCK. But then I realized that there was a card that kind of needed to be depressing as FUCK. Damn you, three of swords. So there it is. Eat your heart out. The six of this suit was a difficult choice, and when I picked the artwork I thought I was choosing a picture of Ashitaka from Princess Mononoke leaving his village, but after some research turns out it's some other guy from a book made by Studio Ghibli, But the context still fits in the story and I'm gonna think of Ashitaka whenever I look at it anyways. So it works. All in all I'm pretty pleased with how it came out.

                                                                 








Sources

ace. official art
3. official art
5. official art
6. Official art
7. official art
8. deleted from Pixiv
10. screenshot
page. official art