Friday, May 6, 2011

Thumbs Up? Thumbs Down?



This is the illustration I did for the "staff" section of the magic items for the Swords & Wizardry Core Rules. It's hard to evaluate one's own work, so I'll toss this out for the question of "is this good enough to be put in a rulebook?" I think it is, given that it's just to flavor up the page describing staffs, but I'm biased.

21 comments:

  1. Well, IANAPACBIDLTCATFF, but I like it. It's got all the kinks and knots and weird bo-jangle do-dads that make for a fine magical staff.

    Looking at the initial thumbnail did confuse me for a sec, as I was wondering what the heck I was looking at - the hoofed leg of a very skinny-legged demon maybe? But embiggening cleared that up.

    The only thing I would change would to have a big old knob of something up at the top - like a crystal ball or something. But that would my own personal version of 'Pimp My Staff' - especially if I was going to actually use the staff and be expecting to bean people on the side of the head with it.

    - Ark

    *(I Am Not A Professional Art Critic But I Do Like To Complain About Things For Free)

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  2. I do think it's good enough, but I'd suggest rotating it--either 180 degrees if you need a vertical image, or 90 degrees CCW if you can make it a horizontal. (I prefer horizontal.)

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  3. Pretty Awesome I think. Love the hoof touch.

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  4. Very excellent. I agree with rotating, but I'm not sure I'd to 90/180 degrees. Perhaps a 35 degree--just a slight slant, in other words. Otherwise, very nice.

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  5. Woah, tha's a creepy looking staff. Heck, I can see Orcus using that thing. A+++++++, I would buy that staff, especially if it's a staff of power.

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  6. Great work Matt! I've always been a fan of your art. I'm still digging that cover to the old schhol primer I bought from you a while back.

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  7. Pouces en l'air !...hum, that's the french for "thumbs up" !

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  8. Hope I can say this w/o you reading too much into it, but, nice staff!

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  9. We can't just go round rehashing 40 years og cliche can we? that staff is all good ... but maybe too high tech for the simple magic effects of the od&d clone ...

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  10. Love it.
    I very intriguing staff. :)

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  11. Yes.

    No qualification.

    I get this by the way.

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  12. Stylish. I like.

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  13. Well done! Would have been easy to over do it. Subtle yet different.

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