Good Playing Card Designers?

yyyyyyy

Elite Member
Apr 7, 2012
537
12
Hello all, a small question for you today. I've been taking a look at custom playing cards and such, for no reason in particular aside from just straight curiosity. What I've noticed is that a lot of the well-known custom decks of playing cards often aren't associated with the people that designed them rather than the company that retails them. For example, I believe the Daniel Madison decks are designed by Jeff Lianza, but most people classify the decks as "Ellusionist Decks" rather than "Jeff Lianza Decks". I'm much less intrigued by who sells the playing cards rather than who was actually behind them. So, I'd be grateful if you could list a few exceptional playing card designers. I'm already aware of Jeff Lianza, Paul Carpenter, Homer Liwag and Lance Miller just to name a few. Any others?

-Patrick Varnavas
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Mar 22, 2013
342
2
Munich / Germany
Lee McKenzie Designed some great decks for Ellusionist such as the Artifice Deck, Arcane Deck, Fathom Deck and the Infinity Deck.
 
Last edited by a moderator:

yyyyyyy

Elite Member
Apr 7, 2012
537
12
Wow, I actually didn't know that. That's interesting, those decks are comparitively very different. Thanks for the input.
 
Jul 22, 2013
222
1
California
Neither T11 nor Ellusionist sell these, but Jackson Robinson designed two decks "Federal 52". Very cool Bicycle cards, you can find them on Kickstarter. He hasn't designed any of the classic or famous decks we all know and love, but I love his design.
 

yyyyyyy

Elite Member
Apr 7, 2012
537
12
Oh yes, I have heard of him. Alot of Kickstarter-based artists don't get the sort of attention they may deserve. The Federal 52 series is a really interesting concept, very well executed I might add.
 
Jun 2, 2012
11
0
Mark Stutzman design the Split Spades and White lions for David Blaine, and recently the Whispering Imps. Awesome cards by the way.
 

yyyyyyy

Elite Member
Apr 7, 2012
537
12
Well it's not like the Madison decks were feats of playing card design. They pretty much completely consisted of different configurations of the "Madison" M logo, and slightly altered faces. Not much going on with those decks, but Lianza seems to be the one with the actual graphics design experience. I guess you could say Madison's "Style" is represented in the cards, but I don't know exactly how much he contributed during the creative process. I could be wrong, I'm just speculating.
 

c.t

Apr 17, 2013
125
0
Australia
I think "Shade" helped design the artifice range with Lee McKenzie and Peter Mckinnon designed the LTDs from ellusionist as well
 

timsilva

Elite Member
Nov 18, 2007
404
43
California
timsilva.com
Hey Pav! I could list a bunch of names, but instead I'll try to point you to some (hopefully new) resources instead. ;)

You can find tons of playing card designers on Dribbble, Behance, or even KickStarter just by searching for playing cards: http://dribbble.com/search?q=playing+cards

I would expect that most playing card designers have experience with print design. So they have probably done brochures, business cards, branding, magazines, and posters as well. The advantage that bigger companies have is of course existing customers and the ability to produce higher quality cards with better ink, stock, and finish. If I remember correctly, Zach said that printing about 3,000 decks at USPCC would cost about $10k. It was in one of his videos about the Fontaine deck. So because of this large investment, it just makes sense for companies to pay for it up front and exclusively use their branding.

In regards to the designers not always having visible credits, it really just depends on the business agreements. Also, the designers certainly aren't the only creative minds involved in the production. For example, I'm sure Daniel spent lots of time working on his vision for the deck and then iterated with Jeff's help and graphic design expertise.

Hope that helps. :)
 

yyyyyyy

Elite Member
Apr 7, 2012
537
12
Thanks for the feedback man, I had almost completely forgotten about Simon Frouws. Thanks for the link, I'll be looking for more art.
 
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