The UNofficial Tarot

Welcome to the UNofficial Coven's Group Project, The Unofficial Tarot

Our Goal is to invite folk with an interest in Tarot to join together and create a unique deck that reflects both our interest in Fantasy Art and our desire have a deck that we have taken a part in making.

The pack as we have envisioned it, will feature beings of fantasy and myth.
The face of each card will be an original piece of art. On the back there will be a short poetic descriptions of the meanings of the cards.

Our hope is in the end that we gather not only the images and words that can be presented on the screen, but also to research and develop the best ways to physical decks that we can make at home and are usable.

How to participate

Choose a card that would interest you to work on.

Place your [username] in the slot provide for the card below.

Indicate whether you would like to work on the face image, poetic descriptions, and or a background image for the descriptive text.

We also welcome help from folks who want to research and share information on: Card meanings and history. Layouts and reading techniques. Methods of production.

Guidelines

To begin with we will be focusing on the Major Arcana, and so far we have only made submission slots for those cards. Although if you feel strongly motivated to create a Minor Arcana Card, Don't be discouraged, Your welcome to make a slot for it at the bottom of the list and submit it anyway. In the end this is all about stretching our creative and spiritual wings.

You are welcome to use any kind of media that can made visible on a computer screen, traditional drawing and painting, digital drawing and painting, photos and photomanipulations.

All works must be created by the submitter/s. For Photo manipulations the photo's should be taken by the artist. If you need to work from others peoples photo's please for either the whole piece or for the odd element, please ensure that you use only photos where the original photographer has given permission for their use, (ie, Creative Commons Atribute licences, Released Photo References, etc.] Also in this case please credit the original Photographer and include a link to the original work.

In the effort to make it possible for these cards to be produced physically We ask that you use the Card Blank Template provided at the bottom of the page. Please keep the narrow border provided as it will help to create continutiy between the cards.

For those interested in working on text descriptions and the background art for them please take to [LynnAnneBrown]'s "Moon Card Back" Submission, to give you an idea where we are going with it. Since we want the text to be readable, It will be neccesary for the background image to look good fade behind the text. *note from Raven - I found the text looked best on tone on tone background. I was also thinking that for continuity it would be nice if the colours used for the tone on tone were consistent. And if folks agree I will help by providing the colours I used and even a tutorial on how I put together the card back.*

Collaborative efforts are not only welcome but encouraged.

Thoughts and Considerations

This is where we will be placing our idea's that need to be talked about and futher developed.

[moira hawthorne]: so... each card would have a different 'poem' but the basic same design type and colour?

[wicked fae mage]: OOOOOOOOH! This is gonna be so uber ^.^
Perhaps we should do it as the fae are swords, dragons are wands, trolls are pentacles and mermaids are cups? Maybe not that exactly, but something like that? And keep the major arcana as to the basic symbols and meanings, but with fantasy as the theme?

[moira hawthorne]: id switch dragons and fae tho

[LynnAnneBrown]: Hmmmm.....I am not sure about Trolls for Pentacles. It might just be because I have never had any real contact with them. At least not in the "Ogerish" monster under the bridge sort of fashion that they are usually depicted in Fairy Tales.

For me when earth spirits take human like form, they more resemble dwarves or leprechauns in shape and stature, except that their overall apearance and dress is more pastoral, than industrial.

[moira hawthorne]: well we could have some variation...

drawfs do work well for earth and for penticles

but so do trolls for me... both the cave dwelling ones.. and the jamician spirtual ones of wow works well...

maybe ... any earthy creature... for penitcles...

water/sea/lake ect for cups

any air flying ect for wands

and the fighting creatures for swords

[LynnAnneBrown]: Works for me, It would allow us to explorethe different ways that the spirits of these elements choose to present themselves. Brilliant.

[LynnAnneBrown]: Moira was kind enough to let me adapt one of her Photo Art Pieces for use on the Back of the Moon Card.

In the course of our conversation she asked me.

are all the cards gonna have that image as their back? or just the moon one?

And I as was writing the response I thought It might be useful to copy it down to here so we could open up the topic to everyone.

I am not sure. Some unifying image might be useful even if it is only a subtle one like the background of the card back. The one thing I would recommend is that if they do vary, and I see no reason why they can not, that the backgrounds should be light and tone on tone like this one so that the writing remains readable. Same with the font, Pretty but legible.

Of course the unifying factor wouldn't have to be the images themselves, they it could simply be the use of the same tone on tone colour scheme for the background graphic.

I was also thinking that what might be cool is to actually put the blanks in the spaces were the finished cards will be presented and so that we can watch the deck as it becomes.

I'd also like to encourage folk to submit their works in progress so that we can get a feel for each others inspiration. I also think that as we watch what is happening we will be inspired to develop the links between the cards which will help unify the deck.

At this point, though, I am only guessing because I have never co-ordinated a project of this size. And despite a desire to create some sort of commonality, I also want to honour the coven's commitment to promoting unrestricted creativity.

Also in the end this is a group project. I might have claimed the page for us but it was born out a common desire to create and needs to shaped and moulded by the group as a whole.

And since you've made me think about this a bit more with your question, I think it would be useful to post your question and the answer so that the topic can be discussed by everyone.

In fact we might want to look at some way to post the guidelines as we develop them. Whether that be in a seperate brainstorming wiki. Or as a section of the top of the one we have going.

But before I get to far ahead of myself, I will just post these thoughts down in comments and see what the response is.

The Major Arcana

0 The Fool

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1 The Magician [LinkTurrner]

I didn't do the words that was done after with Gimp... but here it is.

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2 The High Priestess

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3 The Empress

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4 The Emperor

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5 The Hierophant

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6 The Lovers

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7 The Chariot

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8 Justice

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9 The Hermit
[wicked fae mage] I drew this and the strength card yesterday during power outage. Let me reinstall printer and I'll scan them

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10 Wheel of Fortune

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11 Strength [wicked fae mage]
I like the traditional depiction of this card being the counter of lust/temptation so I'm going to incorperate that with my own little twist ^.^
*scurries away to do work*

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12 The Hanged Man

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13 Death [Rat Hacker]
I like the original meaning of this, Change, the end of something old and the beginning of new. 

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14 Temperance

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15 The Devil

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16 The Tower

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17 The Star

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18 The Moon [LynnAnneBrown]

"Moon Card Back" Draft So here is a quick draft of my Idea I like the Image fading behind the words But think that I would make the image itself more complex, interesting, though I do think that it would be good to keep a it tone on tone so tone so that it doesn't interfere with reading the words.	"Moon Card Back" Photo Manipulation and Original Text By [LynnAnneBrown] Photo Art used in Manipulation http://elftown.eu/stuff/hfytf.png By [moira hawthorne]

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19 The Sun

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20 Judgement

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21 The World

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Card Size Proportion Border Template

download after you have put your name on a card you wish to depict

eeeekkkkkk that needs cleared some in the center... its all gritty like my eyes

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