D&D 5E Toward a new D&D aesthetics

[Faolyn]

Have you ever seen Lilo and Stich? It's the first thing I thought of when I saw this. The big eyes, the non threatening expression, etc.

Lilo and Stitch is the one with the genetically engineered, chaotically destructive monster thing, right?

 

[beancounter]

Lilo and Stitch is the one with the genetically engineered, chaotically destructive monster thing, right?

Lilo & Stitch - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Faolyn]

Lilo & Stitch - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Thanks. I was mostly being facetious, though, since Stitch, as I understand it (not having seen the movie) is a monster, despite being "cute."

 

[Faolyn]

Thats what I'm talking about.

Contrast that with this? Or anything else being splashed with vast amounts of Blue/Purple/Pink digital ink?

Take us back please.

You're comparing apples and oranges here, in terms of what the art is actually for. The first piece was in the 2e PHB, IIRC, and was used to illustrate an adventuring party doing adventuring things. The second piece is used in Strixhaven and was used to illustrate magic school students at a school dance. Both pieces of art are 100% appropriate for the books they were used in.

Personally, though, I'll take blue and purple hues over Elmore's overuse of yellow and under-use of pants any day of the week.

 

[Faolyn]

The characters' clothing and items aren't worn and dirty.

The tiefling is clearly a bard who makes frequent use of mending and prestidigitation.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Three from recent WotC seems easy enough. I don't have any of these but quick image searches from the titles of recent ones that come to mind.

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The first two are what I have seen for the upcoming Radiant Citadel and the third is Witchlight.
These seem indicative to me of a lighter direction for D&D art.

Call of the Netherdeep is another recent one:

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I don't have a comprehensive 5e collection but the 5e art I have been seeing in promotions and such recently do feel like a trend to the lighter and more kid friendly.

These images have almost nothing in common...? I do not at all see a common style here. The first three are somewhat bright colors, for example, but so wildly different in style and tone. First is mildly impressionistic, second is almost like stained glass and resembles a more colorful take on Art Nouveau. Third kinda sorta resembles the first, but is aiming for a pretty high degree of "realism," not in the sense of not being fantastical (what with the butterfly pegasus and all) but in the sense of aiming for minimal stylization and presenting things with most fine details represented as though accurate to a real physical body, especially in the foreground and the central pegasus figure. (The people driving the carriage and the tree are examples of lower detail, but still overall striving for a "this is what it would really look like" vibe, particularly with the attention paid to the humans' hair and the pegasus's mane.)

The fourth and fifth though are completely different. Desaturated, relatively scruffy/rough, featuring comparatively mundane scenes and ordinary clothing. Just about the only things that unite all of them are:

1. They aren't "real is brown," as TVTropes would put it. This is a bit weak because the fourth and fifth images actually do feature some of those characteristics (desaturation, shifting toward a monochromatic or dichromatic palette) but they have at least some ways they defy that trope so l'll grant it.
2. They feature people being happy or positive that do not look like they're exhausted, dirty, or unwell. This isn't universal since image 2 doesn't have people in it at all, but again I'm willing to count it for that purpose.
3. It features a variety of (nonsapient) species and (sapient) ancestries and ethnicities.

That's...pretty damn thin in the similarity department. The first three images are certainly colorful and most of the ones with sapient beings have a high degree of non-humanoid characters...but given non-humanoid are a solid chunk of player characters now (e.g., even if you lump subraces together, the most popular races in 5e are human+variant, full elves collectively, half elf, dragonborn, and tiefling) that seems to be a mere matter of accurately reflecting what people are already choosing to play.

What would you say is the artistic throughline for these images, apart from a loose pattern colorful, positive, and diverse? Because those three alone are hardly worthy of complaint.

 

[Kurotowa]

What would you say is the artistic throughline for these images, apart from a loose pattern colorful, positive, and diverse? Because those three alone are hardly worthy of complaint.

The complaint is that they're different. That time has passed and the in-vogue art styles have changed. That it's not the same as when the poster first fell in love with D&D 20/30/40 years ago. That kids these days have no respect for tradition and listen to terrible music and are ruining everything.

There's no reasoned explanation because it's not a reasoned complaint. It's an emotional one about being left behind by change, which is one as old as recorded history.

 

[theCourier]

And sold...

Welcome to The Band!

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

Yes, over time the number of Disneyfied illustrations have been increasing, and the number of "classic" illustrations are decreasing.

No one is arguing that variety no longer exists.

What does “ Disneyfied” mean? Care to share an example?

 

[beancounter]

A trend toward softer, gentler and more kid friendly art. That's all I was saying saying.
That is the "common thread" among these and other pictures posted by others.

But I think most of you knew that...

It's well known that WoTC wants to expand it's market share to kids, and that's one of the reasons for the recent change of aesthetic.

Wizards of the Coast hires video game vet Leah Hoyer to lead new Wizards Kids Studio

Leah Hoyer‘s new gig leading a kid-focused initiative at Wizards of the Coast has been a “dream come true.” “In many ways, this feels like the position my entire career… Read More

www.geekwire.com

"While both can be enjoyed by kids, they aren’t the target demographic. That’s why Wizards of the Coast recently launched a new studio aimed to design new projects targeted directly at kids."

Well, well, well, the dreaded "D" word associated with a WoTC exec... OMG

Creative storytelling has been the focus of Hoyer’s career. She spent eight years at Disney overseeing the creation and production of kids’ television programming including popular shows Kim Possible and Phineas and Ferb. An experience working on an interactive attraction at the Epcot Center sparked her interest in games.

“That project made something click for me,” she said. “I realized that, while I loved being part of telling stories to kids, the idea that I could craft a story with a player was amazing.”