D&D General Defining your campaing through art? Or how I learned to embrace anime elf ears (image-heavy)

[Rabulias]

Do you know the name of the artist who made this image? It's fantastic!

Looks like it's by Stepan Alekseev (https://app.artstation.com/artwork/bzlKE).

 

[Yora]

I got a lot of images I collected over the years (and a lot I threw out over the years.)
Currently, the folder for my setting sits at a modest 400.

Spoiler: Images

 

[Oofta]

I got a lot of images I collected over the years (and a lot I threw out over the years.)
Currently, the folder for my setting sits at a modest 400.

Spoiler: Images

For whatever reason, I see no images just file names.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

For whatever reason, I see no images just file names.

Same. It may be a quirk of the spoiler tag, I know quotes sometimes breaks images.

 

[Yora]

Weird, it does display them for me. Also in a different browser and on another device. So that does sound like a browser issue on your sides to me.

 

[Oofta]

Weird, it does display them for me. Also in a different browser and on another device. So that does sound like a browser issue on your sides to me.

Huh. Only works in firefox. Guess that makes sense since edge now uses chromium engine.

 

[Yora]

Had it working in Firefox, Konqueror, and UCBrowser.

 

[Keefe the Thief]

The current fantasy art I like the most is specifically done by pauhami and ullathynell (both on Instagram) for Necrotic Gnome's upcoming "Dolmenwood" campaign setting (for Old School Essentials and other BX-derived OSR games).

It's a stark contrast to the prevalent modern manga-style and/or dungeonpunk. Very child-like. Very dreamy. Very evocative.
Enjoy!

Very nice. I always wonder if there is a lot of pressure on artist to draw very "mainstream" until someone comes along and says "please, for this product, define your own style".

 

[reelo]

Very nice. I always wonder if there is a lot of pressure on artist to draw very "mainstream" until someone comes along and says "please, for this product, define your own style".

Yeah, that's a good question. I wouldn't say there's actual pressure but I guess it's just artists "going with the flow" and being —consciously or unconsciously— influenced by what they see others do. By the way, the character art (monsters, PC races) for the Dolmenwood books is noticeably different from this too. But still unlike anything mainstream.

 

[Yora]

Though I think making stuff that is different and distinguishable seems like a much better way to get noticed. There's a huge supply of artists for generic fantasy art, and while there might be more available work for them, they have to split it among them, driving down prices.
More unique styles might have less demand, but if there are few people who can provide something similar, you should be able to get better pay for your work, if you can get it.

Though there's always the real possibilities that those people who have a real budget for art always go for the cheapest option and don't care about an interesting look. Planescape and Symbaroum still remain the exceptions.