D&D General When Did Digital Art Become A Thing?

[Zardnaar]

To me a lot boffins 3E art was hand drawn but I'm not 100% sure all of it was.

By 4E I think most of it was.

First time I noticed was probably 2005. Specifically Magic The Gathering Ravnica cycle.

Telling Time (Modern Masters 2015 Edition) - Gatherer - Magic: The Gathering

Telling Time. Even then I didn't think about it to much.

2001 Hand drawn?

Fact or Fiction | Invasion | Card Kingdom

Reveal the top five cards of your library. An opponent separates those cards into two piles. Put one pile into your hand and the other into your graveyard.

www.cardkingdom.com

Can look cool but starts looking generic fast for me ymmv of course.

In D&D3.5 covers are digital looking to me 3.0 not sure.

 

[TheSword]

What do you mean by digital? Drawn with CAD software?

I’m pretty sure CAD has been used for the last couple of decades or so for a lot of work. A guy in our group who is an illustrator has been using it that long and I remember him needing to get a mac to do his fine art degree back in the nineties because it was pretty much an expectation.

 

[Cadence]

Tangentially, Circle Of Protection: Black - The Crazy Story Of The First Digital Art Magic Card

I never would have guessed.

 

[Leatherhead]

For a bit of perspective, the first drawing program was made in 1963, and the first fully digitally painted movie was The Rescuers Down Under from 1990.

So digital art is older than D&D, and digital art as a prominent thing is older than MTG.

Edit: for clarity~

 

[Reynard]

I found this link. Very interesting. Digital Art Movement Overview

 

[Cadence]

For a bit of perspective, the first drawing program was made in 1963, and the first fully digitally drawn movie was The Rescuers Down Under from 1990.

So digital art is older than D&D, and digital art as a prominent thing is older than MTG.

I had no idea how much of it was digital. However...

"The Rescuers Down Under is notable for Disney as its first traditionally-animated film to completely use the new computerized CAPS process. CAPS (Computer Animation Production System) was a computer-based production system developed by Pixar that was used for digital ink and paint and compositing. This allowed for a more efficient and sophisticated post-production of the Disney animated films and making the traditional practice of hand-painting cels obsolete. The animators' drawings and the background paintings were scanned into a computer, where the animation drawings are inked and painted by digital artists, and later combined with the scanned backgrounds in software that allows for camera positioning, camera movements, multiplane effects, and other techniques." - The Rescuers Down Under

 

[nyvinter]

"where the animation drawings are inked and painted by digital artists" does mean the finished animation art is digital.

Lots of digital artists still use traditional sketches for ideas and figuring out gestures. (Frank Quietly does the opposite I think: digital sketch and layouts and then ink big printouts.) But historically — I can't believe I just typed out those words — Dave McKean's Sandman covers were mixed media photos, ink and digital effects and Ben Templesmith did obvious digital art for comics in 2002 without anyone raising their eyebrow.

Digital art has been here long, but not always easy to spot. (Digital colours has sometimes been easier due to some art trends.)

 

[Cadence]

"where the animation drawings are inked and painted by digital artists" does mean the finished animation art is digital.

Sure, but it reads like there was a lot of the non-digitally drawn things scanned in that were part of the finished thing. It's not what I usually think of as being digital animation. (I'm not arguing with the term or your explanation, just explaining where my headspace was at).

 

[nyvinter]

Yeah but the non-digital you see in the finished movie is the scanned background. And it that isn't enough to make it digital then neither is this (which also used scanned painted background and digitally drawn characters.)

 

[Zardnaar]

Tangentially, Circle Of Protection: Black - The Crazy Story Of The First Digital Art Magic Card

I never would have guessed.

I knew it was used in the 90s not how universal it was though.