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

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

I thought art from 3 0-4E was fairly bad tbh. Went from nice 2E colour hardcovers to poo brown windows and 4E WAR core books. Not a fan of his art.
There was the odd exception like 3.5 Draconomicon, Tyrants of 9 Hells etc.

5E was an improvement.

Art in the 1e-3e area was all over the place IMO. There is good and bad. 4e was more consistent and better on average, but not quite my style for a lot of the edition. 5e has been better. Similar consistency to 4e, but more my style. The technical quality of the art has improved over the edition too and the 2024 core and beyond look to be some of the best art ever.

All the above IMO.

 

[Zardnaar]

Art in the 1e-3e area was all over the place IMO. There is good and bad. 4e was more consistent and better on average, but not quite my style for a lot of the edition. 5e has been better. Similar consistency to 4e, but more my style. The technical quality of the art has improved over the edition too and the 2024 core and beyond look to be some of the best art ever.

All the above IMO.

4E mostly didn't lije the style wasn't bad as such just not my thing.
Think 2E had the best art for me. Early 1E is very rough and 2E had the iconic settings art.

5.5 likely will have the best from a technical PoV probably won't have much bad art as such.

But it depends ds on if you like it's style/digital art.
5E art is fairly good just lacks a few iconic pieces imho.

 

[Vaalingrade]

3x's covers were awesome. They looked like magic books.

But 3x also have the gorillataur minotaur and Lockwood's metallic tropical fish dragons we've been stuck with for 20 years.

I appreciate the spines of 4 and 5 more, but they don't look all that fun. The Actual D&D logo has been degrading too. I get that 5e's is supposed to be a throwback, but it feels... it's hard to describe... cheap? It's like a little too clean but it's trying to have bitz and clutter on it so it looks like it's trying to rip off something else even if there's nothing it's actually ripping off?

 

[Zardnaar]

3x's covers were awesome. They looked like magic books.

But 3x also have the gorillataur minotaur and Lockwood's metallic tropical fish dragons we've been stuck with for 20 years.

I appreciate the spines of 4 and 5 more, but they don't look all that fun. The Actual D&D logo has been degrading too. I get that 5e's is supposed to be a throwback, but it feels... it's hard to describe... cheap? It's like a little too clean but it's trying to have bitz and clutter on it so it looks like it's trying to rip off something else even if there's nothing it's actually ripping off?

Core books splats were meh.

 

[Vaalingrade]

I have no idea what a bookspkat is.

 

[Zardnaar]

I have no idea what a bookspkat is.

Fixed. I hate this phone.

 

[mellored]

Double post.

 

[mellored]

The first art to use "pixels" is from 1886 (zoom in).

 

[Thourne]

The first art to use "pixels" is from 1886 (zoom in).

A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte by Georges Seurat.
Just in case anyone didn't know and was curious.
It is at the Art Institute in Chicago.

.. but also, not digital

 

[Vaalingrade]

Core books splats were meh.

The initial 3e rollout (Masters of the Wild, Song and Silence, etc) we super lackluster, but the later splats were pretty good. Incarnum, despite mechanically being a sign of no longer caring, was a visual bop.