PDA

View Full Version : What do you feel fantasy RPG art should look like?



Agrippa
2012-11-21, 01:10 PM
RPG art, especially fantasy RPG art, helps to give the viewer ideas on the character or creature featured. Not just in surface appearence but also attitude, capablity and how that creature or character carries him/herself. This can be used to make said creature/character look everywhere from mythic and superheroic to mundane and ordinary. This can also be used to divide between what some people call "old school RPGs" and "new school RPGs". So tell me which do you feel is more sutable as fantasy artwork.

More new school artwork.

Chris Stevens a.k.a. chriss2d on deviantArt (along with Mark Sinclair, Kevin Yan and Espen Grundetjern)
http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs12/f/2006/340/f/e/Exalted_2nd_Ed___Manse_Build_by_chriss2d.jpghttp://fc03.deviantart.net/fs12/f/2006/340/6/7/Exalted_2nd_Ed___Elementals_by_chriss2d.jpghttp://fc09.deviantart.net/fs42/f/2009/094/4/2/Exalted_2nd_Ed__Scourge_by_chriss2d.jpghttp://fc01.deviantart.net/fs12/f/2006/340/2/4/Exalted_2nd_Ed___Yeddim_by_chriss2d.jpg

Kendrick Lim a.k.a kunkka on deviantArt
http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs12/i/2006/270/f/0/Exalted__the_BLessed_Isle_by_kunkka.jpg

Hyung Tae Kim
The infamous Savant and Sorcerer Cover.
http://farm1.staticflickr.com/1/3068581_725fa6e648.jpg

Jeff Laubenstein
http://www.arnosoft.de/Erben_Mittelerdes_(html)/Grafiken/fullsize/28%20-%20Dwarf%20(EarthDawn).jpghttp://www.blackgate.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/laubenstein-lyssa3.jpghttp://img407.imageshack.us/img407/1913/magub1.jpghttp://www.rottface.com/media/Rott_Large/sb_dsw_03_xl.jpghttp://moondesignpublications.com/sites/default/files/Kralorelan%20-%20Sketch_0.jpg

Or do you prefer old school fantasy illustrations like these?

David C. Sutherland
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-AzochCSxWG8/T6H6YHR6J5I/AAAAAAAAARU/21nVEDFd_fc/s1600/descent.jpghttp://webspace.webring.com/people/ac/cayzle/screeds/lion009a.jpghttp://i4.tinypic.com/10r8hmt.jpg

David A. Trampier
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-uZ-Tf_0wOHc/TWBEaqoINJI/AAAAAAAABPQ/RhRKIzdKTkQ/s1600/trampier%2Bspider.JPGhttp://mikemonaco.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/trampier-bugbear.jpg

Erol Otus
http://www.robotviking.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/erol-otus-1-300x158.jpghttp://3.bp.blogspot.com/_HPQou-R6PDE/SgRBwluSzjI/AAAAAAAAANI/u7zpoAV-qX4/s400/ErolOtus-RoguesGallery-02.jpg

Larry Elmore
http://i201.photobucket.com/albums/aa320/SnowyOwlet/Request%20Items/LarryElmoreFemaleArcher.jpghttp://fantasy.mrugala.net/Larry%20Elmore/Larry%20Elmore%20-%20001b.jpghttp://dragonlance.vanhardeveld.com/lance69.jpghttp://3.bp.blogspot.com/-RpgQ3qaFX2I/TisyqntTrFI/AAAAAAAADNU/ppyRd9ZmReY/s1600/larry_elmore_dragonsoflight.jpghttp://1.bp.blogspot.com/-VHepmzb80dI/TlodeVMXB7I/AAAAAAAAF7g/pjMDIos22wU/s1600/mightyslayers.jpghttp://4.bp.blogspot.com/-qmULPWTy_p0/S2BeamSi4gI/AAAAAAAAAOM/GwWVXKW6fxc/s400/elmore_witch.jpghttp://3.bp.blogspot.com/-qvH_nGSv9Ek/Tlt1Y4tu25I/AAAAAAAAAk0/8QW8rBado40/s1600/Avalynethelifegiver1988.jpg

kardar233
2012-11-21, 01:13 PM
I'm not sure about the general case, but I really like that one by Kendrick Lim.

Agrippa
2012-11-21, 01:30 PM
I'm not sure about the general case, but I really like that one by Kendrick Lim.

I do too, there's just the little problem of overplating on Tepet Ejava's leg greaves. It protrudes too much.

Spiryt
2012-11-21, 01:48 PM
Art style completely depends on portrayed fantasy style, that's pretty much given...

Out of those I probably like first Trampier the most, if I had to choose, don't really care for the rest.

hamlet
2012-11-21, 01:57 PM
Can't see most of your images (probably has to do with the firewall here), but I've always ALWAYS been a fan of those great big full page paintings that 2nd edition put in most of its work. A lot of them by Larry Elmore.

Agrippa
2012-11-21, 02:27 PM
I just added in Larry Elmore under old school for the sake of fairness.

Craft (Cheese)
2012-11-21, 02:39 PM
http://dragonlance.vanhardeveld.com/lance69.jpg

Quite tasteful!

Seriously though, I don't really know how to answer this question because I'm not sure what the divide between "Old School" and "New School" is supposed to be. The artists you posted are different from each other, yes, but honestly the "old school" artists are just as far apart from each other as they are from the so-called "new school." The only consistent difference I can see is the new schoolers use digital tools to keep their lines and shapes cleaner.

Geostationary
2012-11-21, 02:40 PM
There is no "correct" way to do fantasy art. The only requirement is that it should fit the tone or style of the work such that it works for, not against, the tone/goal/vision of the setting. Some things benefit from the "new school" styles you show here, such as Exalted. Others look wonderful with more woodblock or simpler art, such as you show in the "old school" styles. It boils down to taste and what feels appropriate.

hamlet
2012-11-21, 02:44 PM
Quite tasteful!

Seriously though, I don't really know how to answer this question because I'm not sure what the divide between "Old School" and "New School" is supposed to be. The artists you posted are different from each other, yes, but honestly the "old school" artists are just as far apart from each other as they are from the so-called "new school." The only consistent difference I can see is the new schoolers use digital tools to keep their lines and shapes cleaner.

Elmore likes pretty girls. I can't say as I blame him.

Tengu_temp
2012-11-21, 03:12 PM
I like the illustrations of Earthdawn. I believe they do a very good job at portraying an exotic world that's not a generic medieval fantasy setting, without getting too ridiculous. Some examples:
http://cdn.obsidianportal.com/assets/113802/Races_of_Earthdawn.jpeg
http://wiki.rpg.net/images/c/c2/MPost12812-18396a3d52.jpg
http://www.scifi-universe.com/upload/actualites/2009/ed_illusionist_00%20copie.jpg

I don't like the AD&D cover style illustrations, with moustached guys in winged helmets, half-naked women and diapered barbarians. I think they look silly and too much like covers to bad fantasy novels from the seventies, or perhaps a failed attempt at drawing Asterix in a realistic style.

Craft (Cheese)
2012-11-21, 03:33 PM
Elmore likes pretty girls. I can't say as I blame him.

Bit of a difference between "drawing a pretty girl" and "drawing a woman with her clothes ripped off and on her knees in a submissive position, likely about to be... assaulted."

Granted I don't know the context that particular image was supposed to serve: I could understand if it was part of an erotic graphic novel or something. But it's definitely inappropriate to put somewhere like the cover of an RPG rulebook.

hamlet
2012-11-21, 03:40 PM
Bit of a difference between "drawing a pretty girl" and "drawing a woman with her clothes ripped off and on her knees in a submissive position, likely about to be... assaulted."

Granted I don't know the context that particular image was supposed to serve: I could understand if it was part of an erotic graphic novel or something. But it's definitely inappropriate to put somewhere like the cover of an RPG rulebook.

Actually, it's an image from the 2nd Dragonlance trilogy (Legends) and the instances are quite . . . convoluted. In effect, it started with the woman all but sexually assaulting the man, who got angry and tore her dress to degrade her and refuse her attempts to seduce him.

And Elmore almost never portrays women as helpless or degraded. Much, if not most, of his work shows women as strong and powerful.

ngilop
2012-11-21, 04:10 PM
I would like some 2nd ed art from Tony Diterlizzi, like formt he monster manual and such, Boris Vallejo, or Frank Frazetta for some more support from the 'old school' way......

( the only difference i see really is the the new school seems to be done via computers and not by hand and uses much brighter colors)

Janus
2012-11-21, 05:08 PM
I've always preferred the old school art from AD&D. It seems like a lot of them have a story just begging to be told, whereas 3.x and 4e give me more of a "LOOK HOW AWESOME I AM RAHHH!!!" impression.

Craft (Cheese)
2012-11-21, 05:28 PM
Actually, it's an image from the 2nd Dragonlance trilogy (Legends) and the instances are quite . . . convoluted. In effect, it started with the woman all but sexually assaulting the man, who got angry and tore her dress to degrade her and refuse her attempts to seduce him.

Huh, well that's... not what I expected. Fair enough, though the whole thing is still too sexualized for me to be comfortable with it.

Anyway, call me crazy, but the art that captivates me the most tends to be land/water/city/starscape art rather than character or monster art. Either that or a good map. Sadly something-scape art is pretty rare in RPG books and for some reason high-quality, really beautiful maps are even rarer. Most maps you see tend to be confusing messes of jumbled nonsense words that don't really provide you with a clear vision of how the world fits together. A great map invokes mystery, it should draw your eyes to parts of the world and make you think "Wow, I wanna go see what's there."

Anyway, here's the kind of fantasy artwork I like to see:

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/10999090/insp/growth.jpg
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/10999090/insp/mitauzo.jpg
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/10999090/insp/shakar.jpg
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/10999090/insp/hudozh.jpg

Zovc
2012-11-21, 06:19 PM
I've always preferred the old school art from AD&D. It seems like a lot of them have a story just begging to be told, whereas 3.x and 4e give me more of a "LOOK HOW AWESOME I AM RAHHH!!!" impression.

I think this isn't necessarily an art style thing, but more a focus thing.

When you have a picture of a scene versus a picture of a dude looking awesome, that's kind the intrinsic difference.

Personally, I prefer the two 'new style' examples you gave. But I'm partial to more colorful, vibrant, and 'cartoony' pictures. I do feel like Kendrick Lim may have made the armor a little too ornate and obnoxious in her picture. That may have been what she was going for, but I don't really like World of Warcraft-size shoulder armor.

North_Ranger
2012-11-21, 06:31 PM
Personally I like the kind of fantasy art that straddles the fine line between realism and fantasy. You know, the kind with armor that looks awesome yet also something that could be worn, weapons that exhude a sense of adventure and yet feel like something like that could exist, and so on. Pathfinder, for instance, does that wonderfully - save for Amiri the iconic barbarian and her honking big sword.

I do agree what has been said about D&D 4e art, though. Some of that artwork, while physically stunning, just throws the whole idea of fantastic realism in the junk pile and goes full-on LOOKIT HOW AWESOMESAUCE WE ARE!!1111!!! I'm looking at you, any picture with dragonborn in it...

White_Drake
2012-11-21, 06:38 PM
Anyway, call me crazy, but the art that captivates me the most tends to be land/water/city/starscape art rather than character or monster art. Either that or a good map. Sadly something-scape art is pretty rare in RPG books and for some reason high-quality, really beautiful maps are even rarer. Most maps you see tend to be confusing messes of jumbled nonsense words that don't really provide you with a clear vision of how the world fits together. A great map invokes mystery, it should draw your eyes to parts of the world and make you think "Wow, I wanna go see what's there."

I always liked reading the maps in the front of some of those old fantasy novels, like the ones done by Shapiro in the Belgariad.

Edit: Oh, and to actually contribute to the discussion, definitely Elmore, although the elf in the one with the dragon statue looks a bit too stockily built. Maybe it's just me.

Agrippa
2012-11-21, 06:38 PM
I just added three non-cheese cake illustrations of Elmore's to my original post. And yes, that's a low-level party proudly displaying the baby dragon they slew.

By the way Tengu, who Earthdawn's illustrators? Because I feel like I have to add at least some of them my list of favorite fantasy RPG illustrators.

Agrippa
2012-11-21, 06:44 PM
I think this isn't necessarily an art style thing, but more a focus thing.

When you have a picture of a scene versus a picture of a dude looking awesome, that's kind the intrinsic difference.

Personally, I prefer the two 'new style' examples you gave. But I'm partial to more colorful, vibrant, and 'cartoony' pictures. I do feel like Kendrick Lim may have made the armor a little too ornate and obnoxious in her picture. That may have been what she was going for, but I don't really like World of Warcraft-size shoulder armor.

I think the over-sized pauldrons/sapulders and leg greave outcroppings were on the order of White Wolf corporate.

Hiro Protagonest
2012-11-21, 07:34 PM
I think the over-sized pauldrons/sapulders and leg greave outcroppings were on the order of White Wolf corporate.

Yeah. Tepet Ejava was/is one of the most important Dragon-Blooded there is in the current age. She's going to have artifact armor made by the best Dragon-Blooded artisans. And when you get to Exalted artifacts, artistic license is the norm.

Tengu_temp
2012-11-21, 07:44 PM
By the way Tengu, who Earthdawn's illustrators? Because I feel like I have to add at least some of them my list of favorite fantasy RPG illustrators.

The one who sticks in my mind is Jeff Laubenstein. The guy seems incapable of not drawing spirals on everything - building, rocks, people - and his characters often look heroic and cool without necessarily looking like models. It's awesome.

warty goblin
2012-11-21, 08:04 PM
I don't really like my fantasy art to look like a cartoon. Pretty much ever. It just doesn't say fantasy to me, it says TV show or videogame. Which makes my immediate reference not the action of the work itself, but the medium its style is aping.

I also tend to prefer my art on the realistic side. If it isn't realistic I want a consistent, atmospheric style ala the Disciples series. None of the armor makes any sense, but its redolent with romantic, gothic, despair.

But yeah, in general Larry Elmore could just illustrate everything forever, and I'd be happy.

1337 b4k4
2012-11-21, 10:24 PM
Elmore far and away is my preference. In general is dislike art that appears cartoony (a la Sutherland) or worse hyper real cartoon (like a lot of 4e inspired art). I also dislike art that appears posed (like a lot of 3e art was, but also most of the examples at the top of the page).

I much prefer my art to appear to be a snapshot of a story, which Elmore captures more often than not. Even his dragon hunters shot up there, which is quite obviously supposed to evoke the feeling of a posed trophy photo, still feels like it tells a story as compared to most of the modern "solo character staring off into the distance with unfocused eyes" that's become prevalent or the Stevens image with the elementals.

Lastly, and in almost direct conflict with my first statement, I dislike overly detailed pictures, ones where it seems the artist was interested in cramming every last bit of minute detail into the picture. The Laubenstein alchemist above is a good example of this, but it's really popular with cyber-punk art (where actually I think it tends to work). I just feel the level of detail detracts from the picture as a whole. The focus becomes more on the individual details than on the story in the picture. In other words, I like my art to acknowledge that it is art, not a study in still life.

valadil
2012-11-21, 10:32 PM
I don't like chainmail bikinis. Well, I like them, but not as armor. They belong in the Book of Erotic Fantasy, not in core. I find them demeaning, not just to the women being treated as sex objects, but to the stereotypical nerd they're trying to sell the book to. It feels like pandering. It's like the publisher is saying "if you're reading this, you're obviously not getting any, so look at this instead." I don't think that attitude is doing geeks any favors.

Otherwise I want the art to make sense and be consistent with the setting. Ineffectual armor bothers me on this front too. Ridiculously overconstructed fantasy armor can work for me if it's part of the setting. Are all warriors strength potion junkies? Are there special materials that weight 1/10th what steel does without losing any strength? Are enemies so powerful that you really do need a half a foot of steel on each shoulder? If so, I can live with some degree of WoW armor. Maybe not that last one, but you get the idea. If something in the picture stands out as unrealistic, I want that to be because it's part of the setting it's portraying.

Zovc
2012-11-21, 10:47 PM
Are all warriors strength potion junkies? Are there special materials that weight 1/10th what steel does without losing any strength? Are enemies so powerful that you really do need a half a foot of steel on each shoulder? If so, I can live with some degree of WoW armor. Maybe not that last one, but you get the idea. If something in the picture stands out as unrealistic, I want that to be because it's part of the setting it's portraying.

I see where you're going with this. And for some reason, I like it.

Terraoblivion
2012-11-21, 11:14 PM
I don't really think the op is being fair here. There are no real examples of the really bad art in a lot of modern fantasy, like the infamous Savant and Sorcerer cover (http://www.flickr.com/photos/rushputin/3068581/), or much of the art where the men are so muscular they shouldn't be able to turn their heads due to how thick their necks are, while the old school art is mostly represented by early 1st edition AD&D scribbles by people who weren't professional artists, with Larry Elmore being the only exception.

However, for personal preference probably the biggest things are that I hate art with men who are too muscular. Don't get me wrong, a big, burly strong dude is fine. So is a bodybuilder if it fits, but a scrawny nerd shouldn't have arms like a circus acrobat, nor should a muscley guy have arms as thick as an elephant's legs. Adding more muscles than a human has, especially thick muscles going across joints is another pet peeve.

I also despise overly sexualized art, whether of men and women, if I want something sexualized I'll go look at porn. This is not the same as nudity, non-sexualized nudity is possible if rarely seen in art.

Finally, I really find the "barbarian" look silly, whether it's chainmail bikinis, fur diapers or just random bits of fur, skin and leather strapped on with no clear sense of what purpose they serve there. It looks ridiculous, raises so many questions about why people would choose to wear that and just comes off as being as impractical and useless as the costumes worn by the people on the floats at the carnival in Rio. Also, it really grates on me as a historian to see people perpetuate ridiculous ideas about the past and how people away from major centers of civilization dressed. Fabric has been known for quite a while, so has stitching actual, functional clothing of fur and leather, why not use that instead?

warty goblin
2012-11-21, 11:34 PM
Finally, I really find the "barbarian" look silly, whether it's chainmail bikinis, fur diapers or just random bits of fur, skin and leather strapped on with no clear sense of what purpose they serve there. It looks ridiculous, raises so many questions about why people would choose to wear that and just comes off as being as impractical and useless as the costumes worn by the people on the floats at the carnival in Rio. Also, it really grates on me as a historian to see people perpetuate ridiculous ideas about the past and how people away from major centers of civilization dressed. Fabric has been known for quite a while, so has stitching actual, functional clothing of fur and leather, why not use that instead?

I can't say I mind the dude in loincloth barbarian art too much on principle. A guy in a loincloth with a substantial sort of axe says 'this guy doesn't bother with clothes, they slow him down when he's driving his enemies before him.' I'm well aware it doesn't have any particularly good historical parallel, but neither is the dragon skull he's leaning against. Not realistic, but not jarringly stupid.

That same dude plus some crosbelts holding three dozen tiny daggers and joined by a skull, with three rags of chainmail stuck into the loincloth suggests that the character is either an idiot and will hopefully be eaten by a dragon, or else should go back to his fetish club. Bonus moron points if the crossbelts are attached to one-piece pauldrons each the width of his torso with large spikes positioned so as to remove his eyeballs should he raise his arms.

Should the axe have a head larger than a small child, I start praying that the character will be rendered extinct, hopefully in a painful way involving trolls and an unusually sized garlic press, before he finds a buxom tavern wench and has a chance to further contaminate the fantasy hero gene pool. Plus the sex scene is bound to to be terrible.

prufock
2012-11-22, 12:14 AM
Of those, I prefer the Larry Elmore stuff. I also like the cover art from Game of Thrones:
http://www.examiner.com/images/blog/replicate/EXID13081/images/gamethrones.jpg

And the covers Keith Parkinson did for the Sword of Truth series:
http://lh6.ggpht.com/zsgraham/R99YjDyynaI/AAAAAAAAADU/TUzxdrdJ-30/s400/temple-of-the-winds-1024x768.jpg

http://images.fanpop.com/images/image_uploads/Cover-Art---Stone-of-Tears-sword-of-truth-series-684591_689_365.jpg

http://images.fanpop.com/images/image_uploads/Cover-Art--Wizard-s-First-Rule-sword-of-truth-series-684670_804_439.jpg

http://images.fanpop.com/images/image_uploads/Cover-Art---Soul-of-Fire-sword-of-truth-series-684674_804_400.jpg

Agrippa
2012-11-22, 12:17 AM
I don't really think the op is being fair here. There are no real examples of the really bad art in a lot of modern fantasy, like the infamous Savant and Sorcerer cover (http://www.flickr.com/photos/rushputin/3068581/), or much of the art where the men are so muscular they shouldn't be able to turn their heads due to how thick their necks are, while the old school art is mostly represented by early 1st edition AD&D scribbles by people who weren't professional artists, with Larry Elmore being the only exception.

I didn't forget the Savant and Sorcerer cover, I just couldn't bring myself to post that "artwork". I started this as more of a comparison style than subject matter or taste. Maybe I should include that train wreck.

Kitten Champion
2012-11-22, 12:43 AM
I have to say, the sort of art that draws my eye in RPG materials I've read isn't nude flesh, phallic imagery, or physiologically improbable body-types. It's the kind that evokes an emotion, that gets me to thinking about the thousand words behind the picture -- that peaks my curiosity about any fiction the writers have inserted. Not the generic glossy adventurer/heroic poses, which are all about as emotion-latent as those images of models I see in magazines and catalogues, but of people undergoing real experiences and traumas.

Part of the whole problem with the chainmail bikini is that it's antiseptic, you can't imagine a person wearing such stupid and impractical armour doing anything remotely dangerous beyond contracting STDs. I recall seeing something from one of the Exalted books with a topless woman wielding a spear in a stone-aged tribal warfare setting, the nudity wasn't sexual... well not as overtly sexual as you'd assume. The simple brutality of the act being portrayed, the sense that this was something that happened within this fictional world, the questions that emerge about the events depicted and its participants. That's what drew my eye, not the breasts.

Cardboard cut-outs, regardless of their aesthetic beauty or richness of detail, just don't interest me.

Terraoblivion
2012-11-22, 02:13 AM
Mostly I just felt you favored modern art by choosing artists with solid technical skills, while the older artists were mostly kinda back from a technical perspective. It just seemed like that could skewer the stated preferences of people.

Also, Warty, how many situations are a fur diaper actually a practical outfit in? I mean, I wouldn't want to wear one in Northern Europe even if modesty wasn't an issue, I'd feel like freezing to death even in the summer. Similarly moving through anything with more vegetation than the savanna or the prairie without something covering your skin to prevent cuts sounds remarkably painful. It seems bad for rock climbing too. On top of that, why make a fur diaper instead of a loincloth? Loincloths seem faster and easier to make, while also being more comfortable to wear.

Craft (Cheese)
2012-11-22, 04:28 AM
IIRC, the "almost naked barbarian" trope comes from the romans: The germanic tribes they fought would often go into battle naked. They were perfectly capable of wearing practical clothes, but they preferred to fight naked to lower the chance of their wounds getting infected, as these clothes were quite filthy.

As for why loincloths and fur diapers were added, I suspect it's because the audience this trope is supposed to appeal to is the western 14-year old boy, and you probably know how they react when exposed to penises that aren't theirs.

hymer
2012-11-22, 05:21 AM
In all likelihood, 'naked' to the Romans (at least in this context) meant bare torso. Just throwin' that out there.

warty goblin
2012-11-22, 09:37 AM
Also, Warty, how many situations are a fur diaper actually a practical outfit in? I mean, I wouldn't want to wear one in Northern Europe even if modesty wasn't an issue, I'd feel like freezing to death even in the summer. Similarly moving through anything with more vegetation than the savanna or the prairie without something covering your skin to prevent cuts sounds remarkably painful. It seems bad for rock climbing too. On top of that, why make a fur diaper instead of a loincloth? Loincloths seem faster and easier to make, while also being more comfortable to wear.

Did you actually, you know, read my post? Because I specifically recall saying they weren't realistic and didn't have any particularly strong historical analog*. My point was that this didn't bother me, as it was a consistent aesthetic, and while it may not make 100% real world sense at least its not festooned with genuinely idiotic things.


*At least in late antiquity/early Medieval Europe. And since we're talking about fantasy, that's generally the location and time of interest.

JohnnyCancer
2012-11-22, 11:00 AM
I think there's room for all of it, I don't even think a single book NEEDS to have 100% style consistency either. I guess I just dig it all!

Fhaolan
2012-11-22, 11:38 AM
A lot of 'old school' art in RPGs books were drawn by the writer's brother/sister/highschool friend/etc. Not profesional artists. Mainly because the publisher didn't want to pay what professional artists charged for cover or interior illustrations. Look up Philippe Druillet or Frank Frazetta. They did a lot of pulp novel covers back then, so had 'reasonable' prices, but even that was too much for the emerging RPG publishers.

kardar233
2012-11-22, 11:51 AM
It's the kind that evokes an emotion, that gets me to thinking about the thousand words behind the picture -- that peaks my curiosity about any fiction the writers have inserted.

This. When I look at that Kendrick Lim picture in the OP (someone mentioned it was Exalted?) I see a powerful woman trying to find peace with herself before she goes and does something she really doesn't want to do but has to anyway. Like having to go kill her former mentor because he turned evil, or something like that.

The bad RPG pictures are the ones that just go RAARGH at you, without any interesting content. Better ones paint a scene, where you can get a sense of what's happening as a representative of what your characters might end up doing. The best ones carry some kind of emotional loading: that really promotes good role-playing because people say to themselves "I want to have dramatically powerful moments like those".

Terraoblivion
2012-11-22, 09:38 PM
Warty, my point was that it is genuinely idiotic. It doesn't work in any kind of non-tropical setting because it would be too freaking. Especially since it is associated with mountains and cold, northern regions. The general aesthetic is full of bits of fur strapped to random parts of the body for seemingly no reason, since they generally don't even look elaborate enough to be meant as decoration.

Traab
2012-11-22, 09:45 PM
The type of fantasy artwork I like is more modern. I like the classic pencil style drawings. They can be really well done, but the more modern ones, where its almost like the line between picture and photo are blurred due to the sheer level of detail used. I think the term is photorealistic? Where you could almost believe thats an actual picture taken by camera of the giant panda man holding his beer stein, (or whatever) The extra care given to details just allows the artist to show off so much more emotion, and details of the physical and mental characteristics of the person place or thing being drawn. Ugh, im no artist, I dont know the right terms to use to describe what I mean.

Acanous
2012-11-22, 09:52 PM
I'm personally partial to the older style displayed by AD&D. It felt less like I was being pandered at and more like the artist was trying to convey what the thing looked like.

Water_Bear
2012-11-22, 10:25 PM
I like pictures which give a sense of fantastic wonder and don't look completely ridiculous. So most of the self-indulgent cheesecake/beefcake still works, though it's fairly embarrassing, but a lot of the older pencil-drawn images of monsters are right out. Granted, newer computer-assisted art is still vulnerable to being ridiculous or boring, but seems less so from what I've seen.

warty goblin
2012-11-23, 01:11 AM
Warty, my point was that it is genuinely idiotic. It doesn't work in any kind of non-tropical setting because it would be too freaking. Especially since it is associated with mountains and cold, northern regions. The general aesthetic is full of bits of fur strapped to random parts of the body for seemingly no reason, since they generally don't even look elaborate enough to be meant as decoration.

I never denied it was. The nude, or nearly nude, warrior however is one of those things with a very long history in western art. It can be a potent and effective image to convey physical strength and martial prowess. If it works for Athenian vase paintings twenty-four hundred years ago, why not Frank Franzetta?

Excessive buckles however still look stupid.

Terraoblivion
2012-11-23, 01:20 AM
So does random bits of fur strapped to random parts of the body. If you're not wearing a shirt, why strap bits of fur to your arms? Or your shoulders or thighs, for that matter. Also, said warriors having the build, lack of body hair and oiled skin of a male escort seems kinda absurd too. The Greek at least had the excuse of their art being kinda low detail and of actually, obsessively shaving their bodies.

Mostly, though, it's utterly ridiculous and quite deliberately not going for any kind of realism or practicality. Just like excess buckles, though the latter might actually be more practical if the clothes are tailored to simply look like they have to be buckled all the time. Which you prefer is a matter of taste and not one of one thing being ridiculous and impractical and the other not being. So the question isn't about huge shoulders or oversized swords being impractical, while this look isn't, but rather which look, if either, you find cool. Which rather does suggest that arrogance about the former is silly, especially since the logic that derives at bigger pieces of armor being cool seems a lot more straightforward than the one that arrives at looking like a male porn star posing in the snow being cool. And that's speaking as someone who doesn't like either.

warty goblin
2012-11-23, 02:03 AM
So does random bits of fur strapped to random parts of the body. If you're not wearing a shirt, why strap bits of fur to your arms? Or your shoulders or thighs, for that matter. Also, said warriors having the build, lack of body hair and oiled skin of a male escort seems kinda absurd too. The Greek at least had the excuse of their art being kinda low detail and of actually, obsessively shaving their bodies.

Mostly, though, it's utterly ridiculous and quite deliberately not going for any kind of realism or practicality. Just like excess buckles, though the latter might actually be more practical if the clothes are tailored to simply look like they have to be buckled all the time. Which you prefer is a matter of taste and not one of one thing being ridiculous and impractical and the other not being. So the question isn't about huge shoulders or oversized swords being impractical, while this look isn't, but rather which look, if either, you find cool. Which rather does suggest that arrogance about the former is silly, especially since the logic that derives at bigger pieces of armor being cool seems a lot more straightforward than the one that arrives at looking like a male porn star posing in the snow being cool. And that's speaking as someone who doesn't like either.

I never mentioned liking the random bits of fur strapped to body parts look. Since I specifically said I didn't like lots of buckles, it's not unreasonable to think that using lots of buckles to hold on random bits of fur would be included in that statement. The only comment I did make in that regard was not minding the guy in loincloth look. I also never mentioned snow or related meteorological phenomena. The one reference I did drop was a pretty clear call-back to Conan, which, movies and stories alike, pretty much all take place in Mediterranean or outright tropical climes not known for snow. By all means argue with what I say, and by all means complain about looks you don't like, but stop conflating the two.

And Greek art focused on the male nude warrior isn't limited to low detail vase paintings. There's also the higher detail vase paintings, and all that statuary they left lying around. Since linking to copious shots of splendidly naked dudes probably isn't something really permitted by the rules, google it yourself if you must. I did and within three clicks and slightly fewer minutes was looking at lots of seriously ripped dudes rocking the ever practical helmet and nothing else combo.

I suspect all of them could do quite well in the male escort business. Although perhaps they should ditch the spears and swords.


Also, since when did I argue that this was anything but personal taste? I would have thought that beginning the discussion with 'I can't say I mind', and indeed using the personal pronoun throughout, would have made this clear. I don't recall ever saying something to indicate feelings of superiority over those with different taste. I admit to a certain amount of snark directed towards the too-many buckles and huge weapon aesthetic, but I made no reference to those who like the style. The snarking was, if not all that funny in retrospect, I think broad and exaggerated enough to be clearly taken as snark, and not the pronouncement of Cosmic Truth According To Me.

And the purpose of a male porn star barbarian in a loincloth standing in a snowbank is fairly straight forwards. He's got a hot body, and the cold makes his nipples perky.

GolemsVoice
2012-11-23, 02:58 AM
I also never mentioned snow or related meteorological phenomena. The one reference I did drop was a pretty clear call-back to Conan, which, movies and stories alike, pretty much all take place in Mediterranean or outright tropical climes not known for snow. By all means argue with what I say, and by all means complain about looks you don't like, but stop conflating the two.


Also, at least in the movie, Conan wears rather a lot of armor. When he's not, ahem, busy.

Now, what art I like? Generally more realistic-looking "modern" art. I have a special loathing for Wayne England and most of the older Vampire the Masquerade art. Not only was it often ugly (for me!) but it also failed spectaculary to have anything to do with what the page it was on was about.

warty goblin
2012-11-23, 06:19 PM
Also, at least in the movie, Conan wears rather a lot of armor. When he's not, ahem, busy.

Now, what art I like? Generally more realistic-looking "modern" art. I have a special loathing for Wayne England and most of the older Vampire the Masquerade art. Not only was it often ugly (for me!) but it also failed spectaculary to have anything to do with what the page it was on was about.

He did quite a few of the art for the D&D minis game from a while back, much of which I recall as being bad. There were a couple of people who did art for that which was just plain terrible. Didn't look good on paper, looked worse when cast in plastic.

NikitaDarkstar
2012-11-23, 07:09 PM
Actually, it's an image from the 2nd Dragonlance trilogy (Legends) and the instances are quite . . . convoluted. In effect, it started with the woman all but sexually assaulting the man, who got angry and tore her dress to degrade her and refuse her attempts to seduce him.

And Elmore almost never portrays women as helpless or degraded. Much, if not most, of his work shows women as strong and powerful.

Thanks for saving me from trying to explain that one (to be honest... physically Raistlin was never really strong enough to assault anyone, there's a reason he was a mage. :p).

And while Elmore's women may be strong he does tend to draw them in less clothes than what's practical, granted he's not alone in that, not even among artists from the same time period, but he does do strong, powerful, barely clothed women.

As for my personal taste it really depends but I think I overall prefer "new school" stuff, even if I get horribly frustrated with how ridicolous the armor tends to be with it either being to big and unpractical, or too revealing, combine it with ridiculous weapons and basically all of them looks like they walked out of world of warcraft (incidentally I do blame WoW for the "huge weapons + armor" thing that seems to be a fad in fantasy art nowadays).

I suppose I just like it clean, crisp and fresh looking but with weapons and armor that at least looks somewhat believable, it doesn't have to be 100% accurate, but at least make it look plausible.

White_Drake
2012-11-23, 10:44 PM
I recently finished a complete anthology of the original Conan stories, and a good deal of the time, Conan wore plenty. Of course, he also carried a wide array of weapons, not just the great(sword/axe). In general, if he was expecting a fight, he was clad in at least chainmail. Later in his career he got his hands on a set of full plate. Although the majority of his adventures were in warmer climes, don't forget The Frost Giant's Daughter, which takes place in pseudo-Scandinavia. Actually, I can only recall a handful of stories in which he wore only a loincloth (although they were there).

Remmirath
2012-11-24, 12:21 AM
I tend to prefer old-school over new-school illustrations, particularly in those given examples (I dislike the first two, can't stand the third, think the fourth has a couple good things but am mostly neutral towards it, fifth is kinda sketchy but I like it, same for sixth, seventh I'm more neutral on, eighth I'm rather fond of).

I like the 1st edition and 2nd edition art much better on the whole than the 3rd and 4th, although there are some I dislike in the first two and some I like in the second two. That painting of the low-level party and the dragon was always one of my favorites; so was the lizard man idol with the thieves removing its eye. I'm also partial to the Planescape art.

There is, in my opinion, something to be said for the stark black-and-white ones, and I much prefer the older painted ones to the newer colored ones. The armor tends to be better in the older ones, too. There are, of course, exceptions to this.

I have a tendency to dislike cartoony or very brightly colored and simplified art in general, and so RPG art is no exception to that. Well, the more realistic sorts of cartoon-styles are fine with me, the sorts where it's more sketchy and spare of line than exaggerated. I prefer more naturalistic sorts of paintings, though; and I'm a bit of a stickler for realism of armor and weaponry. I like the fantastical to look fantastical, but grounded in reality. I tend to prefer black-and-white or full paintings.

Overall, of all the RPGs I've played, the art I can least stand is found in Pathfinder, and the art I'm overall the fondest of is found in MERP (even though there are some pieces that I tend to raise my eyebrow about).

I suppose what I most want out of RPG art is two things: that it be grounded in reality (anatomy, armor, backgrounds and detail and such), and that it properly convey the feeling of the setting or the game.

Vitruviansquid
2012-11-24, 12:30 AM
I hope you don't take this to be dodging the question, but I like art that doesn't suck.

I don't care what style it's in, there are good and bad executions of any style. There are cool gigantic shoulders (just look up Samwise Didier for some) and gigantic shoulders that look awful and goofy. There are cool pictures of almost-naked fantasy fighters and cool pictures of fighters hulked out in a skyscraper's worth of metal.

Hell, just look at the 3 David C. Sutherland pictures in the original post. The first picture is a mess. The fighter on the right is in some awkward pose like the floor is a different plane for him than the fighter on the left. For some reason, despite being the largest character, he's drawn with the least detail with his hand and surcoat being blobs outlined in black. Now see the picture on the bottom left of the knight striking what seems to be a devil on the shoulder. It's a cool, dynamic pose, there's an awesome blood splatter where he hits the devil, and both characters have a lot of detail, not to mention they're both standing on the same ground. Even from the same artist there are pictures I do and don't want to see when I open an RPG book.

Oh, and also, all of the other art I can find by Hyung Tae Kim seem much better than that Exalted cover. >_>

Yora
2012-11-24, 06:13 AM
The right art depends entirely on the work it appears in.

Planescape art is perfect for Planescape and Dark Sun art is perfect for Dark Sun. But they would be highly out of place in most other situations. In fact, Planescape without its unique art isn't Planescape. Planescape is 40% content, 20% writing style, and 40% artwork.

In D&D 3rd Edition, there was one artist which I think had by far the worst "quality of craft" with pictures that are just ugly at to the point of being disgusting, but at the same time he had the best idea of the "visual style" of how things in D&D should look like. Maybe because he still portrayed a world as in AD&D instead as of in World of Warcraft.

I recently finished a complete anthology of the original Conan stories, and a good deal of the time, Conan wore plenty. Although the majority of his adventures were in warmer climes, don't forget The Frost Giant's Daughter, which takes place in pseudo-Scandinavia.
So what? :smallamused:
http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20070417135351/forgottenrealms/images/0/0a/Northcover.jpg
But yeah, I consider this terrible art because of the rediculous clothing. Terrible Larry Elmore art with terrible Larry Elmore Hair and invisible Larry Elmore pants for women.

Eldan
2012-11-24, 08:30 AM
I wouldn't be sad if Tony Di'Terlizzi did all fantasy RPG art. Just saying. Though he also got a lot better since his Planescape days, if you look at some of his newer stuff, especially when its in full colour, which a lot of the Planescape stuff isn't.

Old school as represented in the OP is preeetty bad. You can see that it wasn't drawn by professionals. But there's a lot of more old-school things I like. There are old-school pictures where a character just wears a plain, unadorned helmet and some chainmal. How often do you see that in newer pictures? They often feel a bit overloaded with details and decorations. On the other hand, I like my fantasy really out-there, so that's a point for some of the newer stuff.

Yora
2012-11-24, 08:37 AM
Late 2nd Edition D&D had some really good black and white drawings that show both people in practical outfits and high artistic craftsmanship.

Eldan
2012-11-24, 01:24 PM
I also quite liked the pencil sketches various 3rd edition books had, like in the equipment section. Sketches on parchment just seemed like a very good art choice to me.

warty goblin
2012-11-24, 01:30 PM
I also quite liked the pencil sketches various 3rd edition books had, like in the equipment section. Sketches on parchment just seemed like a very good art choice to me.

I would've liked them better if whomever did them (Todd Lockwood, right?) had actually thought about the greataxe for a few more minutes. I'd be more afraid of amputating my own wrists with that thing than anything the enemy could do to me.

But in general yes, the pencil sketch on parchment is a good look, particularly for equipment sections.

Eldan
2012-11-24, 01:31 PM
Oh, true. Some of the actual equipment was absolutely stupid. Pretty much all the exotic weapons.

Azaran
2012-11-24, 06:01 PM
In the age of Photoshop, Corel Draw and Wacom tablets there are sure much more technical possibilities and precision. I am always amazed, what can be done in digital drawing with lighting and transparence effects.
But I think you can transport more "emotion" and "passion" (I do not find another word for it now) with a handmade sketch or a drawn illustration.
I always liked fantasy illustrations morewhen they looked handmade. On the other hand digital drawing fits systems like Shadowrun more, at least i did not any analogue artists that could fit the setting.

Roland St. Jude
2012-11-24, 08:39 PM
With art, as with games themselves, I'm open to anything, as long as it's good. And by good, I mean that I like it, not that it's in some way objectively good.

I've always loved Elmore's work and Trampier's. They set very different tones, but they speak to me. But there are plenty of modern fantasy artists that I really enjoy, too.

Elmore's running a Kickstarter right now, by the way. (http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1488741362/larry-elmore-art-the-complete-elmore-artbook)

RossN
2012-11-24, 09:46 PM
I tend to favour elaborate Old School work - gigantic armour and weaponry doesn't do much for me. That said I admit cheesecake often got out of hand.

An artist I don't think was mentioned earlier is the late Keith Parkinson:

http://viladorpg.files.wordpress.com/2011/05/keith_parkinson_69.jpg

http://www.blackgate.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/6a015390985392970b015435e87d60970c-800wi.jpg

http://www.ancientscrossroads.com/images/characters/diamond_throne.jpg

The Glyphstone
2012-11-24, 11:33 PM
Relevant, sort of:
http://www.vampjac.com/lj/humor/rpg_motivation/rpg_artwork.jpg

Yora
2012-11-25, 11:39 AM
In the age of Photoshop, Corel Draw and Wacom tablets there are sure much more technical possibilities and precision. I am always amazed, what can be done in digital drawing with lighting and transparence effects.
But I think you can transport more "emotion" and "passion" (I do not find another word for it now) with a handmade sketch or a drawn illustration.
I always liked fantasy illustrations morewhen they looked handmade. On the other hand digital drawing fits systems like Shadowrun more, at least i did not any analogue artists that could fit the setting.
With the hyperrealistic style that is "relatively easy" with digital painting (there were some people who already did it in the 70s with paint), artists tend to stick with relatively subtle facial expressions.
Older AD&D drawings had a certain carricature element to them that allows for quite severely exegerated facial expressions and postures without looking weird, because the mind only absorbs the outlines and fills in the blanks. With photorealstic painting, the expressions have to be perfect or you immediately notice that something looks odd. In cartoon style, you can draw eyes or mouth in all kinds of shapes and sizes and the brain just goes with it and has a much higher threshold at which everything doesn't seem to come together right.

Masaioh
2012-11-25, 12:44 PM
Out of those, I would have to say I prefer Kendrick Lim's style. I like the pseudo-realistic look, but I don't care for many of the tropes that permeate old-school RPG art like Elmore's work. I don't really like the comic-esque art that seems to be present throughout the Eberron books either.

Kitten Champion
2012-11-25, 03:22 PM
I was just thinking, with computer tablets being so popular -- if I were making an TTRPG these days I'd have it designed around the sort of interactivity those platforms can provide. Digital animation rather than simple static art, video tutorials as support for the written material, digitized character sheets, game maps with miniature figures which can store data on them like I've seen in some games. I don't know if anyone is doing that now, but I doubt I'm the only one thinking about it.

The art would resemble the digital comics I've seen proliferate on iOS or video game cutscenes in my mind.

Azaran
2012-11-25, 06:26 PM
With the hyperrealistic style that is "relatively easy" with digital painting (there were some people who already did it in the 70s with paint), artists tend to stick with relatively subtle facial expressions.
Older AD&D drawings had a certain carricature element to them that allows for quite severely exegerated facial expressions and postures without looking weird, because the mind only absorbs the outlines and fills in the blanks. With photorealstic painting, the expressions have to be perfect or you immediately notice that something looks odd. In cartoon style, you can draw eyes or mouth in all kinds of shapes and sizes and the brain just goes with it and has a much higher threshold at which everything doesn't seem to come together right.

It is not only the style of the older handmade illustrations, although i ike carricature or comic elements used in character designs like Tim Schaefer used in Psychonauts. With "emotion" I mean that you can see a raw pencil line or the flow of the paint brush in handmade illustrations. Digital art can not imitate that and looks always quite clean.

I good fantasy illustrator i should mentoin would be James Jean.
He did create all the cover illustrations for "Fables", the Vertigo fantasy/fairy tale comic. He is quite skilled in digital and especially traditional art. I will looks up a link to his portfolio later.

And there it is: http://www.jamesjean.com

1337 b4k4
2012-11-25, 08:47 PM
Older AD&D drawings had a certain carricature element to them that allows for quite severely exegerated facial expressions and postures without looking weird, because the mind only absorbs the outlines and fills in the blanks. With photorealstic painting, the expressions have to be perfect or you immediately notice that something looks odd. In cartoon style, you can draw eyes or mouth in all kinds of shapes and sizes and the brain just goes with it and has a much higher threshold at which everything doesn't seem to come together right.

For those of you interested in this phenomena, look up "the uncanny valley"

Ravens_cry
2012-11-25, 09:32 PM
I like pictures that tell a story, that tell something about the world, that invite curiosity and interest.
I prefer expressiveness over photorealism.
While a certain level of exotic flare is more than acceptable, and in fact encouraged, the clothes should look like they could be worn by actual people in actual situations.
Cleavage windows in mail or worse, plate? Oh dear gods.
I am slightly more forgiving of, say breastplate, but I can understand why more knowledgeable armour enthusiasts aren't.
The sad thing is I am pretty sure the pirate in the fantasy art demotivator posted recently is not the worst I have seen, though it is up there.

Knaight
2012-11-26, 12:33 AM
I'd say that the most important aspect is simply that the art fits. For instance, Chronica feudalis is a very medieval, very low fantasy RPG that is nonetheless distinct from history in several important ways. As such, its art needs to fit that, and it ends up working extremely well with art such as this:
http://chronicafeudalis.com/images/conflict.png

However, it's a style of simple, flat line art that depends on the context of the setting. It would never work for something like Shadowrun, which needs the detailed grime, and which needs something closer to realism stylistically due to the futuristic aesthetic. The art that works is highly dependent on the game it is in.

In the case of something like D&D? I quite like the slightly unreal, somewhat bizarre, exaggerated aesthetic, centered around characters actually doing something. It fits well with the game itself, though it is often rather sparse within the game.

Then there is the matter of art that looks like it fits some sort of dubious, juvenile RPG. Given that I generally avoid dubious, juvenile RPGs, my position on it should be clear; I'm not a fan. This includes the pseudo-pornographic stuff, such as the infamous Exalted cover in the first post and the pirate pinup above.

The LOBster
2012-11-26, 04:06 PM
Well, to be honest, I like artwork that's a bit stylized. Not so much Wayne Reynolds, but more Mike Mignola (Hellboy), I guess. I don't know, I just feel Mike Mignola's style could work well with a fantasy RPG - angular and non-realistic without feeling laughably cartoonish.

As for cheesecake, I'd much rather have female characters with different body-types. A slender, agile rogue shouldn't have breasts as big as her head - she wouldn't be able to fit through windows. Likewise, a barbarian shouldn't be a slender bikini model-type in a chainmail bikini - she should be wearing something that'd make sense for someone from the icy north, and she should have muscle built not for looks, but for actual power. She wouldn't look like a female body builder, 'cuz body builders whether male or female build for looks and not for actual strength. And male characters who are strong shouldn't look like body builders, either - they should have functional, powerful, bulky bodies that are more rectangular than triangular.

hamlet
2012-11-26, 04:37 PM
I've always preferred the old school art from AD&D. It seems like a lot of them have a story just begging to be told, whereas 3.x and 4e give me more of a "LOOK HOW AWESOME I AM RAHHH!!!" impression.

That right there, along with the blatantly obviously computer generated nature of the art is what bothered me the most about it in 3.x, 4.0, and Pathfinder. I seriously just dislike the style of the art, the presentation of it, the subject matter . . .

It has no soul, or, rather, it has a soul that I just don't like.

Thialfi
2012-11-26, 04:48 PM
I don't mind stylized art that is tailored to the specific campaign. I'll echo the praise for Tony Di'Terllizzi and his work on Planescape, my all time favorite setting.

In general I don't care about old school vs. new school. I do tend to favor art that displays technical skill over style. I don't need the image to portray anything realistic, but I do like it to be very well drawn.

The only style I absolutely dispise is anime.

As far as women go, I like pretty and sexy women, but I would prefer proportions that could exist in nature. See my dislike for the anime style. While I admire Boris Vallejo and Julie Bell's technical skill, I wouldn't mind if they toned down their Barbie doll in a thong and steroid freak in a loincloth thing they have got going on.

hamlet
2012-11-26, 04:52 PM
The only style I absolutely dispise is anime.


Partially agree.

I have no particular problem with the style in and of itself.

However, I have a serious problem with the universality of the style. It seems, sometimes, that everything is becoming more like Anime as time passes and we lose anything distinct from it.

Ravens_cry
2012-11-26, 04:58 PM
While some art from 1st edition AD&D was good, a lot, well, amateur would be a charitable description.
I never noticed much art looking through the D&D3.X book gallerias online that could exactly be described as anime, certainly not to the extent the infamous picture from Exalted was. Some perhaps, but by no means the majority.
Even Pathfinder, aside from the Beta rules races picture, doesn't strike me as terribly anime either.

hamlet
2012-11-27, 08:28 AM
While some art from 1st edition AD&D was good, a lot, well, amateur would be a charitable description.
I never noticed much art looking through the D&D3.X book gallerias online that could exactly be described as anime, certainly not to the extent the infamous picture from Exalted was. Some perhaps, but by no means the majority.
Even Pathfinder, aside from the Beta rules races picture, doesn't strike me as terribly anime either.

I didn't say that the art of the new editions was anime (I think . . .), but that it was certainly strongly influenced by it.

I will say, though, that even if you want to describe the art in the 1st edition books as "amateur," which is largely undeniable unless you want to say, as some would, that it was a concious style choice based on limited budget and intent, that it had something that 3.x art does not. Specifically, 3.x art is very strongly focused around reinforcing just how damned COOL!!!!! everything is about D&D. Awesome and tremendous with all these nifty powers and hawt women and men in fur diapers . . . etc. Magic powers and so on.

The art in 1st edition (and to some extent 2nd edition) was focused a little differently. It was focused first on not the point of maximum awesomeness, but on the point of decision, the point of "how did we get here?" and "what's going to happen next?". And the comics, which I will always adore, are the second focus, which implicitly tell you that these funny, whacky, silly situations are going to crop up in your game, and that that's OK and even desireable. At some point, your players are going to try and infiltrate a lair of wererats by wearing mouse ears and noses, or something like that, and that is not a bad thing.

Now, I'm not making a subjective argument here about the quality of one versus the other. If you like one and not the other, then fine, that's what personal preference is about. I'm not, after all, going to say that in order to be human you must like Blake's watercolors, else you're a bad person. Likewise, I'm not saying that the art in 3.x is objectively bad, merely that it runs counter to my taste and that I feel that it runs counter to a gaming ethos type that I prefer and grew up with.

But, James over at Grognardia explained this much better than I did a few years ago. I'll have to go digging around on his blog to see if I can't locate that article again.