Making NPC cards: questions

Hi all, just a question: I really like handing players images of people they meet and I do understand that there is a few such products out there, but either I don’t like the Art OR availability/shipping to Europe is prohibitive. So I decided to make my own. Is anyone aware of good stock art that could be used for this or have some experience with printing cards in a copyshop, what to look out for etc? Thanks for the ideas! An example of cards I like are those from the 5e Essentials Kit (see below)

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I’m a fan of the portraits done by Victor J Merino. I’ve only used his scifi ones, but this fantasy set looks pretty nice:

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Oh wow, these are excellent! Great art style! Thank you!

Glad you like 'em!

Also, these are tokens rather than portraits, but they have such a cool old school art style—I bet they’d work just fine as cards.

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Oh my these are even better. Just printed a bunch and ordered a 1-inch hole punch :laughing:

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what about just using some existing public domain art? rijksmuseum is just loaded with good stuff. https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/

a lil bit of photoshopping can make them more fantasy-y.

if you go to archive.org there are a bunch of portrait books as well, so you can get a nice single artist, consistent style, like so:
Icones, id est verae imagines virorum doctrina simul et pietate illustrium, quorum praecipuè ministerio partim bonarum literarum studia sunt restituta, partim vera religio in variis orbis Christiani regionibus, nostra patrúmque memoria fuit instaurata: additis eorundem vitae & operae descriptionibus, quibus adiectae sunt nonnullae picturae quas emblemata vocant : Bèze, Théodore de, 1519-1605 : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

this one is AMAZING, but its only men (a problem with the genre as a whole!)

This one has a ton of great ones, and nice mix of genders, some people in armor. Woodburn's Gallery of rare portraits; consisting of original plates, by Cecil, Delaram, Droeshout ... &c., with facsimile copies from the rarest and most curious portraits, illustrative of Granger's Biographical history of England, Clarendon's History of the rebellion, Burnet's History of his own time, Pennant's London, &c. ... containing two hundred portraits, of persons celebrated for their diplomatic services, military or naval achievements, literary acquirements, eccentric habits, or some peculiar feature in their lives deserving the notice of the historian and biographer; particularly the ... equestrian set of plates in the illustrated Clarendon, belonging to the Right Hon. Earl Spencer, K.G., with others from the most remarkable and singular prints, in the possession of different noblemen and gentlemen, celebrated for their collection of rare portraits : Woodburn, Samuel, 1785 or 6-1853 : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

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A lot of museums offer hi res public domain images on their websites these days. Search the Collection | Cleveland Museum of Art

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These are amazing! I might just hit up a few antique bookstores and see if I can find something similar as an actual book. Really great idea! Also museum archives are great, have been pilfering those a lot, but it’s always a challenge to find non-human ancestries

One of many reasons to ditch non-humans! WINKY FACE

I would say that for most non-humans if you’re going strictly by old school paradigms… They are really just a quick Photoshop job away from being non humans. Shrink them a teeny bit, give them pointy ears. Or make them slightly wider and shrink them, and use the rubber stamp to elongate the beard. Or just shrink them, and then accumulate a bunch of “wildman” illustrations and find hairy feet for them.

one easy way to handle this is by getting some spray adhesive and applying it to the back of the surface you print and then doing the same to some heavy card stock. Once it’s dry and tacky you push the two together and cut away excess paper with an xacto blade and ruler.

This lets you place the print on any material you may want.