March 2023 – May 2023
Introduction
The Zenith project is by far my favorite. This project is very open-minded and allows Freestyle students to let their imaginations run wild and apply all the skills we learned in the past two years to create whatever project we desire. I decided to make my own deck of cards for this project.
Playing cards mean a lot to me. Over the summer, I go to summer camp, and our activities consist of frisbee, making friendship bracelets, and playing cards. So, my summer consisted of card games non-stop for around 2 weeks to 2 months. When the summer is over I would always rush home to teach my dad whatever new game I learned that summer. You can always find a deck of cards laying somewhere around my house and all of last year I kept a deck of cards in my backpack (unfortunately not this year due to the limited space in my minion backpack).
This project was a big risk for me. Designing 54 card faces (55 including the back) in a short period of time was very difficult. Although the card pips and faces were repeated in every suit, designing the border, pip, court cards, color palette, and repeating it throughout the suits was very tedious and time-consuming.
Moodboard
I started off with a mood board full of things I knew I wanted to include. I planned to have a purple and green color scheme and unique card designs like the example in the bottom left corner. I also included card decks from Orbit and Fontaine as inspiration. I made sure to keep the font simple on my mood board because I knew I wanted to design my own.
Progress
I had a lot of speedbumps during this process. The biggest one was having almost no inspiration for my court card designs. I did a lot of brainstorming and talking to my peers (shout out Jake!) and finally came up with good ideas that I was happy with for my court cards.
Below is my Zenith slideshow presentation, where I show my process more and include some more behind-the-scenes.
Finished Product
I am so happy with my finished product. I love how all the colors and designs came out, and I love even more that I have something tangible that I created. Before I ordered the cards, I mentioned to some of my friends and had about 10 of my friends buy my cards! Knowing that my cards are out in the world being used means everything to me, and I think is a huge start to whatever I want to do in the future.
Below is an uncut sheet of all my cards, as well as some of my favorite cards showcased a bit larger.
Zenith Reflection
Read or listen to my Zenith reflection below!