Hand-Drawn Fantasy Card Art Commission

Artist Wanted – 355 Original Hand-Drawn Illustrations for NEXALI Fantasy Card Game Category: 2D Game Art / Fantasy Illustration / Character Design Style: Anime / Manga / Fantasy Creature Art Budget: €2,000–€3,000 (Fixed Price) Total Artwork Units: 355 AI-Generated Artwork: Not Permitted Project Overview We are developing an original fantasy trading-card video game featuring collectible creatures, evolutions, strategic battles, deck building, human characters and an established fictional world. The game is already developed, and all existing creature designs, characters, card illustrations and visual references are available. We are looking for a talented illustrator or small professional art team to create original, human-drawn versions of our existing designs. Important: We are not asking you to invent 355 new concepts from scratch. The characters, creatures, colour schemes and artwork compositions already exist. Your task is to recreate these designs through original human-drawn artwork, remaining as faithful as reasonably possible to their established appearances. We welcome your artistic style, but significant redesigns are not required. 1. Artwork Requirements — 355 Units The complete commission consists of: Artwork Category Quantity creature and evolution cards 216 Legendary / God cards 7 Support and action card illustrations 78 Human characters and portraits 50 Complete world map 1 other 3 Total 355 All 301 game cards require their own specified artwork compositions. Where creatures or characters appear across multiple cards, their established designs should remain consistent. A complete artwork inventory with reference images, names and identification numbers will be provided to the selected artist under the agreed confidentiality arrangements. 2. Black-and-White and Coloured Artwork Each of the 355 artwork units requires two production stages. Stage 1 — Original Black-and-White Drawing One hand-drawn black-and-white approval sketch per artwork unit. Accurate proportions, distinguishing features and composition. Close resemblance to the existing reference artwork. Client approval before colouring begins. Stage 2 — Finished Coloured Artwork One completed coloured master per approved unit. Colours and distinguishing features matching the established designs. Consistent anime/manga-inspired visual quality. High-resolution artwork suitable for commercial use. Total deliverables: 355 black-and-white approval drawings and 355 corresponding coloured final masters. These are two stages of the same 355 artworks, not 710 separate designs. 3. Poses, Angles and Backgrounds Each commissioned design requires one primary illustration or viewing angle based on the existing references. Additional front, rear, side or three-quarter views are not required unless explicitly identified in the final inventory. Creature and character illustrations should closely follow the original poses and designs where practical. Support and action cards may include environments, creatures, objects, special effects or other compositions already established in the game. The world map must follow the existing geographical design, including its important locations and landmarks. This commission does not include animation, 3D models, full manga pages, game programming or additional character turnaround sheets. 4. Technical Deliverables Card illustrations: 3000 × 4500 pixels. 2:3 portrait aspect ratio. sRGB colour profile. High-resolution PNG exports. Human characters: One primary reference-based illustration per unit. Up to 3000 × 4500 pixels. Transparent background where applicable. World map: Coloured master illustration. At least 6000 pixels on its longest side. Original map proportions and recognizable geographical layout. Editable landmarks and labels. Symbols and objects: High-resolution colour versions. Editable vector files where applicable. Monochrome exports where required. Original editable files: We require properly organized editable source artwork, preferably: Native CorelDRAW (.cdr) files. Editable Adobe Illustrator (.ai) files. High-resolution PNG exports. Transparent versions where applicable. Separate editable layers or objects for important components. Artists using alternative professional software may propose equivalent editable formats, which must be agreed before the commission begins. Flattened images alone are not sufficient. 5. Original Human-Created Artwork All commissioned artwork must be genuinely human-created. Generative AI must not be used to produce the commissioned illustrations. We require: Original editable working files. Genuine preliminary sketches and development stages. Documentation of the creative process. Identification of the drawing software and tools used. Disclosure of any third-party resources or collaborators. Selected process recordings for agreed sample illustrations. Organized filenames corresponding to the artwork inventory. Existing game images may be used as visual references, but third-party copyrighted artwork must not be copied or traced without authorization. All process documentation must accurately reflect the actual work performed. 6. Commercial Rights and Intellectual Property The commission requires an agreement granting exclusive worldwide commercial usage rights to the commissioned artwork, subject to applicable copyright law. These rights must cover: PC, mobile, browser and console games. Steam, Apple App Store and other distribution platforms. Physical and digital trading cards. Manga, comics, books and related publications. Websites, social media, advertising and promotional materials. Animation, trailers and future adaptations. Merchandise, clothing, toys, collectibles and other products. Future games, expansions and sequels. Modification, recolouring, animation and adaptation. Sublicensing to commercial partners. Transfer to our future game-development company. Permission for future AI-assisted adaptations is also required. Although the commissioned artwork itself must be human-created, we intend to use the finished original illustrations as reference material for further AI-assisted game artwork, variations and development. The artist must explicitly permit this usage under the commercial rights agreement. The agreement will respect the artist's legal authorship and applicable mandatory rights while providing the commercial exploitation permissions required. 7. Timeline We understand this is a substantial project and are looking for a realistic production schedule. Please include: Your earliest possible starting date. Estimated illustrations completed per week. Time required for the initial paid test. Proposed schedule for black-and-white approvals. Proposed schedule for coloured final artwork. Estimated completion date for all 355 units. Whether you will work independently or with a small team. We value reliable communication, consistent quality and realistic commitments. 9. Project Budget €2,000–€3,000 — Fixed Price The budget covers the complete commission of 355 artwork units, including black-and-white approval drawings, coloured final versions, editable source files, agreed revisions, creation documentation and the required exclusive commercial usage rights. Please provide a fixed-price proposal for the entire specified project, including any applicable taxes, platform fees and other charges. All requirements and deliverables will be agreed in writing before full production begins. We are looking for artists who can offer competitive pricing for a large, reference-based illustration commission.