The Setup

Jason Mong took out week 3 in a Head Judge tie-breaker and stepped up to the plate for Week 4 with this as the theme:

So, the basic idea I have is that we all know that a Future Sight futureshifted card is coming in Theros. I want to see everyone’s guesses, in something other than the futureshifted frame. -Limited to “futureshifted” cards that have not already been reprinted

-Limited to not the “futureshifted” frame﻿

The Sponsors

The home of the contest is the Z’s Proxy Factory Google+ Community. Our amazing friends at ManaDeprived.com and FacetoFaceGames.com are the proud sponsors of the contest, with weekly store credit prizes of $20 to first and $5 to second place.

The Winners

The Rest of the Entries

The Head Judge Speaks

From last week’s winner Jason Mong:

This week’s proxy contest we went back to the future with speculating what the newest reprint from Future Sight is going to be in Theros. The basic rules were that it had to be a futureshifted card and that the card could not have already been reprinted. The proxy could also not be in the futureshifted frame. The amount of creativity that went into these proxies blew me away.

The Winner

There is nothing wrong this card, and the +1’s didn’t disagree. Josh took the full frame and turned it on its head, or in the this case on its side. Finding art for a proxy can always be difficult and finding the right piece of art in portrait can be impossible. The original art was in landscape and by turning it on its side it adds to the flavor of the card of someone stretching their new wings. Other nice touches included a nod to the original card with the water mark of the future sight enchantment symbol.

The Runner Up

I know that I said no reprints but this piece is amazing. It was only reprinted in a From The Vault, so I’m going to allow it. This is another modification to the full art frame that came out perfect. I enjoy the fine details and we see once again nods to the original, using the future sight card type symbol and coloring the text box orange. The text box also reminds me of the original magic frame where green cards had the wood look to them. Using the night shade of green also really set this piece up to go with the art.

New Frames

My favorite part of this week’s competition was the new frames. Adam Dexter started the week right off the bat with his render of Nix. I really enjoyed the concept of this piece, it feels like it piece could actually be in motion.

Svante Ekholm’s Darksteel Garrison was my personal favorite, and it’s even a white bordered card! I really love this new frame it gives nods to the original concepts of the future shifted frame in a cleaner and full art frame. I would love to see more cards with a frame like this with more mana symbols needed to see where it can go. The only direct complaint that I have is the background color of the text box is a bit too dark and the contrast between the text is not enough.

Les did another custom frame here with the greek battle scene in the background. I really liked the creativity of the piece. I would have moved the art to left more as to not have the spillover interfere with the casting cost. Also, I always like to update the text to the oracle text. I have become less of a fan of the transparent text box, but the alpha here is very nice.

I am always a sucker for pop art proxies, and Legolas as an archer is perfect. I really like the art. I am not a fan of the Game Day frame, but the execution of the card was great.

Steven Corrigan’s Korlash was one of the top favorites with the factory workers this week and I see why. This was an excellent piece. The spillover art was done very tastefully giving the card a look of three dimensions, and I feel the flavor of the image and card was spot on. The only complaint that came across on the card was the fonts, but sometimes this can not be avoided.

William Brandon Smith created a great piece with with his Dr. Robotnik. Spacing is good, the fonts look good, everything is color correct, and all the overflows are set perfectly to not block any text. I feel that this piece did deserve more plus one than it received, but I’m also partial to goblins.

This is the card I hope to see in Theros this fall, although I doubt the art will look this amazing. The art fit the flavor here perfectly. Only complaint I have is that the rules text box could have been made a little larger for better spacing.

Great art for this piece and Arcanum Wings seemed to be the factory workers’s favorite spec target. The artist text and copyright could have been in white as they are lost in this piece, I know that I have been guilty of this too though.

Z’s Critiques

In this new weekly section, I will be offering my critiques. I might do a few, or I might do them all. We’ll see from week to week at this point. I am going to attempt to not critique how I personally feel a proxy should look. To a point at least. If an entry uses a different font, I’ll most likely let that pass. But if the process involved a template change that fundamentally changed a card in a way that could lead to an awkward rules question, I’ll call it out.

Korlash

Nice use of the Super Art treatment. Suitable art choice, though maybe a tad low on the resolution. I would have liked to see some spill from the armor and helmet. From my perspective, when spill is used, the focus of a super art proxy should always be in front of the title bar. I’d like to have seen some shadow work over the textbox from the cape.

The paintbrush should match the color used for the artist and “sig” line whenever possible.

Dryad Arbor

I had to break the news to Trevor that the reprint rule was in effect for this piece. However, the amount of work put into this piece is not to be dismissed or overlooked. Super Art DFC night Planeswalker type and title bars, with the Future Sight land symbol in place of the moon. Old school colored green textbox, and P/T box added.

Not a fan of the transparency in the textbox. The flavor text font size should be the same size as the rules text whenever possible. As Dryad Arbor was an Uncommon in Future Sight, I’d have like to see the Uncommon expansion symbol used here as well. Yes, it’s Mythic in FTV. I feel that’s just strange on WOTC’s behalf. FTV shouldn’t be auto-Mythic in my opinion.

Darksteel Garrison

For those that do not know, Svante Ekholm is the legendary (to me at least) xerent from the MTGSalavation forums. Custom frames always make me smile, and this was no exception. Great art choice, and I will always love a white border treatment.

I’d like to have seen an expansion symbol used.

Nix

I’m going to stick with some of the amazing alternate frame work we saw submitted this week.

Nix is a very interesting take on creating some extra space for the art, while at the same time allowing for all of the existing card elements to remain in place.

Ideally, I would have liked to see the frame continue along the card edge. As is, the break is somewhat distracting and isn’t coherent.

Thunderblade Charge

Another step outside of a comfort zone that could use some love. I can understand the reasoning behind wanting to maintain the integrity of the black border, but it does mask the desired effect of wanting the title and type bars to be coming in from different directions. I’d like to see a revist of this frame where the art frame and textbox frame are skewed diagonally to showcase the motion of the title and type bars.

Nice work on the expanded expansion symbol section.

What’s Next?

Find out here!

Art Links

Steamflogger Boss as submitted by William Brandon Smith

Daybreak Coronet as submitted by Daniel Sexton

Thornweald Archer as submitted by BJ Sejkora

Arcanum Wings as submitted by Joshua Enke

Darksteel Garrison as submitted by Svante Ekholm

Arcanum Wings as submitted by Z

Korlash, Heir to Blackblade as submitted by Steven Corrigan

Thunderblade Charge as submitted by Shreyas Sampat

Imperial Mask as submitted by Les Kershaw

Dryad Arbor as submitted by Trevor Davis

Nix as submitted by Adam Dexter

– @TheProxyGuy