So, House of Dark Shadows aired on TCM last night and I got to thinking: where were the trading cards for this movie? In a lot of ways Dan Curtis Productions was the Lucasfilm of its time and never missed an opportunity to pimp its wares to a willing market. It seems that the merchandise for House of Dark Shadows was limited mostly to the Marilyn Ross novelization, so Dark Shadows fans missed out on some fun collectibles.
So, I got bored and mocked up a few examples of what House of Dark Shadows trading cards might have looked like. I dirtied them up a little and tried to write the kind of quick, cheesy copy that accompanied the various series of Topps non-sports cards. And for verisimilitude I roughed up the edges of these images by using the dog-eared corners of some 1960s Dark Shadows trading cards.
These images needed to have a dark color scheme, but it was also important not to use a modern font palette or cliche goth imagery (no dripping fonts) because I wanted them to look of their time. Topps series of Close Encounters and Superman III trading cards were the inspiration for the simple design.
Once these images hit the Google search index they're going to create a little bit of confusion (no, these cards really don't exist) but that's Google's problem.
Loved these! They actually look like the real thing. Thanks for your artistry and creativity!
ReplyDeleteThanks! I toyed around with the idea of doing more House of Dark Shadows cards, but I don't have many color photos from the film to work with (and screen caps are out of the question because it's not on DVD.)
ReplyDeleteThat being said, I want to do a handful of faux trading cards for Night of Dark Shadows soon. I've got two pieces of desktop wallpaper that will be posted tomorrow that you might like, as well.
The Creep (CHS custodian)