This week we’re going back to the classics. We’ll be doing a straightforward extended art alter of the one and only (you know what I mean…) Llanowar Elves.

If you’ve been waiting for the perfect card to start following along, this might be it. This will be a short step up from the classic “Sharpie on the white border” genre of alters. Despite the nine colors I’ve pulled out, there are only really two parts to it- the background and the arms.

I’m going to start out by painting neutral beige (Citadel Bleached Bone) around the border, stopping about halfway down the textbox on either side.

To make the light mint green color for the background I’m going to add a sliver of bright green (Camo Green) to white. Once we have our color where we like it, paint a couple layers of green over the beige, leaving basic shapes of where his arms will continue. If you paint a couple strokes of green and don’t like the match, go back and edit your color mix a little bit to fix it.

When the green is done, paint black over the border on the bottom. Once the black is done, quickly rinse your brush off, and while the black is still wet on the card, mix some light green into the black where it meets the green already on the card. Use this process with the green, then black, and so on until there’s a natural fade between the two.

Don’t worry, blending makes me bang my head against the wall, too. But it looks nice. Now I’m going to take my ratty brush, get a tiny bit of medium gray (Codex Gray), and continue the background texture at the top of the card.

Next we’ll take some flesh color (Dwarf Flesh), lighten it by adding it to a little beige (Bleached Bone) and paint in the shape his bicep on the left. Then I’ll take my dark brown (Scorched Brown) and paint the shape of his cuffs on both arms.

Once I have that down, I’ll take my medium brown (Graveyard Earth) and paint some bands of lighter brown on the leather cuffs. Then, with the same brown, paint in the lines for the shadows of his muscles, adding gray along the bottom of the arm for shadow.

Now I’m going to use my beige again to outline the pommel of the elf’s sword. Lucky for us, our elf here is apparently a dual-wielding ranger, and his other blade is still in its sheath. We’ll just copy the shape of its pommel for the one he’s holding with the beige (Bleached Bone) and paint over that with yellow (Golden Yellow) once it dries.

All we have left to do is add line details in black on the cuffs and the pommel of the sword we just painted.

And… we’re done! Sign and date the cards, and seal them with a spray acrylics seal so the paint doesn’t stick to sleeves or binder pages. If you followed along send me a photo of your cards at awillson@jupitergames.net. If you didn’t follow along, don’t be a wuss! This one was simple! Special thanks to my good friend Sean Browne for giving me the suggestion for this week’s card. If you have a suggestion for a card you think would make for a good article, let me know. Remember my criteria is 1) under $5, 2) has interesting art, and 3) sees play in multiple formats.

Watch the Jupiter Games Ebay store for the cards painted in the article.