Early Sets - From Stock Image to Pokemon Card Background

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Hello everyone!

I could not find any post related to this, but came across an investigation by a guy on Twitter that I thought was worth sharing in here.

See for yourselves in here :blush:

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This is amazing! How did this take 25 years to get discovered!

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We were talking about this on discord a bit last night! I wonder how of more will be discovered.

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Wow! This is cool and also surprising to see. Now I see the scyther card in a whole new light.

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A conversation about this had started in The Giant Art Thread. I had a good look through the images yesterday hoping to find the source image for the Neo Premium File Pichu but couldn’t find it, however sozaijiten does appear to be part of a wider set of stock images available on designpocket.jp - it wouldn’t surprise me if that Pichu background is in there.

Interestingly they did still appear to be using this set of stock images in 2009:

What I find really great about these is that the stock pictures have descriptions which give a hint at where they were shot. The above Pichu card background is シュレックホルン (Schrekhorn); a mountain in the Swiss alps.

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This is soooooo cool! Thanks for bringing the tweet to our attention, @styluspt!

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I’ve been going through Base Set and I’ve so far matched up all but 5 of Ken Sugimori’s 32 Base Set artworks with stock images:

Most of these are just the raw images with some kind of filter applied, but some are flipped (i.e. Kadabra) and others are recoloured (i.e. Metapod).

All of these are from only 5 stock image volumes:

A lot of people complain about 5ban but at least those don’t use stock images for backgrounds. :grin:
It does make me wonder what involvement Ken Sugimori had in the original Pokémon sets, as it wouldn’t surprise me if some intern just took his Pokémon drawings and stuck them on fitting stock backgrounds.

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Thanks for sharing this! :blush:

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Is that the cursor in the top left of the Ponyta artwork? It seems like some 1st Ed/Shadowless Ponytas have it but that some don’t, and all Unlimited Ponytas don’t have it. New corrected Ponyta variant?

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That little white speck on the upper left quadrant? I’ve never noticed it before and didn’t realize the unlimited card didn’t have it.

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Despite spending ages looking for this when I put together my Base Set list above, today I realised that one of the images in Vol. 7 Light/Crystal edition is the Neo Genesis Pichu background.

https://instagram.com/p/CN-g2bal2zT

I made a rough gif to show it off better if that’s hard to make out:

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This video is more about video games but it’s a good primer for this concept of “texture archaeology”

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In an attempt to find the image used for Neo Genesis Lugia I did discover what seems to be image used for Skarmory, Sabrina’s Slowbro, and Erika’s Dratini. *EDIT* Had a brain fart and realized Neo Gen Lugia is not Ken Sugimori art. lol I knew that. Still going to see if I can’t find more.

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*EDIT*

And here is Jungle Mr. Mime

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Here some more;
@pichufan , Base Set Magmar is this image flipped: www.sozaijiten.com/cdrom/imagedetail.asp?pid=5&fid=99004070&i=69

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Someone has a page on their website dedicated to these now: www.pokemonaaah.net/research/tcgbackground. It has some of the ones you shared above already @rattledkarp, but a few are missing.

The Neo Genesis Pichu is one of several which feature two stock artworks merged together - something I didn’t notice until they pointed it out.

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So… which collector is going to buy the NFT for the backgrounds?

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Had a great time watching all these, at last a good post

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Here is a fun one.

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Not sure what image is used for the background but they once again use this star/prism/light image…this time it is rotated.

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VERY cool find!!! This might just be the most used background ever, because Base Vulpix and CD Promo Mew have it, too:

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Do you have the link to that star image in high res?

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It is used on the Neo Genesis Pichu as well. lol

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