Creating the Board Game
Creating the Board Game
Frank Riccio, Julia Stege, Terces Engelhart, Matthew Engelhart:
The Game Creation Team
In early Spring 2002 Matthew Engelhart got an idea while sitting in a transformational workshop. He and his partner Terces would work together to create a boardgame that inspires the experience of abundance. Soon after Matthew approached friend and Graphic Designer Julia Stege with this question: "Terces and I are creating an abundance game board. How do we do it?" Julia and Matthew brainstormed over veggies and noodles, pondering the need for strong branding and great illustration.
So Julia went off to find an illustrator who not only could draw the complicated imagery that would be required, but who could create a distinct brand image for Matthew and Terces' new company.
One illustrator stood out in Julia's mind: Frank Riccio. Julia had known Frank since high school. Recalling Frank's beautiful illustrations and paintings that she had seen over the years, she knew that he could draw anything,and that he could create a unique brand image as well. Julia looked Frank up online and saw he had recently done some illustrations for Neale Donald Walsch and Linda Goodman! This showed he already had the skill to attract and communicate to our desired audience. Julia called Frank and asked if he would like to paint a game. Frank was free and willing!
Once Matthew and Terces agreed to choose Frank as the illustrator,the creation process began. Because Frank lives in Virginia, and Julia, Matthew and Terces live in California, all the planning and brainstorming on the look of the game was done on the phone. Following the advice of Marketing Guru and college friend of Julia's, Allison Deegan, the team chose an allegory that we could use to represent the unusual ideas behind the game. Matthew and Terces chose a river motif, and came up with the names of their company, With the Current, and the game,The Abounding River. Everything was falling in to place!
Once the ideas began flowing, Frank started sketching. He would sketch and then fax the rest of the team who would then discuss the sketches in detail. Here is a sketch of the Game Board in it's final pencil stage:
Game Board Sketch
This is the finished pencil sketch of the game board.
Frank sketched the game board plus all 6 cards for the game and allowed for input from the rest of the team before beginning to paint. Below you can see Frank in the process of painting the game board.
Having mostly finished painting the interior of the board, Frank begins painting the border.Here you can see the contrast between the underpainting and the finished painting.
Frank paints details of the river in the border.
Close-up of the pallette.
Partially painted border contrasts to the finished sky.
Finished Game Board painting. Spectacular!
Once the game was painted, Frank painted all 6 of the card illustrations. Matthew and Terces had written text for all 120 cards, all of which are inspiring and thought provoking exercises, suggestions, and illuminations. Julia designed the back of the cards and modified the ribbons from the game to fit on the card fronts. Dan Yokum helped to lay out the cards while Julia modified the mountain illustration from the game board and the "I am" girl in Photoshop for the LOGSHEET. The packaging was designed by Julia who created the side of the box by modifying the waves and ribbons from the border. Matthew and Terces had heart-shaped leaves cast for the game pieces. They can be worn as a pendant, too!
While the team was looking for a perfect printer for the Abounding River Game, pondering the various places in the world they would like to visit, Robert Clark of Norcal Printing came to an Abounding River Workshop in San Francisco. He was so taken with the work that he found us the perfect printer for the project, and we didn't even have to travel overseas. Before we knew it, we had the game in our hands. A perfect print job!
Then we started working on The Abounding River Logbook. Matthew and Terces painstakingly wrote and re-wrote the various sections. Terces worked hard to make the concepts easy to understand, editing the text on their road trip across America, and during two trips to Hawaii! The result is a perfectly blended piece of writing that truly does what it promises: It offers an unusual view of being abundance.
Frank created 6 original paintings for the Logbook and Julia created backgrounds, montages and silhouettes by modifying Frank's illustrations in Photoshop. Then Julia designed the book template and she and Dan Yokum worked together to place the workbook content together. Julia designed each page of the book as a separate piece of art. The result is 180 colorful pages and a new experience of abundance.
Written by Julia D. Stege
Abounding River Art Director and Designer