Alternative Playing Cards for the SVG Deck, Public Domain

When looking for images of playing cards to use in apps there is a huge choice of designs. A web search shows many of the possibilites for playing card design. The Tek Eye free deck of SVG playing cards has a design based on the widely used French-suited cards. It includes all 52 cards, two Jokers (often overlooked for digital card designs), a blank card, and several card backs. At one point in the history of playing cards, the Ace of Spades was ornately designed and printed to indicate that an appropriate tax had been paid. This is reflected in the design of the Ace of Spaces for the SVG desk (see a version without the words later), however, the free SVG deck includes a simple Ace of Spades if it is required.

For the free SVG card deck some alternative individual card designs have been considered, some prompted by comments made about the published deck. Firstly, here are alternative designs for the Aces. They feature a large central pip instead of the small pips used on all the cards. Click on a card to see the SVG file, and use the browser back option to return:

The fancy Ace of Spades design is available without the words:

In a few card decks that can be purchased, the eight card has two rows of four pips, instead of the more common two rows of three with two central pips. The more common layout was used for the SVG playing cards, however, here are the alternative designs for the eight card:

Having a free to use desk of digital playing card assets saves time when developing card playing apps. Plus, it means that the digital cards images can be changed for alternative designs and options. A few of those options have been shown above. It does not stop there, as it allows for other design possibilities. Why not change the court cards for numbered cards (11, 12, 13), or increase the number of cards in a suit beyond 13, allowing new types of card games to be invented. If you design any new cards based on the free SVG deck let Tek Eye know and they can be featured here.

See Also

• See the full article on the SVG playing cards deck.
• Download the SVG playing cards as a zip file.
• Inkscape - draw graphic images for free.
• See here on Tek Eye for a Mini SVG Playing Card Set.
• For a full list of all the articles in Tek Eye see the full site Index.