Anatomy of a card

From time to time I have had people commission me to make cards for their relatives who played ball but never had a baseball card of their own or from people who thought it would be really neat to have a card with themselves on it picturing them playing for the Homestead Grays, New York Knights or some other old-time team. Here is one such request I recently did and got permission to show the process...

Gary,
I love your cards, the stories and drawings are great. I was wondering if you do custom cards, because I would really like to have one made of my grandfather Eddie. He played for a few Navy teams during the war and I'd really like a card of him back in his playing days. Would you be able to create a card of him, in the style of your card set and have some printed? We don't have any pictures of him playing baseball, but do have a few pictures of him when he was in the Navy.
Thanks and keep up the great work,
-Jay

Jay,
Yes, I can do custom cards. If you send me one or more photographs of your grandfather when he was young I can find a suitable ball playing pose that would work. I will send you a sketch of the card and when you approve it I will color it and add a background. Let me know if you would like a stadium, fence with trees, buildings, etc. I'd probably suggest a fence with trees because it would be more appropriate for a military base back during the war. Let me know what teams he played for and I will try to find out what the uniforms looked like. Once you ok the finished card, I can get 500 of them printed just like my cards and will also give you an 4" x 6" print of the card you can frame for a price of $200. Let me know if this is what you'd like to do.
-Gary C.

Gary,
Yes that would be great! I am attaching a scan of my grandfather taken during the war as well as a file with the story I'd like on the back of the card. Can you have him play for the Sampson Naval Training Station? I don't know what the uniforms looked like. He threw and batted right and played 2nd base.
Let me know if you need any more to work with,
-Jay

Jay,
Here is the sketch of your grandfather. I posed him with his hand in his glove. I could not locate a photograph showing the Sampson baseball team but I found a good uniform type that will be visually interesting and I attached it to this email. I will place an "S" on it for "Sampson". It is the second one from the left with the star on the sleeve. I think the story you wrote will work fine for the card. Please let me know if the drawing looks good to you and I will color and detail it out for you.
Thanks,
-Gary C.

Gary,
The drawing looks really nice, I can't wait to see how it looks in color! I think the uniform you picked looks the best out of all of them...
-Jay

Jay,
Here is the finished card, front and back in color. What do you think? Please re-check the story on the back and make sure everything is spelled correctly. I'd hate to print your grandfathers' first and only baseball card with his name misspelled! If it meets with your approval, I'll send it to the printer and you should have everything in a week.
Thanks,
-Gary C.

Gary,
I just received the cards today... THANK YOU SO MUCH! They look fantastic and I can't wait to give these to my relatives! THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!
-Jay