artslam

This isn't an official Mod Post, but since we have about a week left to go and I know that I'm pretty stoked to get started, why not consider some pre-Slam shenanigans?

DMC!
How about a no-sweat Draw My Character! event: Sign in with a comment below, with a link to the character (pick one, please!) that you would like to have drawn. Then, if you want to do a sketch (or more!) for another participant, simply drop a link to your image in their thread. Please only use SFW images for reference, and keep in mind that there's no guarantee that you'll get art. This is just for fun! Draw who you like!*
*These characters by no means have to be related to your challenge this year, but it might be worth considering!

Upcoming Weekly Neatness
A couple of traditions brewed up at ArtSlam involve Smutterday -- bring on your NSFW (or even mildly suggestive) art, ship some of your own characters! Fanart Friday is another -- much like the DMC here, if you dig someone else's concept, give 'em a drawing! They're both completely voluntary, so no pressure.

For those who have been waiting, Artslam's writing sister has opened June Sign-ups and will be running them into the first week of June due to the late opening.

If you hadn't noticed this was going down, here's some info from our About page to get you in the know!

( No Tumblr? No problem! )

( Community Moderation )

( Flexible Challenges )

Want to see more about the rules and achievements? Visit us at summerofwords.tumblr.com

(OPEN)
INTRO
Hello, you awesome slammin' folks! It's that time of year again. I'm opening sign-ups with 15 days to spare, so that we all have time to prepare our project for the next month -- or two, or three!

NEW STUFF
This year will be a little (officially) minimalistic. I'm putting aside the manual handing out of achievements, though there is a list (that I will update with a 'participated all three years' pip, as well!) that you can use as a guide-line if you wish.

We have joining our ranks a new option for posting your images, if you're not using LJ as frequently as once you did: ArtSlam on Tumblr has been created and is launching alongside LJ -- there may be some kinks to work out, so keep an eye out, and please let dracothrope (LJ Admin) or schizostories and sendingauron (Tumblr admin) know if you run into any snags so we can smooth things out.

We are also opening the door this year for combined challenges: arting and writing! We have a sister Tumblr over at WordJam if you'd like to have a go just at writing. (No WordJam LJ community as yet -- we're testing to see how the writing aspect fares, so it will all be combined hereabouts.) The WordJam aspect will be more relaxed than NaNoWriMo standards: there will be no hard limits that you have to meet. If you have any questions, renessa47 is the Tumblr admin of WordJam. Essentially, you could spend a month writing a script for your comic, posting a little every day, then spend the next two months putting your script to picture. Or, you could spend two months writing a short story and spend the last month doing wicked cover art for it. You could try to do a little of both each month if you're up for even more of a challenge, though be sure to keep your concept relatively focused to help you see some progress from start to finish.

THE SIGN UP SCHPEAL
Sign-ups for the month of June last from May 15th to May 31st this year. In order to sign up, please fill out the form below and toss it up as a comment. If it doesn't appear immediately, don't worry! Last year LJ had some funny business about marking random comments as 'suspicious', which screened them. All that means is that a mod from this account will be swinging through and removing that designation, but it may take a bit of time to catch the odd ones out.

Because this year will be less closely modded, all that mods will be doing is adding new users names to our tag list, as well as being handy to answer questions. All that you need to do to help us maintain a great archive is to tag each new post with your LJ username. If you have changed your username, we'll give you a new tag. It will be your responsibility to update old posts with the new tag, if you want to change them all over. We can then delete the old tag.

ArtSlam runs from June 1st to August 31st, providing a summer-long challenge that is simple on the surface: draw something every day. (This year also: write something every day!) For this community, we prefer that you pick a concept and stick with it for at least one month. If you have a world that you want to explore with art, or a set of characters, this is a great place to do it! If you're shaky with perspective, background art, anatomy, or just really want to draw 30 pandas, you can hone your focus that-a-way, too.

What constitutes 'a drawing a day'? A sketch works -- preferrably one where we can see what you're trying to communicate. Finishing an image takes more time, so noticeable progress on a single piece works, too. As for writing, we're trusting you to set a goal that you think you can make: it might be based on word count, or you might have a single scene you'd like to get done in a day. You may want to do 30 small drabbles, or spend a month busting out a novel project you've been laying aside. If you're collaborating with someone on a project, that's cool! Let us know a little about what you two (or more!) are working on. When it comes to posting up work, you may want to work out who posts what each day to give a better flow. S'up to you!

Fill this info out and post it up as a comment, please! I'll begin adding new users tags to our list for June 1st. In the meantime, check back and leave comments as you like! We have a little more than fifteen days to get concepts ironed out. If you have any questions or concerns, drop dracothrope a note or leave a comment here. :3

<b>Username:</b> <lj user="insert username here"> <b>Goal at ArtSlam signup:</b> Insert difficulty rating here: Hard (3 Months), Medium (2 Months), Easy (1 Month). You can change this towards the end of June or July if you like. One concept == one challenge, so switching means you'll be doing two or three different challenges. <b>Links:</b> Insert any pertaining links to other galleries: <a href="">dA</a>|<a href="">FA</a>|<a href="">Personal Site</a>|<a href="">Sketchblog</a>|<a href="">Tumblr</a> <b>Concept:</b> Writing? Art? Both? Tell us about your project for your first challenge -- stay positive: you'll do awesomely. :D (Just for fun and pre-slam discussion -- feel free to fill these out or delete them, or add topics of your own if you'd like to talk about something else.) <b>Who is your favourite artist or author? Links?:</b> <b>When did you start drawing (or writing?) What do you love about it the most?:</b> <b>Any shout outs in particular for other ArtSlammers this year?:</b> <b>What's one thing you'd like to improve in the most over this summer?:</b> <b>Have you participated in past ArtSlams? Which ones?:</b> <b>If yes to the above, where are those projects now? Have any success stories that budded out of an ArtSlam challenge?:</b>

MOD STUFF
For everyone who said they'd have some time to help with modding, dracothrope will be tossing a note your way some time in the next couple of days. There shan't be much to do, but I'm really grateful that you're willing to help out a bit. I'll give you the details via PM. Thanks for your support!

Hopefully it's okay that I post this here. If not, please feel free to redirect me!

If you haven't heard, ArtSlam now has a tumblr! You can see it HERE

Okay guys, so Sendingauron and I are hard at work to create the tumblr merger. We're still setting up all info (Rules are up, FAQ and visual guides for submissions), but it is up, and is pretty much ready for any testing. Again, you can take a look and make some test submissions and offer feedback on ease, and if you would be comfortable posting this way HERE (and of course feedback can be left here). The comment system is also up (though we're still getting it just right, primarily in removing the option to enter email, and only requiring a name that can be replaced with your username), and we have a good and easily navigable tagging system all worked out if you want to see how interaction would feel amongst everyone.

Primarily though, I am posting this here to ask a couple of question and include some of our own concerns should this work out:

1.) Because we simply want this to be a crossover, we've set it up so the tumblr format allows those without a tumblr account to sign up and participate. For those with a livejournal account, would you like to cross post, or stay away from tumblr all together? Obviously a huge concern is being able to allow everyone to see everything, and one of the aspects that would keep this from working would be that submissions would be split. Dedicating time to check both sites could be inconvenient.

2.) That being said, the tumblr format also allows for people without a tumblr OR livejournal account to sign up submit. So basically, so long as someone uses some sort of blogging system to compose multiple-image entries, or sticks solely to an image a day, they can participate. How would you all feel about this?

3.) A downfall of the tumblr system is that it WOULD require moderation, and all moderators would need tumblr accounts. The good news is that we have figured out how to allow any mods to moderate the Art Slam without having to sign out of their main tumblr account, while still keeping the Art Slam tumblr on a completely separate account. Reasons for mods would be because all submissions require moderator approval (all this takes is checking your messages when you get one, and clicking "Publish"). And also to confirm the signed-up usernames of said posts (I imagine this will only take a day or two to figure out, as the usernames will become familiar very quickly). So if anyone is willing to volunteer themselves for moderating, Sendingauron and I would welcome your help and we could all work out a system should the whole tumblr thing work.

4.) Go ahead and try it out! There are some brief instructions on submissions already posted on the tumblr, as well as a few test submissions by Sendingauron and myself, so feel free to try and offer your feedback here. And of course list any questions, concerns, opinions, etc that you think we can hit on, since we've got almost a month to really get this ironed out!

PS: If you have any trouble with the submission process, I've also put up a pretty in depth visual guide in the "How Do I Submit" section so it's super easy for everyone :)

*CROSSPOSTED FROM TUMBLR*

IT'S OFFICIALLY MAY.

*confetti*

If we'd like to start in June, we should probably start discussing comm rules.  Don't worry, this doesn't mean we've settled on tumblr either, I'll be cross posting this to LJ.  Here's some issues and challenge details that need some deciding on (with my thoughts in parentheses).

( Read More )

Also, if you are interested and would like to come play with the tumblr community to see whether you like it or not, leave me your preferred email and I'll shoot you an invite.

It's drawing (har har!) close to that time of the year again, and I thought that I'd make an announcement to gauge interest and lay down a few potential changes.

1) This year, I'm pretty darned busy, and I know I won't be able to keep up with the usual mod/admin duties. Is there interest to step up to fulfill basic mod duties? (That includes: logging into the mod journal and double-checking signed-up folk against the tag list, and adding new usernames to the list.) Other fairly mundane essentials that could potentially be nixed would be to update and maintain a user log (list of usernames participating this year, what they're planning on doing, galleries where people can follow more work, etc.) keep an eye on the FAQ and answer questions based off of previous years, and, in the event of trolling or trouble, dealing with the folks causing it in a calm, professional manner. To give a meterstick: it's often taken about three to four mods to keep up with the basics of adding new tags in and updating the user list, and up to ten to hand out achievements. Since achievements are nigh upon impossible to distribute without some kind of streamlined automated system, I'm thinking they're sort of on the back burner this year.

2) If people aren't able to mod, would you be interested in joining the artslam without moderation? I could fiddle with the tag settings and ask kindly that everyone only tags with their username, though there is potential that people could abuse this system and I won't time to prune the tag list!

3) There's been mention of starting a writing affiliation over on tumblr, and I know that a lot of people here are also writers in addition to being awesome artists. Would you like to see some elements of writing included this year as a test run to the slam? I'd suggest one drawing per day OR a short snippet of your setting, characters, or a Nano-style word-count that you can set yourself, to minimize on word-count angst and hopefully encourage just getting something done every day.

4) Kittens? Any suggestions for this year? Just excited to see it spark up again? Now's a good time to camp out and chat about what you're hoping to get started on or just see who else is kicking around. :D

HEY GUYS! :D

I have seriously missed you all since last year, and I hope to be able to check in every now and then to see all the ridiculously awesome things you all put out this summer.

I've had a lot to think about this last month, given my graduation in a week, and I've made some goals for the next few years of my life. In concert with those goals, I think this summer I want to focus on writing rather than art.

'But why not do this and then NaNoWriMo in November?' you might ask. I've never liked the concept of NaNoWriMo: entirely too much stress on quantity rather than quality. I am also a slow worker and put things down in my own time. I have in fact burned out on writing before and that was a very unfun and lengthy recovery time where it felt like part of my soul was missing. I'd rather take my time over a long challenge and not finish anything while still feeling accomplished than burn the candle at both ends and wind up with Twilight a pile of crap I wouldn't even read to my worst enemy while tied to a tree to prevent escape. I want to go at my own pace and still feel good about revising as I go without fearing some loss of nerd points for not chugging ahead blindly.

But I still kind of want a challenge.

So I'm asking here, since I know many of you are writers as well who often draw your own head worlds, would you be interested in an artslam-style summer writing challenge? I'm kind of done with LJ and have moved on to tumblr, so I'd rather host it there; and we'd have to figure out some minimum in prose and poetry to count as progress (revision would also count as progress); and we could certainly come up with achievements; and... and other things.

I'm going to write regardless, but it would be more fun if we could make another community out of it. Anybody like the idea?

EDIT: Since I've gotten some positive response from a lot of different places I've asked about this I made a test tumblmunity to see if I could figure out how to work it (and Disqus comments, since tumblr doesn't have native comments in the sense most people think of them).

If you're one of those who DOESN'T like tumblr then don't fear, this is just a test. Even people who like tumblr may decide that's not the best option for this and we may switch back to LJ. But at least test it out and help me out in the process.

Join by going here: http://www.tumblr.com/join/i7Unbs95E1

Hey, folks! Everyone sounded pretty pumped to create a world that the community can share, and everyone seemed pretty evenly split between September 23rd and October 31st.

So, since September 23rd is only a week away, I'd like to present you with the ArtSlam Equinox Challenge: From today on until Wednesday, September 21st, this thread is open to drabbles, scribbles, and any other planning that you guys are interested in building on. This week is for tossing ideas back and forth and revising. Feel free to add to any section that you are interested in, and add to thoughts that others have already laid out.

From Thursday, September 22nd until Sunday, September 25th, character creation begins! Feel free to post to the community a single (or multiple, if you're feeling prolific) characters that would fit into the world we've built, how they fit into it, and what (if any) relationships they have with other characters.

Participation is completely voluntary: if you guys like the place that we all build together, we can use it as a setting for future challenges. If not, we can always try something new and different!

I'm going to reserve a few comment spaces at the top of this post to guide specific development: (Namely, Geography, Flora and Fauna, Natural Phenomena, Cultures, Tech & Science, Religion & Myths, People/Places/Things of Interest) beyond that, if there is something that you guys would love to add that doesn't fit into any of those categories, feel free to add it below!

(There is no sign-up for this event, since it's a short one. There will, however, be a little achievement to honor those who've finished a character for the world!)

renessa47 suggested extending the art slam a touch by including some mini-challenges around the seasons. The Autumn equinox this year is September 23rd, and then there is always Halloween on October 31st. If you are interested in participating in a mini-challenge, which date would you prefer?

Some suggestions for challenges:
-Classic Art Trade: A good old-fashioned art trade (you draw my character, I'll draw yours)
-Autumn/Halloween Image: An Autumn-themed or Halloween-themed image for one of your characters (alternately, are there any autumnal festivities in your world's culture? Is there such a thing as autumn there? Draw what it'd look like!)
-Autumn/Halloween Party Gathering: Everybody draws an image of their character partying as a transparent .png file: they'll all get plopped together in a montage of equinox/halloween partying goodness! (Costumes and/or masks may be a cool addition!)
-Genre-Swap: Everyone who wishes to participate leaves a comment that summarizes their world's genre: "battle mech tech, virtual science fiction, gryphony sci fi, magical fantasy, suburban horror, western fantasy, etc. etc." You'll also either leave a link to more info if needed, or quick info about the most important bits about your world and contact info if folks want to ask more. The results will be shuffled and randomly drawn to participants -- at this point, draw you character(s) as they would look if they originated from this particular genre!
-Other: (leave info in your comment!)


So, if you are interested, let me know if you'd prefer the challenge to fall over the equinox (September 23rd) or Halloween (October 31st). If any of the above suggestions appeal to you, or if you have your own idea, leave it in the comments! (And if you see a comment left with something that sounds amazing, please comment to it so that I can tally up them votes!)

eta: There will be an achievement specific to this event, that I'll actually be really for genuine truth giving out to participants. XD It will be a unique achievement sort of like 'Founder' was!

Votes So Far
(These count votes including "I want to do any of them!", though we'll still only pick the one with the most in the end for this mini-round.)
September 23rd: 5
October 31st: 5

Classic Art Trade: 6
Autumn/Halloween Image: 4
Autumn/Halloween Party Gathering: 4
Genre-Swap: 5
Art Slam World Design Conference: 10