Monthly fanfic/fanart contests?

[nytecat]

Hi!

At the Kotor Fan Media site, they have a monthly fan submission contest called the Dueling Challenge. It's where fans can submit either fan art or fanfic based on the theme of the challenge e.g. a story about supporting characters.

The submitted creative works are then voted on by the fan community. The works with the highest ratings win... uhm... I think prestige for winning the challenge.

Anyway, I was thinking perhaps we can do something like that for here too. It will let us get to know each other better as well as have fun together. It will also let us broaden the scope of the WOEICS? because there are many untold stories out there!

We could all vote on the themes as well.

Anyone interested?

[Laurie]

(The edit I made above was just to fix the link code. Proboards uses ubb instead of HTML.)

Anyway...

It may be a possibility. Even if it's not a contest per se, but just something a few fans participate in just to get the creative juices flowing. The issue I wonder is if we have enough people to do it though...

[Kara]

I would be up for a monthly challenge....it would be good excuse to exercise the creative muscles. And I think montly is better than say, weekly...which seems like it might be a bit much.

[shesVILE]

Well, I'd be willing to participate.. if the theme seemed like fun and inspired me.. and yeah monthly is alot better then weekly.. I agree... I've had such a tough time finding Carmen Fan Art though.. I mean.. just period.. I held a contest at Deviant ART to try to get people drawing VILE and Carmen themed things.. I plan to put on my site.. er... eventually.. (to much stuff to do this month) -_-;;

[nytecat]

Should we then have the first challenge in Aug?

This gives us a month to brainstorm themes and also do the 10th anniversary scavenger hunt.... which I got hopelessly lost at with the first clue, by the way

[Kara]

Yeah, August would give us time to amass some themes and get prepped. So, the challenge would go out August 1st and then entries would have to be submitted by August 31st- is that correct?

Would you want to have people submit their challenges by posting on the forum? I've only ever seen this done on lj before, but I suppose the forum would work, too. Oh, other question- would you like the challenge to be the same for both fanart/fanfic?

As to suggestions for possible themes....mwahahha- brainstorming this is going to be fun! I like your idea, nytecat, about a secondary characters challenge. And I will raise you....

1. Take an episode and write it from 1st person POV of one of the main characters.
2."Meet the Parents"- Zack & Ivy's? Carmen's? Let's leave it open ended.
3. A character's favorite memory
4. A character's worst memory

That's all I got so far. 3 & 4 are blatantly stolen from the snape100 lj group I read....

[nytecat]

Double dare!!!

Kara, I like your ideas for the monthly challenge, especially the first two which will be challenging to write. Though the Meet the Parents would be fun.

And yes, I agree that if we announce the theme at the beginning of the month, we should submit the fics/artworks by the end of the month. I don't see a problem with submitting the fics on this forum but would the artworks have to be hosted on another site then linked?

Also, I think the art and fanfic challenges should be the same theme.

Another suggestion I have is an alternate universe scenario. Write a "what if" story - examples: what if... carmen never left Acme; what if...Zack and Ivy ran VILE and Carmen was the detective; what if...the CHIEF was human; what if Carmen was finally caught; what if Carmen was as evil as Maelstrom; what if the whole 'chase me' capers was actually a government conspiracy; what if Carmen retired and settled down, etc

The whole thing can be left up to the writer's to choose.

[waschbaer]

I like the "what if..." idea. It sounds very interesting, for there are very many possibilities.

Kara´s ideas are great, too, but personally I don´t think I could write anything sticking to those themes. Would be a bit to much challenge for me

I got an idea, too, also what if... theme:

What if Ivy and Zack grew bored by chasing Carmen?

[nytecat]

That's good! Keep the ideas coming =)

Another thought for a theme: Amnesia. What happens if one of the characters got amnesia?

[Laurie]

nytecat said:

And yes, I agree that if we announce the theme at the beginning of the month, we should submit the fics/artworks by the end of the month. I don't see a problem with submitting the fics on this forum but would the artworks have to be hosted on another site then linked?

If we keep the contests run on the forum, I would say folks could either upload a pic to DeviantArt or even get a Photobucket account just to host the files. I'd love to put up all the entries on the Manor too.

So...how would it work for voting? If say Augst 31st has come and gone, do we start voting September 1st?

Also, would we have challenges where the theme calls for fics only or art only or would the challenge be for either? (Ie, if we went with the 'What do you think Zack and Ivy's parents are like?' could someone write a fic while someone else draw a picture?)

Just curious on how it would all work, tis all.

[DarkRaven]

or what would happon if some one got stuck in and outher show or movie i could just imang Zack in like Lord of The Rings or Supperman.

[Kara]

Such good challenge ideas! Alternate universe challenges are always fun. Amnesia's a good one too.

Crossovers are also fun, as you suggested, Lenore.

Here's another idea- a story set in a character's childhood.

Oh also, would fanfic and fanart be voted on separately?

[nytecat]

Well I guess after the challenge ends at the end of Aug, we should begin voting on Sept 1. I think a week would be enough time for everyone to read all the fics and see the pics to vote. So voting would end at Sept 7.

Uhm... I just had a thought. I don't like the idea of saying this fic/artwork is the best for those who get the highest votes. How about calling them This Month's Forum Favourites?

To be fair, fic and artwork should be voted on separately.

On the Kotor site, fic and artworks are done for the same theme but I admit some themes might be hard for the artworks.

Does this forum has a poll system? Otherwise, I wonder how we're going to vote or tabulate the votes.

Here's another theme to add to the pot =)

"Regret" - from the POV of one the characters. Maybe from their past or present time?

There are so many good themes, we might have trouble choosing!

[Anita]

So many interesting ideas! I think I can come up with two. In this same section of the forum, some time ago, there were two topics that were broadly discussed and most of us agreed that they would be interesting material for fanfic. They are "Carmen and boredom" and "Little orphan Carmen". Perhaps we can do a challenge related to that!
Nytecat, your idea about calling the challenge "This Month's Forum Favourites" it's excellent.

[Laurie]

nytecat said:

Well I guess after the challenge ends at the end of Aug, we should begin voting on Sept 1. I think a week would be enough time for everyone to read all the fics and see the pics to vote. So voting would end at Sept 7.

Should we set up a time zone deadline as well? Just a thought since we're all over the world.

Uhm... I just had a thought. I don't like the idea of saying this fic/artwork is the best for those who get the highest votes. How about calling them This Month's Forum Favourites?

To be fair, fic and artwork should be voted on separately.

Sounds fair on both accounts.

On the Kotor site, fic and artworks are done for the same theme but I admit some themes might be hard for the artworks.

Right. Well if some months we only have fic or only have art, that's fine. Though if we only have say one fic or one pic...how would that work?

Does this forum has a poll system? Otherwise, I wonder how we're going to vote or tabulate the votes.

Yes. You can only add a poll when you first create a thread. Click the 'New Poll' button at the top right corner. This will also allow you to add a post beneath the poll.

There are so many good themes, we might have trouble choosing!

True! So, should we vote on the next theme or just do a random draw?