Mega Flare 2011: It's coming!!

[owlmoose]

That's right! The time we hope you have all been waiting for is finally here: the official announcement of the new round of Mega Flare, the Final Fantasy Big Bang.

Based on how things went last year and your feedback, we have made some changes to how the project will run, so please read the rules closely. We hope to have a FAQ ready sometime next week. And now, with no further adieu:

Rules for Mega Flare 2011: The Final Fantasy Big Bang

1. Schedule! All closing times and due dates are 11pm Pacific Time (UTC -6).

Sun Jun 5: Sign-ups Open
Fri Jul 9: Author Sign-ups Close
Fri Jul 9: Mega Flare 2010 Collection Closes
Sun Sep 18: Rough Drafts Due
Mon Sep 19: Story Selection Begins
Sun Sep 25: Story Selection Closes
Sun Sep 25: Artist Sign-ups Close
Fri Oct 28: Posting Begins!
Sun Nov 13: Posting Ends - All stories and artwork due


2. This year, we will institute a new wordcount levels option! Authors will be able to sign up for one of these four levels:

Flare - 5,000 words
Ultima - 10,000 words
Mega Flare - 20,000 words
Giga Flare - 40,000 words

We hope that having a variety of challenge levels will make it easier for more people to participate. Please choose your preferred level on the sign-up form. Of course, nothing is stopping you from writing a longer story.


3. We will have announcement communities on LJ and DW both! However, for ease of modding and communication, comments will be allowed only on the Dreamwidth community. Anonymous and OpenID commenting will be open for those who neither have nor want DW accounts. (If you don't have a DW account and would like one, drop the mods a line -- we have plenty of invites.) Come check us out at megaflare_ff or megaflare_ff!

4. All stories must be posted to the AO3 Mega Flare collection.

• If you don't already have an AO3 account, request an invite here. It's a good idea to do this as soon as possible.


• Stories may be broken into chapters, but you must post the entire story at one time -- no spreading it out over several days or weeks.


• You are totally welcome to cross-post as you wish!

5. Expectations for authors

• If you would like artwork, send a rough draft of the story to the mods by Sunday, September 18th. Your rough draft must have a wordcount of at least 33% of the total wordcount for the level you selected.*


• Unposted WIPs are allowed, with a maximum of 25% of words at your selected level already written.**


• We will open story posting on October 28th, and it will stay open for approximately two weeks. Sunday, November 13th is the final deadline!

6. Expectations for artists

• Be available the week of September 18th for story selection.


• Post one or two high-quality fanart pieces inspired by the story you have chosen. You should work with the author to embed the artwork in the story as posted on AO3. Although AO3 doesn't offer image hosting, we will! Watch the community for more information about how to upload your artwork.


• Anyone is welcome to sign up as both an author and an artist, but you must select someone else's story to illustrate.

7. Collaboration!

• We definitely encourage artists and authors to sign up as a team! This suggests that you will work on the project together from the beginning. When you sign up, please let us know that you are going in together so that we know that you don't need to participate in story selection.


• Authors who sign up with an artist do not need to turn in a draft. However, please check in with us at this stage to let us know how it's going.

8. Betas

• Although we won't be doing official beta sign-ups, anyone is welcome to advertise their services as a beta in this post.


• Betas are not required, but they are strongly recommended.

9. Other stuff

• Defaulting: In life, things happen. You may get to a point where you realize that you just aren't going to be able to finish your story or your artwork -- maybe not on time, maybe not at all. Either way, please feel free to contact the mods at any time, either by email or by leaving a comment on the DW community. No worries! Whatever it is, we would rather know and have the opportunity help you out.

That's all for now! If you have questions, feel free to comment or contact the mods. The FAQ will be up soon. Watch this space!

Love, your mods,

renay and owlmoose

*The required minimum draft wordcounts for each level are:

Flare: 1,700
Ultima: 3,400
Mega Flare: 6,700
Giga Flare: 13,400

**The WIP maximum wordcounts for each level are:

Flare: 1,250
Ultima: 2,500
Mega Flare: 5,000
Giga Flare: 10,000