Ahoy there! The last contest was a lot of fun and I, Malcolm Terzich, have decided that we’re gonna do this thing Quarterly. I think the easiest way to line that up for me is to have the deadlines on the Solstices and Equinoctes, which means this contest will be as tight as the previous (a bit under two months) to meat the Summer Solstice. That’s why this time around, to get that Summer feel even if most of us are still trapped at home, the theme of the contest is “beach”.

What does that mean, you may ask? Well, I’ve personally participated in tons of fan art contests in the past and they all become boring because it’s always just a “draw a character” and occasionally there will be a theme for the how to draw the character. I ain’t about that life and I’m not going to force you to be either. If you want to just draw an Ex Dynamis Chaos character in a swimsuit, that’s perfectly fine. I’m not tying your hands down. But the more creative you can be the better. You don’t even have to draw a character at all. You can enter any art that uses either locations, creatures, objects, symbols, motifs, or whatever from Ex Dynamis Chaos and make something that fits the theme “beach”. If you don’t want to draw a character it could be something like monsters attacking a beach or what you think a beach inside a Subspace Highway looks like. It can go in any direction you want. The updated rules will be as follows.

Rules

1. It has to be an easily recognized form of art. Not just to me, who is still fairly artsy despite not considering myself an artist, but to the audience.
2. It needs to depict at least one aspect from Ex Dynamis Chaos that the audience can easily pick up on. As stated before, it can be a character, a creature, a location used in the stories, a machine or any other object, symbol, or motif that is used in the stories. If we can all tell the piece is related to EDK, go wild.
3. This piece has to have been made specifically for this contest. We’ll have no way of knowing if it’s something you previously finished and never posted or if you had a WIP you just got around to completing, but no entree that has been published in any form prior to this post will be accepted. You may publish work for this contest anywhere you wish after you complete it, as that will show it was posted after this contest began.
4. All entries must be PG-13. Obviously not everything EDK related even falls cleanly into this category, but because this is a community contest open to the public we want this to be a generally family appropriate competition. I’ll be fairly lenient, but use your best judgement please. No explicitly sexual content, though themes are okay. No uncensored nudity. Any gore shouldn’t be too visceral, cartoon gore is perfectly fine. If a good parent wouldn’t let their teenage child see your piece, submit something else.
5. Collaborations are allowed, but the prize must be shared evenly amongst the team so it probably isn’t worth it. Sorry, just being honest. Your group must also have a name or an identifier, like a band does, since it will count as a single artist.
6. Multiple submissions are allowed as well, but each artist (individual or group) may only win once. Entering multiple times does increase your odds of winning, but if more than one of your pieces place only the highest placement will count and it’ll skip to the next unique artist after that.
7. All entrees must be submitted by Saturday, June 20th of this year [2020]. To submit, post your art or a link to it on Twitter tagging @exdynamischaos and the hashtag #EDKartcontest along with title and/or subject of the piece and the names of all contributors. If you would like to submit a larger resolution image and don’t wish to host it elsewhere to link, or include more information than would fit in a tweet, or just don’t wish to use Twitter, you can also send submissions to me via email at immadametal@gmail.com by the deadline. I’ll repost all off Twitter entree with credits using the EDK handle, as well as posting them in the discord as well.

Prizes

All entrees will be voted on by the public over a period of five days after the deadline. This may quickly become a popularity contest, but I ask you to absorb as many of the entrees as you can and search yourself for the one that speaks to you the most for whatever reason. Maybe it’s the most technical piece, the funniest, or the coolest subject. After votes are in, 1st through 3rd places will receives awards. All entrees will be included in credited posts on the site, but the three winners will have a blog post dedicated to them to say something about themselves or to plug their own projects if they wish.

Grand Prize

The grand prize winner will not only receive a full color commission of their choice, but you will become part of Ex Dynamis Chaos through an official 4 page short where you get to decide plot (which editorial supervision). But unlike last time, your short must fit the “beach” theme. It can either be an insert of yourself or an original character of your creation (also with editorial supervision) that does something adventurous and/or meets your favorite EDK characters. And because the character will exist in the world from that point forward, you may even see them in a cameo or two at a later point in time. It can even be the same character as before if you were a winner previously. Don’t worry if you aren’t much of a writer, I can help polish it up and the sequential art will be taken care of by me.

Second Place

The second place winner will receive a full color commission of their choice from myself. It does not have to be Ex Dynamis Chaos related (this also applies to the commission portion of the prizes for 1st and 3rd place). It does have to fit the same PG-13 requirements of this competition though. Since it is a community event, I have to be able to share the final product. The commission will be fairly high resolution, traditionally inked, and digitally colored. It can have some text or word art and can be treated as a single panel of a comic if desired. You may also decide if you want to fit a standard set of dimensions if you plan to use it for something: comic page, two-page spread, desktop wallpaper, phone wallpaper, etc. Just let me know which one you need.

Third Place

The same things as the second place prize except without any color. You get a traditionally inked commission of your choice. Aside from color, all the same rules apply as above.

Anyhow, I hope you choose to enter and enjoy the competition. Be sure to share this with your friends. The more the merrier. And if this you all like this, we’ll do more in the future!