Paintersblock

Welcome to Painters Block. We are a juried site dedicated to showing the best of fantasy illustration to a wide audience. Your work will be displayed on approval of our Editors. To do that in a timely manner below are listed some guidelines to help
you understand what we are looking for. Submission Guidelines
Our Guidelines
Everyone hates rejection and we hate to reject but we are looking for the best in fantasy illustration and want you to display your best work. If a work is rejected because it has some flaws that need to be corrected or doesn't meet our guidelines in anyway. We will do our best to point you in the right direction for help in understanding the rejection. You may resubmit a rejected work that has been corrected.

This site is dedicated to helping artists be the best they can be. So help is available in our tutorial and WIP sections. If you don't understand a guideline rule then please visit our forum and ask your question.

Images need to be no more than 1024 px in width, and no more than 250 kb in file size. Otherwise you will get a message telling you have gone over the upload qouta.

*1. Painters Block only accepts finished Fantasy illustrations. An illustration tells a story. Who? What? and Where? Who is your character/subject?...what are they doing?...and where are they at? The work should be grounded and have suggestions and elements of story telling and a setting for your character. Concept/sketchy figures floating ON paper are not considered finished illustrations. A setting/background is a must to show here.

*2. What is Fantasy? Art/illustrations depicting fantastical elements. They can be Science Fiction, Horror, or Fantasy. Work done with a fantasy flavor in rendering is also acceptable. Fantasy is a wide spectrum and all of it will be considered. All styles and mediums are acceptable. From traditional art to digital 3D.

*3. Presentation is important. So make sure that your work is the best scan possible. Has no pixelation problems. Is sized right for the best showing and is not smudged, blurred, distorted, faded or too dark to make out elements. If you want to check these things before submitting. You can post it in the WIP section of the forum for advice.

*4. Content.
Painters Block has an audience of all ages and will be viewed by people from all cultures and nations.

Tasteful artistic nudity is allowed but images depicting male or female genitalia and/or sexual and pornographic acts are not.

Artwork that might be considered blantantly offensive to any religious group or culture could be rejected on those grounds. We believe in artistic expression but will be the judge when the line has been crossed into offensive, hurtful or too gory for our general audience.

*5. Copyright.

You may not submit work that belongs to another artist or that is a close copy of another artists work or that contains another artists work within it.

If you use photo references or photo paintovers or photo manipulation in your rendering process you must have clear copyright to the material.

Fan art is not allowed in Painters Block because of the confusions that arise on copyright issues.

If you work for a company/publisher and were hired to do the artwork by the copyright owner then of course it is acceptable. Just make sure that you let it be known on submission and have your copyright credited correctly contractually.

*6. Some Digital Guidelines.

This is the digital age and we are all for it!

But, Over use of filters and computer generated effects can result in disaster.

If your work consists mainly of computer generated effects and filters it could be rejected for excessive digital effects.

Pasted in photographs or obvious photomanipulations of photographs to make a collage effect or as a shortcut is also subject to rejection.

*7. Text on images.

Excessive Text on a work of art is distracting to its presentation. So oversized Signatures, oversized Banners advertizing you homepage across the artwork, Repeat Water marks filtering the image and Lettering that isn't part of the subject/ work could result in a rejection for excessive text.

If possible a published cover work should be presented without the Text.
You can note that it is a book cover and the name, author and publisher in the text under the artwork.