Submission deadline is only a week away!

[http://users.livejournal.com/traycer_/]

Only a Week Until Submissions are Due!

Art and Fics Due - August 26th, 11:59 PM (Midnight) PST (here is a timezone converter.)


We're almost there and I can't help but be so excited about all the great stories and the beautiful artwork heading our way!! Squeeee!!!!! I love this comm! :D

We still have three more fics that need artists. Go claim one and showcase your amazing talent!. And yes, I admit it. I LOVE the artwork that comes through this comm! :)

And while we are at it, here's a rundown on how to post your final works to this year's AO3 Collection:

POSTING REQUIREMENTS

Where do we post our completed fics?
We are using AO3 collections, with the deadline for submission as August 26th, and the reveal date of August 31st. You can post them up early!! Post them up now, if you want! You can also post your fics anywhere else you like, just don't post them anywhere before the Debut Date.

I think that everyone who has signed up for this challenge has an AO3 account, but if you don't, there is plenty of time to sign up. You can ask a friend for an invite code, or you can request from A03 here or at ao3_invitecodes. If you are unfamiliar with it, here is the FAQ of AO3. Do not publish your fic for everyone to see at AO3. Instead, submit it for our 2016 collection. Only the author of a work can add it to a collection, and then the mods approve it and we'll reveal it on the Debut Date.

Once you've done that, we are also asking you to drop an email to thehetbigbang [at] gmail dot com when you submit your work to A03, with the following information:

Email Subject Line: (Fic or Art Submission. YOUR NAME.)

AO3 Name/LJ Name: (both)
Fandom:
Pairing:
Artwork or Fic: (artwork for "Title of Fic, by Author") or (Fic: "Title, rating, and word count. Big Bang or Little Bang.")
Summary: (if applicable.)

Further Posting guidelines below. (The pics used are for the old 2012 submissions, but just mentally adjust for 2016.)



1. Sign up for A03. You can ask a friend for an invite code, or you can request from A03 here or at ao3_invitecodes.

2. DO NOT POST YOUR FICS/ARTS SO THAT THE GENERAL PUBLIC CAN SEE THEM. Double check after posting to make sure it doesn't get posted to the general audience. If it does, delete the work and start over. Instead, you need to allow the mods to collect your fic/arts so that we can reveal everything together on August 31st. Go here, to the 2016 Het Big Bang Collection, and go the "Post to Collection" button in the top right corner. The collection is currently open, moderated and unrevealed.



This will bring you to the normal template where you submit your fic/artwork. In the first block, you fill out all the tags: fandom, warnings, ratings, characters, pairings, additional tags, etc.

In the second block, you fill out the preface information, including title, summary, and author's notes.

2a. For Artist: your summary line should include your author's name and the title of their story (if you know it).

3. In the third block, for "Associations" make sure the line for "Post to Collections/Challenges" lists "Het_Big_Little_Bang_Challenge_2016."



3A. For Artists: the next line, "Gift this work to:" should be filled out as well. Artist, you know your Author's A03 name, which should have been provided to you through your emails. If for some reason it was not, please contact your authors and get this name from them. Fill in the "Gift this work to:" line with your author's name. That will link your artwork to them. After the submissions have gone live on the Debut Date, we would like you to go back and edit your submission to add in a link to the specific story you created your artwork for. But until the entire big bang goes public, the main way you'll attach your artwork to the piece will be by identifying the author through gifting.

When you finally get the chance to link to the story, edit your submission and use the HTLM coding: <*a href="INSERT THE URL HERE">Title, by Author. (Remove the *) You can put this in your author's note or summary.

3b. For Authors: After the submissions have gone live on the Debut Date, we would need you to go back and edit your submission to add in a link to the specific artwork that was created for your story. You don't have to "Gift this work to:" to the artist, but it'd be neat if you wanted to do so.

When you finally get the chance to link to the artwork, edit your submission and use the HTLM coding: <*a href="INSERT THE URL HERE">Title, by Artist. (Remove the *) You can put this in your author's note or summary.

4. Formatting and coding guidelines are important.

4a. For Artists: AO3 video embeds are working from Youtube, Vimeo, blip.tv, Dailymotion, Viddler, Metacafe and 4shared. So if you have a video, you upload it to Youtube for example, and then embed into an AO3 post.

For images like artwork and icons and banners and cover art, use the <*img src="INSERT YOUR URL HERE"> HTML coding (remove the *). You can first upload your images at Tinypic or photobucket or a similar image hosting website, and then make an A03 post with the HTML coding.

5. Submit your fic/artwork.

You need to make sure when you hit "Post" that you see this text at the top of the resulting page:

"This work is part of an ongoing challenge and will be revealed soon! You can find details here: Het Big/Little Bang Challenge 2016"

6. Now, your fic should NOT be displayed to the general audience. It might not even show up on your dash, but fear not. You can still edit, add new chapters, mess around with it to your heart's content.

We, the mods, unfortunately do not have access to your story. We cannot tell if it is properly formatted or not. THIS IS FRUSTRATING, but there's nothing we can do about it. We can only see your name. All works are titled "Mystery Works" until we reveal the entire big bang. So, please make sure your own fic is properly formatted.

If you need to edit your fic, login and go to your dashboard. Go to the "Edit Works" button in the top right corner. From there, you can edit your works.



A03 will require you to format a header with all regular information on it.
Remember to properly tag your works, including appropriate warnings.


Both HTML and Rich Text are supported, and you can edit/delete, have multiple chapters, etc...

1. The Rich Text Editor lets you add formatting, links and pictures to text without using HTML tags. It also has an option for pasting from Word which will preserve some of your Word formatting, although please note that this is buggy. The Rich Text Editor is only available for your work text.

2. The HTML editor allows you to change the look of your text with HTML tags. It can be used in any place you can submit text, although some fields permit only a small subsection of allowed tags. You can see a full list of the allowed HTML on the Archive FAQ, but the standard HTML tags is as follows: b, big, blockquote, br, caption, center, datetime, div, dl, dt, em, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, height, hr, href, i, img, ins, small, span, src, strike, strong, sub, sup, table, u, and more.

Also, two years ago, anr was a saint and provided you with a post that explained "how to format a fic for posting in less than 30 seconds no matter the story length or amount of formatting" trick.

The mods won't be overly picky about formatting. I'd prefer for all dividers and scene breaks to use <*hr> (remove the *) which creates a horizontal line that serves perfectly as a scene break. However, that's optional. You choose your own way to format.

Other optional suggestions, just for uniformity sake's:
How do I do Chapter Titles: Bold 'em.
How do I timestamp and do locations: Italicize the dates and locations.
How do I do subtitle stuff: Italicize it.

There is only one major fail regarding format, and that has to do with paragraphs breaks.
There must be a full line break between paragraphs.

Example of doing it wrong:

Chapter One: The Invasion
March 6, 2005 - The City of Atlantis
Elizabeth ducked quickly behind a console and attempted to catch her breath. A flush of pink colored her cheeks and a thin sheen of sweat had appeared on her brow. If the situation weren't so dire, John would have been turned on. As it was, however, he couldn't give it much thought as he had to focus on the batch of Ancient zombies that were slowly staggering in through the Stargate.
"At least they can't run," he offered lamely.
Elizabeth spared him a glare. "Why can't they run?"
"I don't know." John shrugged. "But they never seem to run. They always lurch. Maybe when they're brought back to life they don't get knees?"

Example of doing it right:

Chapter Two: Ancient Ex-Girlfriends
Yes, They're Zombies Too

Elizabeth peeked around the consol. "Oh, my god," she breathed. "Is that--"

"Chaya?!" John squeaked.

"Talk about creepy ex-girlfriends." Rodney scrunched his nose. "She doesn't look good in green."

John cringed and crouched down lower. "Do you think she's their leader?"

Elizabeth looked thoughtful. "Well, this may be better for us." She narrowed her eyes at John. "We can give them you in trade for a cease fire--" Something caught her attention behind John and she broke off. "No, wait. Look to the left! That's... oh, god, John. That's Teer!"

John and Rodney stared in disbelief. "Damn you, Kirk!" Rodney groused, and hit John upside the head. "We're going to be killed by a legion of your dead ex-girlfriends!"

"Okay, everybody calm down," John soothed. "Let's not overreact and go blaming--"

"Hey, look, your ex-wife!"

"What?!!"

Grammar and Spelling fail:
If your fic doesn't look beta'ed, we will call you on it, which will create an AWKWARD situation for both of us. Having a beta is a REQUIREMENT. Grammar, spelling, proper paragraph structure, etc... these are all REQUIREMENTS. You need to give your beta ample opportunity to go over your fic for mistakes and edits, so remember to factor that into your deadline. Don't have a beta? Check out this post!


Can I post it to my journal a few days early to show my friends?

No. The first time you show your fic for this big bang must be on Debut Day, on this comm. Mods will handle the revealing details. There will be more posts on that to come. Once the Big Bang website goes live, feel free to post your stuff wherever.


Also, please remember that extensions for final fic and art submissions will not be granted. Please make sure your stories and art are submitted no later than August 26th.