Presentation

The most common reason a moderator will delete an artwork entry is because the artwork does not meet our presentation rules. Artwork with the following characteristics will usually get flagged for presentation:

• blurry/out of focus
• pixelated, low resolution
• not properly cropped as in you can see the surface the artwork was photographed on or you can see the artists fingers/toes.
• the canvas or paper is crooked
• rings or ring holes from the sketchbook are showing.
• sketch is too light.
• text isn't legible on comic entries.
• entry is a screenshot of a computer application.
• distracting watermarks (see Watermarks section below)

When an artwork entry is flagged for presentation it will most often be deleted and the artist will be asked to fix the image and repost it. On rare occasions, the entry wont be deleted but instead the artist will be asked to edit their submission and upload a fixed image.

The following are examples of artwork that do not meet our presentation guidelines.

Don't know how to fix your images? See our tutorials on how to use a free image editing tool to prepare your artwork to meet our presentation guidelines.

Watermarks
Watermarks are an effective tool to deter and prevent art theft and plagiarism and we suggest that all artists make use of them. However, we do have guidelines against overly distracting watermarks under our presentation rules. We consider distracting watermarks as spam since the artists name and/or website becomes the focal point rather than the artwork.

Watermarks over the central focal point of an artwork are strongly discouraged. However, if a watermark must be placed over the main focal point, the watermark should be at a very low opacity (around 10%) and not distract too much from the overall composition. You may want to add an additional placement of your watermark within the corner of your artwork at near full to full opacity and at a small size. The larger and subtle watermark, while not very legible, keeps the artwork from being reproduced/printed while the smaller one tells the viewer who the owner of the artwork is.

For non-central watermarks, its ok if the watermark overlaps part of the drawing but it must not be too large or too opaque. Something between 10 and 60% opacity should work fine. The watermark should not be large and/or opaque enough to become a focal point in the artwork's composition. In other terms, the watermark should not act as a bullseye guiding the viewers eye first to the watermark and second to the art.

This watermark example is acceptable and highly encouraged

Notice that there are two watermarks on this image. There is a light watermark overlapping the drawing and another in the lower right corner. The transparent watermark protects your artwork from being stolen while the lower right provides better readability.

The following examples are NOT acceptable