Application Guide
General
Although your full writing portfolio may include NSFW stories, please ensure that the specific examples you submit for judging and those in art portfolios do not contain NSFW content.
Artists
We are looking for a total of 26 artists:
1 cover
22 vertical single pages
3 horizontal spread pages
Artists will be asked to provide three examples of their best works and a portfolio. Your portfolio can be a Google Drive folder, Wix, Instagram, or other similar website. If you use Tumblr, please link to your specific art tag rather than an entire blog.
You are not required to include members of the Todoroki family in your portfolio, but we highly encourage it, especially if you would like to focus on a particular Todoroki in your zine piece.
Backgrounds are highly encouraged, as we will be requiring artists to draw more than just a monotone or simple pattern for the background in their actual zine pieces.
If you are interested in drawing multiple characters, an example containing more than one person is highly encouraged.
Traditional mediums are allowed as long as you can provide high quality scans that fit the zine specifications (A5 size images, 300 dpi, etc.)
Artists are encouraged to curate their pieces. In general, please submit art that represents your best work and you believe is zine-level quality.
Judging will be based on anatomy, color, value, composition, background, and consistency.
Writers
We will be looking for 5 writers to write fics with a word count of up to 3k.
You must provide three examples of your best work. The first example may have a word count of up to 5k, but the other two must fall within the range of 1-3k.
Providing a link to a portfolio is optional, but it is highly encouraged so that we have more to work with in case of a tiebreaker. Your AO3, fanfiction.net page, a google drive folder, wix page, weebly, or similar website can function as a portfolio.
Examples must be hosted on a google doc, AO3, tumblr, weebly, wix, or fanfiction.net. We will not accept samples from wattpad, amino app, twitter, or a wiki. Other sites will be handled on a case-by-case basis. If you upload examples to Google Drive, ensure that your stories are not set to private. If we cannot open your examples, we will move on the next applicant.
One of your samples is required to be a BNHA fic. The others may be from original works or other fandoms. However, please note: RPF (real person fanfiction) and reader inserts are not allowed as examples.
Excerpts are allowed, but it is in your best interest to make sure that your excerpt still has a well-defined beginning, middle, and end. Remember, one of the things we need to know is if you can work within a limited word count.
You are not required to include an example featuring a member of the Todoroki family. That said, if you have a Todoroki-specific example, it would be advisable to use it, as it will give us a better sense of how you would write that character.
Winter Dawn aims to capture all aspects of the Todoroki family, from the challenging and dark to the tender and humorous. We’d like to create a zine that faces the family’s serious concerns but also captures their capacity for growth, redemption, and recovery. In light of this, we encourage applicants to include samples that demonstrate diverse views of the family - light-hearted pieces are just as welcome as angst! If your samples include very serious subject matter, please aim to address those topics tactfully and with characterization in mind.
We will be judging based on characterization, spelling and grammar, story structure, and wordflow.
Merch Artists
We are looking for 5-6 merch artists.
Most merch artists will be asked to create more than one type of merch item (i.e. a button and a bookmark). As such, we recommend you select more than one type of merch in your application so that we know what you’re comfortable drawing. Note: For very complex or detailed merch designs, such as prints, merch artists may be asked to create only one piece.
It helps to provide examples of the types of merch you want to design in your portfolio. If you want to draw a poster or bookmark, include illustrations in your portfolio. If you are interested in charms, include examples of charms that you have designed in the past, etc.
Although a portfolio link is not required for merch artists, we highly encourage you to include a link to more examples of your work for the judges to review. Your portfolio can be a Google Drive folder, Wix, Instagram, or other similar website. If you use Tumblr, please link to your specific art tag rather than an entire blog.
Judging will be based on anatomy, color, composition, and consistency.
