The Summers Home: Whedon Elite Challenge 117 Winners, My Entries and Banner

Congratulations to the winners of whedon_elite Challenge 117, sweet_lyri and starry_night; THANK YOU to setentpet for the Mod's Choice Award for my #4 entry and to everyone who participated in the voting. Banners by your's truly; click on the banner to see all the winning icons and banners.

       

My entries:  1. 2. 3. 4.

Mods choice banner, alts and thinky-thoughts after the cut :

 

For the banner I was inspired by design of tempertemper's gorgeous banners for slayerstillness Challenge 43 and her use of "radial blur" to try it for myself. The font isn't specifically "period" but it has a slightly vintage feel and reminds me of fonts I've seen on the covers of early 20th-century magazines. A photo or screencapture of the Summers' home exterior set provided the base image. I confess that I don't recall where exactly I found this photo; my apologies to whoever posted it originally. (Or for that matter, whoever shot/taped the original image.)



The icon setentpet chose is my favorite of my four entries for this round, and the only one I made multiple alts for. I kept fiddling with the color, sharpness, glow, added floral layers; tried to make it look more like a pencil drawing, etc. before finally deciding on one of the earliest versions. I'm not sure it's the very best alt I could have submitted, but I liked the softness and glow, and even that tiny touch of color reflected in Buffy's hair.

Alts:   5.  6. 7. 8. 9.

         10. 11. 12. 13.



1, 9 - 13) kikimay encouraged me to keep experimenting with floral textures after my fourth entry for Challenge 116 also won Mod's Choice.

With #1, I simply liked how the flowers echoed the pattern of the wallpaper, and the colors of Anya's hair, lipstick and clothes; so there was really no particular "meta" meaning there. (Although if you want to read meta meaning into it by all means do!)  With the Buffy/Joyce icons I think I was trying for a sense of the banality of domesticity, as well an echo of the flowers Joyce received from Brian that we've just seen, and a suggestion of funeral flowers. I don't think it worked and at any rate it distracted from the main image. Fun to experiment with, though.


2, 4) Yeah, it's the latest in my "Buffy and dead Joyce" series and I have to say, one of my favorite things about my most recent btvsats20in20 entries is that I made two - count 'em, two! - icons of Joyce, by herself and alive.  That said - I will always maintain that Joyce's death is the single most traumatic thing that happens to Buffy, aside perhaps from being resurrected. Even above killing Angel, although that's certainly in the mix.*

I've said it before - the men in Buffy's life are important to her but Joyce is at the core of her being, her constant.  Even if Joss never quite got that and Joyce was shunted to the sidelines. For someone who "gets it", check out velvetwhip's  WIP, Answering Prayers. If you feel about Joyce's neglect in canon the way I do, Answering Prayers makes everything better.**

3) If you didn't know what that image is, you probably wouldn't know what that is? I tried other images from Forever, an unjustly overlooked episode because it follows the Body.  If it were a masterpiece in and of itself it would still be overlooked and it isn't, but it deserves better than the neglect it tends to get. Several folks voted it best light use this round, and thank you to those who did. The caps in this last scene in Forever are terribly dark and difficult to work with.


* I started making a list of the traumatic things Buffy endures and gave up when it got really, really long. And then I started thinking about Dawn and the list got exponentially longer Instead of hating on them for what they don't get right, I'd rather hug them, congratulate them and marvel that neither one ends the series in a catatonic state for the remainder of their days, utterly ground down beneath Life's Heel. I don't think I could endure a fifth of what Buffy and Dawn do with any semblance of sanity.

** Who's with me on the Summers Women lovefest?

The Work I've Left Undone: Pimping the Vote at Slayerstillness and btvsats20in20

These last couple of weeks I've been tired as all get out from my job (and now on the verge of "the thing that's going around" for the third time since the beginning of the year.  Oh FUN - not.)  Ergo I've been remiss at not promoting a thing or two:

slayerstillness - Your votes is needed in TWO tiebreakers, one to decide 2nd and 3rd place winners, and one for Most Creative, in Challenge 44. Make sure you hit each button individually so your vote registers in both. Challenge 45's theme is "Potentials", entry deadline May 29th midnight at your time zone.

btvsats20in20 - Votes still needed in Round 9, deadline tomorrow May 23rd.

Themes 10 as usual - you know the drill.

Category Choose your top three sets and then your FOUR (not six) favorite individual icons. (Only four artists entered this round.)

Artist's Choice. (Same as with Category Voting.)

I should have been pimping this much sooner; my bad. You'd think with all the time I spent making icons...but never mind that. Only 19 folks have cast their votes thus far (someone voted in the first three themes and then apparently gave up, so those votes will likely be tossed.)  Voting is always appreciated by the artists who make the icons. We also love it when we get direct feedback (the more specific the better but even a simple "I like this" is appreciated!) So if you haven't stopped by the individual artist's posts, it's not to late to give some love. Just scroll down the Round 9 tag.