red_satin_doll

So I've taken the plunge and signed up for Round 19 of

seasonal_spuffy - the 10th Anniversary, which is amazing and pretty darn cool. There are only 4 slots open in November as of this moment. Admittedly I'm nervous - I'll be doing artwork and I want to make a good showing because, hey, 10th Anniversary. Last round I made banners but this is the first time I've actually signed up for a round. And - 10th anniversary. Ten years of Spuffies creating and enjoying some really amazing artwork and can I honestly make something that is good and original and will be enjoyed by all and be true to my interpretation and feelings about those crazy kids?

********

Thank you to the voters at

btvsats20in20 Round 12 and

slayerstillness Challenge 53! Thank you

starry_night for the Mod's Choice, and

tempertemper for the banner for my "Passion" theme winner.

Banner credits: tempertemper (L.) and red_satin_doll (R)

Nightmares is one of my favorite episodes of Season 1 in part because of the way it resonates all the way to the end of the series, particularly in terms of Willow and Buffy. It's one of the most essential episodes of Season 1 and on my shortlist of "S1 episodes You Must Watch if You're Going to Try to Wriggle Your Way Out of Watching the Entire Season (Which You Shouldn't.)" But it also has some of the most fantastic imagery of the entire series and this was one round I could have very happily submitted 10 - 15 icons. My entries:

1 - 5

My favorite icons are definitely 3 - 5, Xander and the Evil Clown; and the swastika icon is my absolute fave of this set. For once I'm unhappiest with the Buffy icons. I had better ones than 1 - 2 that I didn't submit and I'm not sure why.

Alts: I nearly submitted #6 instead of 5; I like the way Xander is "consumed" by the light.

6 - 11

When I was in college I came across a biography of child-killer John Wayne Gacy that included a photograph of him in a clow costume. The corners of his painted mouth were pointed just like that of the Evil Clown in Nightmares. Apparently professional clowns were shown the photograph and noted that they never painted the corners of the mouth pointed in that way because it was considered to be scary and threatening.

Speaking of voting and all that jazz, voting for Round 32 of the Sunnydale Memorial Fanfiction Awards is open now until October 31!

nightmareschosenbannertext507squarenewtextRSD2014-15.png

Title: North Star (Nightmares/Chosen) 2014 - 2015

Artist:

red_satin_doll

Characters: Buffy Summers

Size: 507square

This is one of my favorite banners that I've made, and I have no idea why I've kept it hidden away for so long. As anyone whose known me for five minutes knows, "the Buffyverse across the seasons" and one Buffy Anne Summers in particular are two of my favorite subjects to play with in fanart.

Alt versions of banner (full-size images all 507square):

Click for full-size versions:

2nightmareschosenbrightcorrectedeye503x507sharpenedRSD.PNG

bluesigned_aa5e3fa1-28ca-4b7e-b191-edeaef0c32c7_zpsc496cd8c.PNG

The bokeh effect is from ipiccy ; the cloudscapes are views of a brilliant New England sunset my sweetheart took a couple of years ago. I layered the same shot twice at slightly different angles to one another to fill the space.

Icon versions:

You may recognize 4 - 7 from such ~~televison show~~ icontests comms as

slayerstillness Challenge 37 and

btvsats20in20 Round 5.

(No, I have no idea why I submitted #4 to SS when it's softer and blurrier than 1 - 3, either.)

1 - 5

6 - 7

Resources:

Screencaptures: Bloodqueen, Pretty as a Picture, Leave Me the White

Text: Quote from BtVS episode 4.22, "Restless", written by Joss Whedon

A Vague Disclaimer is No One's Friend:

~ DO NOT RE-POST TO OTHER SITES (INCL. FANPOP) OR LJ COMMUNITIES WITHOUT MY PERMISSION!

~ Take what icons you like for personal use but please credit if used :)

~ No hotlinking!

~ Comments however are appreciated :)

~ All artwork by yours truly except where otherwise indicated.

Current Music: Amy Ray, "From Haiti"

My cup runneth over: Thank you to the voters at

whedon_elite Challenge 126 and

slayerstillness Challenge 52 for voting for my icons, to

starry_night for the Mod's Choice, and to

tempertemper for her gorgeous Willow banners (B - F)!

Congratulations to

fassy,

sweet_lyri,

crazy_cordy,

emmatheslayer and

tempertemper for their wins in both challenges!

A - B

More banners and icons after the cut....

C - D

E - F

Entries for

whedon_elite Challenge 126 "Weapon of Choice": "For this challenge you have to icon your characters with their symbolic weapons. Doesn't need to be physical weapons, e.g. vampire with fangs, witches using magic, etc.".

thewitchcatherinemadisonicon1.2rsd2015.png

1 - 4

Entries for

slayerstillness Challenge 52 "Free-For-All"
doublemeatpalace0434_willowicon3.7.png

5 - 9

Alts/Extras:
buffyangelweaponicon1.4crsd2015.png

10 - 12

13 - 18

19 - 24

25 - 29

Texture Resources:

lookslikerain: 1, 7, 10, 23, 25 - 29;

whitebamboo: 9, 21;

jordannamorgan @

wolfbane_icons: 25, 26, 29
Brooklyn Museum of Art, Atahualpa, Fourteenth Inca, 1 of 14 Portraits of Inca Kings (el tirano Bastardo, Atahualpa), (Peruvian, mid-18th Century(?), artist unknown): 5, 19 - 20

Beta: Muse-Goddess extraordinaire velvetwhip

A Vague Disclaimer is No One's Friend:

~ DO NOT RE-POST TO OTHER SITES (INCL. FANPOP) OR LJ COMMUNITIES WITHOUT MY PERMISSION!

~ Take what you like for personal use but please credit if used :)

~ No hotlinking!

~ Comments however are appreciated :)

All artwork by yours truly except where otherwise indicated.

Current Music: Sandy Denny, "It'll Take a Long Time"

THANK YOU THANK YOU to everyone who voted for my icons at

slayerstillness Challenge 52 ! Wow! Thank you

starry_night for the Mod's Choice Award, and congratulations to

tempertemper and

sweet_lyri! Banners forthcoming from

tempertemper and I can't wait to see what she comes up with. I feel like Pavlov's Dog, slavering eagerly for an impending treat (the banners). Just call me Fido. Except unlike poor Fido, I know TT will deliver the goods. Speaking of banners.....

7f67b8bf-1d58-402b-8344-7c42e68c3f19_zps54aa5c79

Something to Sing About (v.2), 2014 Click image for full-sized version

My newest friend in fandom

sandy_s was admiring the WIllow icon I made for

whedon_elite Challenge 110, whilst I was swooning over her entries for 127 and her "Echoes" Spuffy userpic. I asked if she wanted to see ones of Buffy I'd made for

slayerstillness Challenge 37.....

....and then I remembered that I had never gotten around to posting the icons from that challenge or the beautiful awards banners

starry_night made for me. I'm sure Sandy had no idea what she was getting herself into *lol*. So without further ado: the awards banners are by

starry_night, all other artwork by yours truly. The Icons eminently snaggable and I have a veritable treasure trove. ( FYI: I despise the term "icon dump".)

I love how

starry_night coordinated colors and patterns individually to each icon. My favorite banners are 2nd place and the rich "tobacco brown" color, and Most Creative with a bokeh pattern that wittily matches what's in the icon itself. Did you see the warm tangerine glow of her banner for

comlodge or the frost pattern that echoed

rua1412's distinctive textures?

Click banners for full-size images:

Banner by starry_night for Challenge 37 Dec 2014

My entries:

1 - 5

6 - 12
Yes, I duplicated a few images; you noticed? I have no idea why Starry let me get away with it, other than she was being super-generous.

This was a special challenge for me in a lot of ways. When it began, I had just lost a friend in fandom (how is neither here nor there at the moment) and I used this challenge to push myself through a period of intense grief.The person I'm speaking of had been very supportive of my artwork and so I had them in mind the entire time and kept asking myself, "What would she think? Would she approve of this?" I tried out new-to-me techniques and came out with a set of entries and alts I'm immensely proud of. (That this person had not passed away in fact is neither here nor there now.) I decided to focus on Buffy, my favorite fictional character, and dive in deep. (That this person was not a Buffy fan, making this an altogether strange "memorial" is neither here or nor there either.)

1 - 2 ) Probably the simplest icons I made that round, so the 2nd and 3rd place awards stunned me. The Dawn icon I literally threw together at the last minute because I realized I wanted to do something with Dawn in it and I liked the image. #2 is the only cap from that heartbreaking scene in Listening to Fear that I could make a decent image from. I had wanted to depict Buffy crying but had to go with this. I also had to make the scene look like daytime light in order to make it visible; the caps are incredibly dark and this is deceptively warm and sunny. But I like it that way.

3 - 4, 12) The one moment in BtVS when a character shattered the "fourth wall"; it's been done as a gimmick countless times before and since (Garry Shandling, anyone?) but this is one of the few instances I can think of when it's genuinely unsettling. The camera is uncomfortably close to Sarah's face and we are "in her space" as she calls us out on our passive complicity. As viewers we are "enjoying", are "entertained" by her pain and trauma; and unlike her friends we've been in on the secret from the beginning. I love Sarah's face as Buffy (and specifically as Buffy); and unlike so many caps for the series, this image is relatively good quality, clear and well-lit.

5) Another image that I've reused in other projects and dearly love, Buffy in her own dream at the beginning of Nightmares; I layered two photographs my sweetie took of New England sunsets over Buffy. Yes, the clouds were really that brilliant and fluffy and I only slightly adjusted the saturation.

6 - 7) These Joyce & Buffy icons were two of my favorites going into the challenge; I absolutely teared up while I making them. And made tons of alts, which were nothing more than small tweaks to coloring, sharpness etc. I made versions that included text (see alts) from The Gift, "I just wish my mom was here." What Buffy says to Giles (again) in Intervention, that she feels that being the Slayer is turning her into stone, was also on my mind. I wanted to compare/contrast Joyce who is dead, "cold as stone" but very much alive in her daughter's memory; and Buffy who is alive but feels herself to be a dead thing. Her depth of feeling indicates to me that nothing could be further from the truth but it's what she believes about herself. (I have strong words for Xander Harris and Riley Finn and their entitled manpain but I will keep them to myself at the moment. In the interest of the children.)

"Sing" on number 3 and it's alts refers both to Buffy's lament "Something to Sing About" and "Sing" written by Joe Raposo (1971) and made famous by the Carpenters, a song I grew up with thanks to Sesame Street and probably had on my CD player when I was making this set.

9) Another of my favorites, "Normal Again grune wall" is still in my userpic gallery. The look of this icon was inspired by

tempertemper's 1st place Willow/Tara icon for

slayerstillness Challenge 32 from Oct 2014, believe it or not. I even asked her how she got the look of the icon, attempted to duplicate it to the best of my limits and got something completely different. I'm still really pleased by the balance of sharpness and blur and how palpable it seems: Buffy dirty hair, her gritted teeth, and tensed muscles are all very sharp, contrasted with her hand flapping impotently against her attacker. It's an incredibly sad image; that the girl who went up against Angelus ("Take all that away and what's left?" / "ME.") is reduced to this, even if it's an hallucination, and that she should find this state of affairs preferable. Of course it also speaks to Joss Whedon's fascination with tearing characters down to a state of complete powerlessness and then seeing how they react. Which he does over and over and over.....ad nauseum, ad infinitum.

11) I actually had

snogged on the brain for this one, due to the rivulet of blood effect. Sarah's hair reminded me of a needle piercing her skin; the effect was surprisingly easy to create. I probably should have kept this one to myself but it was just weird enough that I decided, what the heck. It's weird. I'm weird. And that's ok. But OTOH, I thought 13 would be "too weird" to submit, although it's one of my favorites. Go figure.

And I did promise a treasure trove of alts. Challenge 37 was a special free-for-all: we were allowed to enter as many as we wanted instead of the usual five. My habit at the time had been, 5-9x the number of alts per entries needed. I entered 12. You do the math, Gentle Reader. This only represents a fraction of my alts btw. You're welcome. (And I wonder why it took me nearly a year to post these?)

13 - 19

20 - 25

26 - 32

I might like the b/w versions better than the sepia ones. It's a toss up.

33 - 39

40 - 47

This was the round I finally got in the habit of saving icons with and without font. In case you hadn't noticed.

A Vague Disclaimer is No One's Friend:

~ DO NOT RE-POST TO OTHER SITES (INCL. FANPOP) OR LJ COMMUNITIES WITHOUT MY PERMISSION!

~ Take what icons you like for personal use but please credit if used :)

~ No hotlinking!

~ Comments however are appreciated :)

All artwork by yours truly except where otherwise indicated.

* NEWSFLASH! This just in! Congratulations to

fassy,

sweet_lyri,

crazy_cordy and

emmatheslayer for your wins in

whedon_elite Challenge 126 and THANK YOU for the Best Crop Award for my favorite entry of my set this round! A gorgeous, dynamic set of winners - banners will be forthcoming posthaste!

We have a veritable TSUNAMI of icontest challenge votes (Listed in order of urgency, more or less):

1)

slayerstillness Tiebreaker for Third Place icon in Challenge 52, PART 2. Yes, part 2. No, I didn't pimp part 1. My bad. It's been whittled down from part 1 to three icons competing.

starry_night said And if it’s still not broken after this one, I’ll just call it and post winners anyway :) Personally I think it's cute and it's an honor to be considered good enough to compete with and hold my own with artists I admire and who are far more experienced. (What? If you voted already you'd know that I had to beg out as a nominee. So if this a surprise, you clearly haven't voted yet and need to do so. Or you're one of those people who are disciplined enough to not check out who else voted in which case, I aspire.)

For some reason I thought tiebreaker voting was unusual, or more usual lately until I check out the history of the comm and saw that tiebreaker voting is the rule rather than the exception going all the way back to Challenge # 4. Personally my favorite icons that round were the Mod's Choice winners by

teragramm and

tempertemper; and

moriwen1's icon of Angel with a cobalt blue mug. But I didn't know about the comm back then so I didn't get a say. Boo-hoo.

Icons by teragramm, tempertemper, and moriwen1, April 2013.

whedon_elite Challenge #126 "Weapon of Choice" Vote for Top Three, Best Color and Best Crop amoung 17 dynamic entries. Full disclosure, this one probably does have a runaway winner. (I should know, I voted for it. You'll see what I mean.) But everything else? Totally up for grabs.

3)

btvsats20in20 The big kahuna in my icontest world and the reason I don't compete in any other 20in20 comm. Those of you who participate in more than one? You have MY RESPECT. For those of you who are newbies, there are three posts:
THEMES -TEN separate icons to vote for, and remember you have to press the "vote" button ten times, not once to cover all your choices.
CATEGORY SET - Choose your top 3 sets, and top six individual icons.
ARTIST'S CHOICE SET - Ditto. This always ends up being harder than I expect. You'd think after a year I'd know to expect that?
And btw, if I didn't vote for your icon? I apologize. I probably wanted to. Especially the Category sets - I wanted to vote for my favorite 12 icons. At least.

Current Mood: confused
Current Music: Leonard Cohen, "Everybody Knows"

Instead of making posters for several different stories as I did in Round 1 of

buffy_genfic, this time I made several variants of a banner for one story, "Choose 1 for Ready, 2 for Not Ready" by the very talented

spuffy_luvr. (This wasn't planned - sometimes you just gotta go where the Muses take you. All the stories this round were absolutely wonderful so no snub is intended on my part. But Buffy and Willow are one of my OTF's.)

Versions 1 & 2 are

spuffy_luvr's favorites; at the time they weren't my favorites but I find myself agreeing with her choices and her reasoning is wonderful, especially with #2. I worried that Buffy and Willow's expressions were too light-hearted for the story but she felt that they were putting on their best faces for one another in that banner; whereas their faces in #1 express how they actually feel. The "polaroid" of Buffy and Willow in the library is from Teacher's Pet. I loved it because with one image I could make a compare/contrast and speak volumes about their friendship, about what's changed, what's damaged, and what binds them still - the history, the shared trauma, the forgiveness and the love.

Teasers:

Alt 9 for spuffyluvr round 2 buffy genfic exchange sept 2015

Alt 8 for spuffyluvr round 2 buffy genfic exchange sept 2015

Click all images to see full-sized versions:

I think at this point #1 is now definitely my favorite. I can image Willow's face looking exactly that way at the moment in the story when her memories simply become to painful and she abruptly ends the call.

spuffy_luvr's characterization of both Willow and Buffy is so on-point; she makes me want to cry for both of them.

I know that Buffy and Willow would be using laptop computers but the banner looked better using a desktop monitor; it was a stronger graphic image and much easier to work with. I also know that the monitor is too modern and not appropriate circa 2002 but....shockingly, I don't give a damn.

The vintage wallpaper grounds the laptop in an actual setting, and adds a bit of warmth and domesticity. And I wanted a wallpaper that could somehow be linked to either Revello Drive or Giles' estate without specifying either one. It reminds me a little of the striped wallpaper in the upstairs bedroom of the Summers home, and it looks like it could conceivably be found at Giles' English country home, which is why I faded the wallpaper just a little. Based on #3 below, I'm not sure it's actually necessary though.

In 1 & 2, I used lesser-known images from the episode Same Time, Same Place; the caps from STSP that I used in #3 are quite well-known but I just loved Sarah and Aly's expressions and the lightness of the caps.This was originally my favorite version but now it feels unfinished. I didn't add the polaroid from Teacher's Pet because every time I used it I had to cut the borders anew and I simply ran out of energy. The wallpaper background is missing but I actually don't mind that. I overlaid an image of a cracked mirror over the Skype lens as a symbol of the "cracks" in their relationship, which looks nifty but in hindsight might be a bit heavy-handed.

#3

Alt 3 for spuffyluvr round 2 buffy genfic exchange sept 2015

Alt 2 for spuffyluvr round 2 buffy genfic exchange sept 2015

#4 is a bit darker, obviously - and more than a bit heavy-handed, what with the monitor itself being cracked in addition to the camera lesn, the images from Villains, the stains on the polaroid and tape. An example of going too far and having too much fun playing with layers. And yet I still like this.

And because I am a completist:

#5

Alt 6 for spuffyluvr round 2 buffy genfic exchange sept 2015

This is only distantly related to the story and the wood frame makes no sense in context but I couldn't resist playing with this image; this led to the "polaroid" in 1 & 2, so it was worth the experiment. And gosh aren't they just adorable?

Also I apologize to everyone (especially our mods

kwritten and

aliceinkinkland, and of course the author herself) for the delay in getting this posted; inspiration finally struck just the other day, quite literally.

Vague disclaimers: Artwork by me, 2015. Look, enjoy but do not snag, or post to any other website or archive unless your name is spuffy_luvr. Do not steal, claim as your own or alter.

Thank you to everyone who voted my Buffy icon "Best Crop" at

whedon_elite Challenge 125 and congratulations to

marishna,

sweet_lyri and

teragramm! The theme for this round was "Muted Coloring" - more banners and icons, including Banner Maker's Choice Award, after the cut:

Reminder: Entries for

whedon_elite Challenge #126 "Weapon of Choice" are due Sept 20th.

The last round of

slayerstillness I was agog over

teragramm's icons especially her Helpless entry; this time around

marishna's Buffy and Willow icons blew me away. The color and shine of Willow's hair in her first place winner alone is indescribably beautiful, as are the peach, ecru and blue tones in the Helpless icon. How does she achieve that perfect balance of softness and clarity?

BMC goes to

sweet_lyri's Chosen icon; the first time I saw it it, I thought Buffy looked like she was standing in front of a bisected mirror. Getting those images to line up perfectly is harder than it looks (I know, I tried); and the dark texture in the foreground echoes the dusty setting and makes the dirt on her skin seem palpable; I can almost feel the grittiness of it.

See the rest of the winning icons and banners for

marishna,

sweet_lyri and

teragramm here.

Banners and background photograph of daisies by your's truly; photograph taken at Wilcox Park in Westerly Rhode Island, 2015.
Icons by their respective makers.

My entries:

PDVD_033_BYicon1.2_rsd_zpsbmjmqkra.png~original.png

1 - 4

My personal favorite of my set is #1. But I also had a ridiculous amount of fun playing with #3 - see alts below for occular confirmation.

Alts:

5 - 8

sphereglow8buffyicon1.6e_patronsaint_rsd2015.png

sphereglow8buffyicon1.6g_patronsaint_rsd2015.png

9 - 13
True Champions of Buffy Summers (TM) will appreciate #12 - 13 (I'm looking at you,

kikimay and

clockwork_hart1)

A Vague Disclaimer is No One's Friend:

~ Want? Take, have for personal use but please credit if used.

~ DO NOT RE-POST TO OTHER SITES (INCL. FANPOP) OR LJ COMMUNITIES WITHOUT MY PRIOR PERMISSION!

~ No hotlinking!

~ Comments however are appreciated and feedback is coin of the realm; leave a little and make an artist's day. :)

But first a word from our sponsor: Cast your votes for the top three icons plus Best Crop and Color NOW if you haven't already at

whedon_elite Challenge 125, "Muted Coloring.". There are 20 lovely icons to choose from, and only ten votes cast so far so more are definitely welcome! Now back to our program:

THANK YOU for voting my Angel and Drusilla icon "Best Crop" at

slayerstillness! And congratulations to

teragramm and

tempertemper for their beautiful winning entries! I was tickled to see everything I voted for on the winner's slate. Not that I need anyone else to vet my choices, but I like seeing these things go as they should. Nevermind that there wasn't a bad icon in the bunch.

Check out the complete set of winning icons here - I love reading

starry_night's reasoning for her Mod's Choice Awards; then see all the awards banners here. I didn't choose a BMC this round because it simply didn't feel necessary (go the the banners post and all will be explained.)

trumpetflowerbanner350x272modschoiceteragramm1.4.png

I adore teragramm's Helpless icon. Truly, madly, deeply.

killing_kurare's wonderful set for Round 11 of

btvsats20in20 inspired my Daddy's Home icon; I actually had the phrase in mind from the episode Ted and thought about making a Ted/Joyce icon to match but didn't have time. The "flame" texture is by

pensnest, which I found via

colorfilter's journal, set on Lighten or Screen.

Banners by your's truly, icons by their respective artists. For the background image I cropped a photograph of a trumpet flower in our yard that I took this afternoon, pointing my Nikon Coolpix upward on macro setting to keep the blossom in focus and the sunlight-dappled trees in the background blurred. This accounts for the natural "bokeh" effect in the lower portion. I wanted to capture the elegant simplicity of the flower; it's texture and form remind me of a parasol made of the most gossamer silk, it's edges billowing slightly in the breeze.

The gold frame around the icons is meant to be a punning reference to the phrase "gilding the lily". The flower isn't a lily but the phrase became my mantra anyway when making these banners. What I had in front of me was already beautiful - the flower, the icons - so don't overwhelm, overwork or overdo.

My entries (1 - 4) and alts:

innoccenciconpaperwhite1.3a.png

Buffy_2x13_Surprise_246_crop1_icon1.1.png

buffygilesfirstdateicon2.2a_rsd2015_SS50.png

Buffy_2x14_Innocence_038_crop1_icon1.1.png

1 - 4

InnocenceHD_762545Sanstitre1_HDicon3.1.png

5 - 8

I suddenly realized that I've never seen a smushname for Angelus-Drusilla. "Dangel" perhaps? "Drangel"? "Drungel"?

9 - 13

Now that I'm looking at these again I'm sort of kicking myself for not entering 12-13. I think I was bothered by the fact that I couldn't get the area around Giles' mouth right with that one. In hindsight I probably shouldn't have let it bother me so much because I like the color and luminousity of it otherwise, especially on the right side of the image. Textures in #3 and 12 - 13 a combination of textures by

colorfilter and

lookslikerain.

The father/daughter icons (Angelus-Dru and Giles-Buffy) were obviously the ones I lavished the most attention on; which is contrary to my usual habit of focusing almost exclusively on the women; but I do seem to have this "thing" about surrogate (not biological) fathers and daughters (BtVS, Doctor Who, Moulin Rouge). My father died when I was three and I had two abusive, shitty stepfathers after that. Analyze away, Dr. Freud.

A Vague Disclaimer is No One's Friend:

~ Want? Take, have for personal use but please credit if used.

~ DO NOT RE-POST TO OTHER SITES (INCL. FANPOP) OR LJ COMMUNITIES WITHOUT MY PRIOR PERMISSION!

~ No hotlinking!

~ Comments however are appreciated and feedback is coin of the realm; leave a little and make an artist's day. :)

Congratulations again to the winners in

btvsats20in20 Round 11,

killing_kurare,

kwritten,

starry_night and yours Truly. Here are my banners for the winning entries inclung BMC award. This was a fantastic round in terms of quality and artistry, and making banners is a wonderful chance to really appreciate the icons anew.

scenerybannerKK1.2.png

CLICK TO ENLARGE IMAGES or go to winners post here

Banners for

killing_kurare:

Banners for

kwritten including Banner Maker's Choice Award for her entire AC Set. I love the cinematic quality of her cropping her focus on Dawn's face. That episode and especially that scene is incredibly underrated IMO - it's the entire Bangel saga compressed into one episode, ending in a little girl having to kill her first love. And having just worked with some very dark and grainy screencaps from that ep, I'm in awe of the lovely "finish" she achieves here. (How in the world does she get those clear colors and that dewy look in ipiccy?)

Banners for

starry_night

And finally, banners for your's truly - THANK YOU to everyone who voted for my icons!

I think I've mentioned this before, but my first place category winner was my homage to

sweet_lyri's style of wrapping a figure in shadows until it's nearly submerged; I wanted to give it a try but never imagined it would be one of my most popular icons this round. And I did not see the third place category win coming at all and I'm tickled that it's the Joyce icon; it and the Uncle Enyios icon were two of my favorites of my set.

Background image of bonfire from my own photograph, 2015. All icons by their respective artists.

Congratulations to

sweet_lyri,

teragramm,

entwashian and

emmatheslayer for their winning entries in

whedon_elite Challenge 124!

Not shown here is the Best Composition banner for

entwashian.

My entries (many MANY thanks, kudos, roses, hugs and much applause for my beta-Muse

velvetwhip for her guidance, for helping me select my entries. And especially for appreciating the frame within the image of #2. (I made a lot of alts of that one in particular that she had to sift through, and did so with her usual graciousness and keen eye.)
ted0540_icon2.2framedrsd2015.png

1 - 4
Because the theme of this challenge was "Framed" my original concept was to have icons from three episodes in which Buffy was framed for murder (get it?): Ted, Consequences and Dead Things. I didn't end up using the DT icons I made but that episode still maintains a presence in the phrase from it I in #1. That scene in the police station is incredibly chilling and Sarah plays it beautifully. We don't often see Buffy scared in the series but in the interrogation room she's not the Slayer, just a terrified girl.

Alts aplenty:

5 - 8

9 - 12
Told you I had fun with the chalkboard series.

13 - 15

banner by tempertemper my edit1 with signature and date added august 2015

1 - 2

The gorgeous

slayerstillness banner was made by

tempertemper; I adore how well it echoes my icon stylistically, and the boldness of her font choices. Not only am I far more limited in that regard I'm also far more timid.

whedon_elite banner by yours' truly; image of Elisha Dushku on The Chosen Two gallery, (photographer unknown).

Feast your eyes on the winning entries and banners at both comms here and here respectively. My own entries:

3 - 7

Challenge 49 at

slayerstillness was "white decoration"; the textures on icons 3 - 6 are all by the

lookslikerain. I swear that the the bars on icon #6 looked white-ish (off-white) to me - until I actually sent the set to

starry_night and - oops. oh. damn.

If icon #5 reminds you of the Willow character poster I made for Ipseity by

spuffy_luvr, it should. ;-) The symbols on the left hand side are glyphs created by Laurel Cannon.

Poster 2 for Ipseity by Spuffy Luvr Willow variant

8

A tsunami of alts (once again, all textures except on the Joyce icons by

lookslikerain). I particularly like the texture on #9 :

9 - 11

12 - 16

17 - 22

23 - 26

Quote on #24 from the gorgeous short story "Grave Daughter" by Nightmarish on A03. I really wanted that quote in my entry icon but I wasn't happy with the clarity/resolution of the text and I tried a couple of different fonts.

The

whedon_elite challenge was - well, a challenge; I had already made some lovely framed icons of Faith for Round 10 of

btvsats20in20 and didn't feel like I really had much else to say at the moment. For whatever reason Faith doesn't inspire me, visually or thematically, the way Buffy, Willow, Dawn, Joyce, Tara and now, Lorne, do. (Giles is the other fella I am starting to get comfortable with in terms of making icons - I hope.) Hence the shortage of alt versions. You're welcome.

27 - 32

I am really happy with my banners for the round however. I wasn't sure what photo to use at first but I liked this one partly because of the white light in the upper-right corner; it provided a space to fit the icons without having to take the separate step of place them in a frame of give them a shadow to make them pop.The photo was black and white and I toyed with cropping it and just letting it be, but I felt like that would almost be too derivative of

tempertemper's banner. So I started adding the color, toyed with sharpening and softening filters, and the added an additional layer to the lower left side - a photograph of lights (carlights?) in the darkness I took last year, set to Lighten or Screen.

I particularly like how the Light Use banner for

sweet_lyri turned out because those shades of pink and red are hard to match. I wasn't really trying for exact matches anyway but simply to coordinate nicely. The BMC banner for

teragramm was the first one I made and I was happy with it right off the bat, no need for remakes. The yellow, orange and green tone banners were much harder by comparison. The banner for

everythingshiny's first place winner was probably the hardest in that regard.

we123_bestightusebanner_sweet_lyri1.2.png

33 - 34

A Vague Disclaimer is No One's Friend:

~ DO NOT RE-POST TO OTHER SITES (INCL. FANPOP) OR LJ COMMUNITIES WITHOUT MY PERMISSION!

~ Take what you like for personal use but please credit if used :) Do not take banner #1 for personal use without asking myself or spuffy_luvr.

~ No hotlinking!

~ Comments however are appreciated :)

Thank you again to everyone who voted for my icons in Round 10 of

btvsats20in20! My banners, a bit belatedly, with many thanks to
my wonderful betas

tempertemper and

velvetwhip for their thoughtful and generous feedback on both the banners and the icons:

Click images to see full-size:

Congratulations to winners

sweet_lyri,

tempertemper,

killing_kurare,

teragramm,

snogged and

spikesredqueen! Check out their winning icons and awards banners in the thread here.

As with the banners I made for the last round of

slayerstillness, the base image is a photograph I took of daylilies at a local bank while waiting in line at the drive-through. I originally was going to do a fancier image with light effects and literally "gild the lily", until I came to my senses and realized simple was best. I love the summertime feel of the image, and how the colors coordinate suprisingly well with so many of the icons.

It should be noted that I all but threw multiple alts of the Faith and Joyce icons in

velvetwhip's lap and she, being the superb Muse that she is, singled out the versions I submitted. Take a look (NWS warning for one tiny icon of Darla's cleavage)

Teasers:

I loved making the Faith and Dru icons this round - they were so much fun to make. (Admitedly, I have a weird sense of "fun".)

1 - 7

8 -14

15 -21

22-28

29-35

Speaking of winning icons and banners, congratulations to the winners of

whedon_elite Challenge 122 "Bright and Shiny" :

teragramm,

sweet_lyri and

double_dutchess in her ~~first go at WE~~ correction: her first time competing in any icontest! Congratulations on the splendid icons ! And THANK YOU to everyone who voted for my icons and honored my Buffy icon with a Best Crop award! :D Awards banners to come shortly, stay tuned!

Final poster art for Answering Prayers by

velvetwhip

Teasers for more artwork after the cut:

I've praised this author's work and this particular story before, but I won't pass up another opportunity. Ever since I entered Buffyverse fandom I've wondered at the absolute dearth of Joyce-fic out there. A huge number of fans - and authors - are women of a certain age and mothers, after all. And fanfiction is designed to explore what goes ignored, overlooked or forgotten in canon. This story fills a huge need and I hope will inspire other writers.

The project sat on the back burner a bit longer than I'd intended. I've had the basic composition in my head for months; making sketches in my notebook, however crude, really does help me remember my intentions. This is pretty close to what I first imagined; the biggest difference from sketch to poster is that I wanted a shadowy "ghost image" of Buffy walking away from home in Becoming, or sitting on her bed in the dingy apartment in Anne. But neither image worked quite the way I'd intended.

Technically this was my third go at the poster for this story. " Version 2" (b & c below) was a lot more complicated, busy, bright and overstuffed with details (layers! layers! layers!).

velvetwhip preferred the more subdued version, and her feedback inspired me go back and try to pare back down to the basics. I realized I'd gotten enamoured of playing with the images and effects and had forgotten the story itself. In theory every detail in V.2 has a meta point but it's all too much.

I also realized I needed something closer to a square-ish shape to fit Gabrielle's journal format. Version 2a-b below features a "flame" texture I got from

sweet_lyri and she is not to blamed for the fact that I went overboard.

The thing about poster art for me is that, I want the recipient to love it; I want them to feel that it's an absolute perfect fit for their work because the point of me making a poster is to honor their prose and encourage people to want to read it. And yes, I absolutely realize that's kind of selfish and egotistical on my part, but I like to think of it as a "win-win" situation all 'round.

Which is to say, if I ever make an artwork for you, Gentle Author, and you don't love it with your heart and soul, be honest and tell me and if I can't rework it, I'll let you know.

2a)

2b)

For the final version (#1 above), I removed the texture, cropped it differently, and used a different texture altogether - a photograph of a bonfire in our front yard I'd snapped the night. I expanded it on low opacity in Layers mode, stretching and moving it about. Somehow a curve of flame fitted against Joyce's cheekbone so I left it there; then I added a second layer of the same photo but smaller, to fill the space in the lower left around Joyce's chin and conceal the edges around Angel's hand.

Half the task of making banners is covering up the joins, I swear.

The flames have a meta purpose in the image though; Angel has just returned froma literal Hell (this story takes place the summer between S2 and S3); but Joyce is in an emotional Hell which she knows is partly of her own making; in discovering Angel at the mansion she takes a headlong dive into her daughter's world in astonishing ways.

Below is what I call "Version 1". This was the image I turned into an icon for Gabrielle a few months back, because she'd asked for one for Christmas; and which I've reworked slightly to make into a poster for her story "We Tell Each Other Fairy Tales". The problem is that I don't think it really fit that story, which is mournful, angsty and angry. It's Jangel but it's not "shippy" in a traditional way, and this poster uses the fantasy image of Joyce that Xander had in his head from Restless.

So there's a mismatch here between an image that caters to romantic tropes and the prose which is anything but a traditional romance.

velvetwhip twists, deconstructs, slyly exposes and gleefully smashes all manner or romance tropes in her work. And she does it with incredible elegance and perceptiveness.

That image of Joyce from Restless was a bitch to work with btw, as are most caps of Joyce from the series, poorly-lit and unfocused. So not my best work but a good exercise. I actually think this one looks better in the icon version I made for Gabrielle. Speaking of:

4 - 7

And again I am borrowing

starry_night's succinct rules regarding my own arwork:

~ DO NOT RE-POST TO OTHER SITES (INCL. FANPOP) OR LJ COMMUNITIES WITHOUT MY PERMISSION!

~ Take what you like for personal use but please credit if used :)

~ No hotlinking!

~ Comments are appreciated :)

ETA: Nominated for Best Banner, wicked_awards 2015 - THANK YOU for the nomination!

nomineebuttonbuffywickedawards275x128_rsd2015_1.1final.png

Runner-Up, Under Your Spell (Best Banner),

wicked_awards Round 12, 2015

Poster and icon to go with.

Click poster for direct link to

spuffy_luvr's fic Ipseity on EF, or here for the story on A03. She was kind enough to thank me on her own journal (dig the cool new layout). Also check out the other banner for the story made by

pfeifferpack, which is a gorgeous, gorgeous thing.

More icons and thinky-thoughts after the cut:

I made the icon first by downsizing the image of Buffy that I'd cropped, ligntened, etc and layered two icon-sized textures by

lookslikerain from their aptly named "When the Wheels Fall Off" icon texture set over it.

1 - 3

Then I went back to the 310sq crop of the screencap image in Layer Mode and expanded or "upsized" just the second "ladder" filter to fit over it. You almost always want to go the opposite direction in sizing, but it worked here with some sharpening and bloom/softening filters to balance the other out. I think in Photoshop you'd use a single "unsharp" mask to achieve the same effect?

More alts of the icon:

4 - 6

It would be easy to overstuff the image and I originally wanted to add the images of other characters on the right hand side, a la one of Jo Chen's wonderful cover illustrations for the S8 comics. But I don't have the skill (or the patience, frankly) to made the faces of other characters work at the size I needed. So I subsituted the text, which is the central mystery of the story to most of the other characters around Buffy; and also is a nod to S4's "Who Are You" which, like Ipseity, deals with questions of identity and how the people around Buffy Summers shape their identities in response to her; and how they perceive her according to their needs and in response to the masks she wears.

Sometimes I want a banner to tell a story but with this poster I wanted to imply or impart a flavor of the author's story without giving away the goods. Frankly the story is so complex and twisty I don't think I really could give away anything. Her story has me wondering at every turn what's going to happen next (and so far? I haven't been able to predict a thing.) She twists, deconstructs, and/or slyly smashes any number of tropes which are not exclusive to Spuffy fic; but if you're looking for the same-old, same-old Spuffy schmoop/porn/fluff, don't go here. If you're looking for an actual story, by all means hop on over immediately.

I'm borrowing starry_night's succinct rules regarding my own arwork:

~ DO NOT RE-POST TO OTHER SITES (INCL. FANPOP) OR LJ COMMUNITIES WITHOUT MY PERMISSION!

~ Take what you like for personal use but please credit if used :)

~ No hotlinking!

~ Comments are appreciated :)

It all connects to the dream, the real dream – the one she can’t remember well enough, the one she wishes she could just let go of and forget. She doesn’t know how and she doesn’t know why, but it’s sitting there, salt and bitter on the tip of a tongue that can’t tell the truth to the people who need to hear it…a tongue that rises in songs of bitterness and numbness and a longing for what she left behind – for a place from which she was torn, bleeding from wounds no one but her can see.

- velvetwhip, "Blink and You'll Miss What You Never Saw" (IWRY Marathon, 2011)

Gabrielle's story is my favorite IWRY fiction, ever. The passage above should tell you why. It might also give you an idea as to why I dislike the episode And yet, I'm fascinated by the notion that the repeated violations of Buffy's mind - Angel taking away one set of memories, the monks inserting another in S5 - contribute to Buffy's mental illness, to her trauma, depression and grief in later seasons, simply in terms of altering her brain's neurological pathways.

Which is to say that I very nearly didn't make any icons for

slayerstillness Challenge 47 - and I'm honestly stunned by the outcome of the round.

Congratulations to

muirthemne and

tempertemper for their wonderful winning entries this round and THANK YOU to everyone who voted for my icons and thank you also

tempertemper for the lovely, swoon-worthy banners! I love the contrasts of "glamour" and grit in these banners; the light leaks and the disintergrating font contrast against one another in much the same way the chain-link fence sets off the dolled-up Sarah. (And kudos to you for signing your work, babe!)

Entries

1 - 4

Alts:

5 - 7

8 - 12
My personal favorite is #5, and it was very close to being an entry instead of #1.

I really wanted to make at least one icon of he Oracles, because I think they look like rejects from a high school production of "Satyricon: The Musical!" I'm sort of disappointed with myself that I didn't but I wasn't inspired by any of the screencaps of them I looked at.

I honestly thought the awards would be pretty evenly spread out this round because there were so many lovely ones to choose from. I assumed

muirthemne's set didn't dominate. I didn't know who made them - or any of the entries - I just knew they were elegant, autumnal, and suffused with emotion. Her 3rd place Angel icon was my first place choice, and her Mod's Choice and Banner Maker's Choicer wins are well and truly deserved.

tempertemper's Cordy lightbulb icon, the other Mod's Choice winner, was my Most Creative choice; any icon that can make me chuckle every time I look at it deserves bonus points.

Don't forget to enter Challenge 48 "Five Faces"; deadline is midnight on Friday the 17th.

Texture Resource Credits:
#1 -

colorfilter;
#3, 11 -

whitebamboo;
#5, 9, 10 -

lookslikerain;
IWRY Screencaps from Pretty as a Picture

Want? Take, have! But proper credit a must; do not claim as your own, hotlink, post to fanpop.com. or any other archives or websites without my express permission first.

ETA: IWRY Icon #1 Nominated Best Icon wicked_awardswicked_awards 2015 -THANK YOU for the nomination!

Winner, Something to Sing About (Best Icon), wicked_awards Round 12, 2015

But first thank you for everyone for the hugs, support and good wishes regarding my recent job loss, you guys are truly amazing.

Thank you to the voters who awarded my Riley and Lorne icons 2nd and 3rd place (tied with

shameless666) at Whedon Elite Challenge 120. Congratulatioms to

fassy,

entwashian,

sweet_lyri,

shameless666 and

starry_night on your winning entries this round!

Those were my two favorite icons for this round; ironic, as I rarely do male characters. Also, I'm not Riley's biggest fan and I haven't watched Lorne for more than a few minutes on AtS. So I was surprised and pleased that they won. Yes, Virginia, it is possible to make fanart of characters you don't like or are barely familiar with.

Click all images to see full-size:

Banners and base photographs by yours truly. Many thanks to my incredible Beta-Muse

velvetwhip. More banner images affter the cut

Teasers:

we120_bestcolorbannerwithicon1.2FINAL.png

we120_bestcropbannerwithicon1.2FINAL.png

I had no idea what I wanted to do for the banners until I came across a close-up photo I'd taken two years ago of the bark on the locust tree in our front yard. The color and pattern of it faintly resembled army fatigues as well as the colors of

fassy's first place icon and the patterns on Connor's sweater. So I used it for the base of both her banner and my Riley one; all the other banners have different base images but they are all photographs me or my sweetie have taken in the past couple of years. I decided to stick with the nature imagery all the way through.

The River banner differs slightly in that the base image is a photograph of a wooden bowl my sweetie made several years ago when she did woodturning for a time. It's probably nearly 20 years old but the grain still shows up beautifully in the sunlight. I like how the woodgrain across River's face in the banner reminds me of Maori or "tribal" tattoos.

For the Lorne banner I wanted to use the sunset photo to the mournful tone of the icon and specifically his last line in the series, "Good night, folks."

For

shameless666's banner, I knew I wanted flowers in the base image to go with the icon but I didn't have photographs of daisies. A couple of months ago I waved bunches of lilacs in front of my Nikon Coolpix camera to get blur and motion effects; the green from the leaves was simiilar to the color of the icon once I adjusted the image slightly, and Skye's face emerged dramatically when I layered it with a PR image.

I would not mind if the mods repeated did a round-robin challenge like this again because it really stretched and challenged me, alongside Round 10 of

btvsats20in20, to try new things. BTW, deadline for Challenge 121 is Sunday July 12, 3pm EST - and only seven icons by two artists have been entered thus far.

And speaking of

btvsats20in20 HAVE YOU VOTED YET FOR THEMES AND CHARACTERS? HAVE YOU TOLD YOUR FRIENDS TO VOTE? Because as it stands this moment

starry_night is going to be stuck with a bunch of two and three way ties and the entire process will be drawn out.

VOTE HERE AND NOW AT

btvsats20in20 Round 10: THEMES & CHARACTERS .

Remember that each post has 20 choices for you to make. You will in essence be voting on each icon twice (or not, as the case may be.) Last round we had four participants, this time it's eight. (Count 'em! Eight!) Last round I also waited until the last minute to really and truly promote it which is inexplicable (and inexcusable) given the amount of time and care that goes into making the entries. This round, I intended to promote early and often.

Also inexcusable and inexplicable? I never showed off the lovely awards banners

starry_night made for me, nor did I properly thank her and everyone who came out to vote in Round 9. So herewith, the banners (click to view full-size):

starry_night knows what I like, and I love the Summers women, oh I do indeed. These banners are so pretty, soft and feminine; you'd never know that the context of both of these is sacrifice, death and grief. More images after the cut:

In terms of Joyce especially this was a "transitional" round for me. Up to this point I'd not done any icons of Joyce alive successfully, only as a body, a ghost, an absence; even if she was alive, her face was out of the frame (6-10 below from Round 5.) I made one last try at the "Buffy & her dead mother" theme ("Shocking") but also two of Joyce from Blood Ties (Category 1 & AC1): alive, warm, a bit careworn and worried for her daughters. I've been wanting to for ages, inspired by

debris4spike's Joyce icons that captured her elegance and beauty; but I couldn't quite "grasp" her somehow, not until this round.

I really hesitated about the "Shocking" icon.

iconsoleander did such beautiful, heartrending icons for The Gift (particularly her Category set) in Round 2 last July and I still had those in mind as examples I couldn't hope to improve upon. But I also had in mind the Buffy & (dead) Joyce icons I made for Challenge 37 of

slayerstillness back in December (1-5). As I recall I was mourning a friend here on LJ who I thought had died 0 then discovered they hadn't, setting off another round of mourning of a different sort.

1 - 6

7 - 12

I think I may prefer the SS ones aesthetically, but I've gotten this award and more to the point, I'm making icons of Joyce as a living person, I'm reading

velvetwhip's gorgeous Answering Prayers, and I am done - for a while at least - the "dead Joyce" theme.

I also hesitated about the Drusilla one for very different reasons. One of course is the very disturbing, phallic imagery, but also the layers of victimhood that form the subtext of this icon. This image captures, to my mind, a lot of the sickness and depravity that Dru has been both a victim and perpetrator of.Vampires are victims, are violated - with the possible exception of Ford in Lie to Me, what vampire in the Buffyverse "agreed" to be killed and turned with anything approaching full knowledge and consent? And Drusilla, sadly, was the one most horribly victimized of the Buffyverse "Fang Gang"; in this shot the tables are turned and she is a victimizer, licking the blood of the dead Slayer Xin Rong off of Spike's finger - and so death, violation, perverse sexuality are interwoven and repeated from person to person, from generation to generation.

"Best Love" was perhaps the biggest surprise of all the ones I won here because it was the simplest Icon I made, the one that had no special effects and I said, oh well, it's not great but it's something, throw it in. No one will look at it. (There's at least one of those in every single round, at least for me. Anyone else?)

Banners by starry_night, do not steal, deface, claim as your own, repost to fanpop.com or any other archives/sites without express permisson of the artist.

Teasers:

Full set after the cut!

Kudos to: My extraordinary and marvelous Beta-Muse, velvetwhip. WIthout whom this set would not exist, or at least be half as strong.
Special thanks to: starry_night for extending the deadline for me and being so incredibly patient.

Willow/Center Crop	Faith/Frame	Buffy/XtremeCloseCrop	Dawn/B/W+Color	Joyce/Hope

Tara/Power	Oz/Solid Background	Angel/Lyrics	Cordelia/Blue	Spike/Negative Space

Giles/Text	Fred/Hands	Wesley/First Scene	Anya/Hairporn	Kendra/Beginning

Xander/Eyes	Lorne/Last Scene	Drusilla/Duplicate	Darla/Faceless	Monster/Dream

ETA: Cordy Icon Nominated Best Icon wicked_awards 2015 - THANK YOU for the nomination!

nomineebuttonfaithwickedawards275x128_rsd2015_1.3final.png

Voting up NOW for two icontests that usually announce winners fairly quickly so head on over without delay:

1)

otherworldlyric Challenge 204. Nine terrific entries using the Spice Girls' song "Wannabe". Not that you'd know that from the elegance of the entries.

Entries for Challenge 205, Cher's "Believe" due July 3, midnight. (Remember Kathy in "Living Conditions"? Yep, it's that song. And hey, I know everyone made fun of Kathy's love for that song but - I liked it, ok? And I still like it. Yeah I said it. But, I digress...)

2)

whedon_elite Challenge 120. Votes to be counted later today or tormorrow 'cause

fassy does not waste time, y'all. I might have mentioned this one previously; it was an amazingly fun challenge to particiapte in. 40 entries to choose from, which is the most outside of a 20in20 I've had to vote for at one time, and believe me I could cast that ballot five times and come up with completely different choices each time.

Challenge 121's guidelines are up now, and it's back to the normal type of challenge; deadline is July 12 at 3pm EST.

And now that you've voted, here's some treats for playing along, but first an apology: I am sorely belated in congratulating

fassy and

sweet_lyri for their truly gorgeous winning entries in round 119! Check out the winners and award banners here, and the full slate of entries here. Because of the small number of entries there is only 1st, 2nd and 3rd plus Mod's Choice.

Teasers:

The background image for these banners is a photo I took last year of a bare tree branch in a local cove; I layered the image over itself to multiply the brances and fill the space. If you look at the full-size versions you can just see the cricket on the right side of the image. That cricket probably made the photograph for me.

I only entered one icon for this round: "Buffy Blue" (#1) - but of course I have alts. You know me, right? And yes, I'm still playing with the fabulous images of SMG from Greg Gorman's S5 promo shoot, with no apologies.

1 - 5

6 -9

The challenge was "Color Coded" - match the first letter in a character's name with the first letter of a color. So it could have been simple, as here, "Buffy Blue", or I could have gone more complicated, ie "Buffy / Boston University Red" (yes, that is actually a color. I looked on Wiki. There are tons of colors listed there and people get paid just to name these things? I want in on that gig.)

I went with 1 because it has one dominant color, easy-peasy; but I also love the "ghostly" quality of #2-3. Very meta in terms of the end of the end of S5 - beginning S6. These remind me of an antique etching or pen and ink drawing, and in fact the color of #5 was directly inspired by the color of walnut ink. I hope

kikimay will approve of the warm-tone variations.

As often as always, my fondest appreciation to

velvetwhip, the bestest Muse a girl could ask for.

* Or not, actually. But anyway - Break these ties pretty please at

slayerstillness Challenge 46 - Second/Third place and Best Color.

I adore at least one of the icons currently in the running for Best Color but they're both lovely and I don't want to play favorites or hurt anyone's feelings.

*

whedon_elite has kept me hopping the last couple of days and that's been a good thing - I normally overthink icons to the nth degree, and this round robin session (Challenge 120) has really pushed me to make icons quickly, no overthinking, - I have to respond fast, before anyone else does - and do so with characters I wouldn't normally icon: Rlley, Giles, Cordy, Faith, and Wanda Maximoff (the Scarlet Witch) from Age of Ultron (a movie I havent' seen and have no intention to, to be entirely honest); plus Drusilla . And those are just my entries, which only scratch the surface. (Voting on this round is going to be a pleasant nightmare *lol*.) I've thrown out the Buffybot for someone else to icon as the next post and no one has responded, but the challenge is open until June 28th, so I certainly hope someone will.

This special round is a great way to dip your toes in the water if you've been wanting to enter an icontest challenge but were intimidated by the 5 or 20 entries needed in most other comms, so I hope someone who hasn't joined the fun yet will do so. And I hope someone answers the Buffybot challenge because she's such a fascinating character (see this tumblr meta for proof.)

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Page Summary

Banners and icons for btvs20in20 #13 & Slayerstillness #53
(no subject)
Fairie Queens, Flying Fatalities, and Wicked Words
Something to Sing About: Awards banners by starry_night and my icons for Slayerstillness # 37
TIME TO GET OUT AND ROCK THE (ICON) VOTE
Poster Art for "Choose 1 for Ready, 2 for Not Ready" by Spuffy_Luvr for Buffy_Genfic Round 2
My icons and banners for Whedon Elite Challenge 125!
Daddy's Home - Thank you for Voting my Icon Best Crop at Slayerstillness 51 - icons plus banner art!
BANNERS FOR ROUND 11 WINNERS, BTVSATS20in20!
Framed: Banner and icons for Whedon Elite Challenge 124
Banners and Icons for Slayerstillness, Whedon Elite + Willow character poster for Ipseity
My banners plus extras for btvsats20in20
What I've Been Up to Lately: Artwork for Velvetwhip's Jangel Fanfics
What I've been up to lately: Fiction Poster & Icons for Spuffy_Luvr's Ipseity
The Dream She Can't Remember : Icons and Banners for Slayerstillness #47 (IWRY)
Banners for Whedon Elite Challenge 120
VOTE NOW AT ROUND 10 OF BTVSATS20IN20! (Who needs a preamble, we've got art!)
btvsats20in20 ROUND 10 SPECIAL
Oddments and Endments: Let's Just Cut to the Chase Here
Tiebreakers! Gotta love 'em!

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Style: Ivory Alcea for Mobility by branchandroot
Resources: Mitsuba Aoi

Page generated May. 24th, 2025 01:42 pm

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Entries tagged with icon(ic) thinky thoughts

Banners and icons for btvs20in20 #13 & Slayerstillness #53

(no subject)

Fairie Queens, Flying Fatalities, and Wicked Words

Something to Sing About: Awards banners by starry_night and my icons for Slayerstillness # 37

TIME TO GET OUT AND ROCK THE (ICON) VOTE

Poster Art for "Choose 1 for Ready, 2 for Not Ready" by Spuffy_Luvr for Buffy_Genfic Round 2

My icons and banners for Whedon Elite Challenge 125!

Daddy's Home - Thank you for Voting my Icon Best Crop at Slayerstillness 51 - icons plus banner art!

BANNERS FOR ROUND 11 WINNERS, BTVSATS20in20!

Framed: Banner and icons for Whedon Elite Challenge 124

Banners and Icons for Slayerstillness, Whedon Elite + Willow character poster for Ipseity

My banners plus extras for btvsats20in20

What I've Been Up to Lately: Artwork for Velvetwhip's Jangel Fanfics

What I've been up to lately: Fiction Poster & Icons for Spuffy_Luvr's Ipseity

The Dream She Can't Remember : Icons and Banners for Slayerstillness #47 (IWRY)

Banners for Whedon Elite Challenge 120

VOTE NOW AT ROUND 10 OF BTVSATS20IN20! (Who needs a preamble, we've got art!)

btvsats20in20 ROUND 10 SPECIAL

Oddments and Endments: Let's Just Cut to the Chase Here

Tiebreakers! Gotta love 'em!

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