doodle4doodle | Doodle 4 Doodle: Rules Post

The Basics

You must be 18+ to participate.

By signing up for this exchange, you are committing to create a gift of art for at least one person and receive a gift of art in return. All assignments created for this event need to fulfill one tag from your recipient's request while respecting their DNWs.

The minimum requirement for assignments is

a doodle or clean sketch
- of at least 400x400 pixels
- on an single color background or unlined paper
- that contains some element of drawing and/or painting
- that you have made yourself

Artwork that exceeds the minimum requirement (portraits, comics, paintings, mixed media and more) are welcome!

Please note: your doodle should be scanned or photographed if you are drawing traditionally. Scans/photographs should be in focus and clearly lit.

More On Art Requirements

Works created to fulfill an assignment must contain some element of drawing and/or painting.

Digital art that is drawn or painted with a stylus or mouse is eligible.
Traditional art that is drawn or painted with a pencil, pen or brush is eligible.
Pixel art is eligible.
3D works created using a tool like Blender's grease pencil are eligible.
Voxel art and CGI renders that use assets that you have created are eligible if the artwork contains some element of drawing and/or painting. If they do not contain any drawing/painting, they are not eligible for assignments, but may be posted as treats.
Gifs are eligible if they are hand-drawn animation by the gifter.
Manips, photo/video edits, graphic design/page layouts like logos or menu design are not eligible for assignments this exchange, but may be posted as treats.
Any art mediums that haven't otherwise been covered: even if the medium, or you specifically, don't use lineart in your process, the medium/artwork is eligible if it has some element of drawing or painting! A doodle or clean sketch is the minimum, but absolutely not the maximum. If you have any questions about whether something is eligible, you can contact the mod on the screened contact post.
Art smaller than 400x400 is welcome as treats!
There is no expectation of a certain skill level or style. Artworks can be of any skill level, or technical proficiency!
Images that are wholly or in part generated by genAI models such as ChatGPT, Midjourney, Stable Diffusion, DALL-E, etc are not eligible to be posted to the collection. Use of generative AI is banned.

Nominations

Each participant can nominate up to 10 fandoms, with up to 20 characters/ships in each fandom. Nominations will be done in the character field, will require a Group: prefix for relationships, and requires disambiguation.

Eligibility

All fictional work fandoms, characters, and ships are eligible for this exchange.
Settings and objects from your fandoms are eligible.
Specific or Pre-existing OCs can be nominated under the fandom "Recipient's OCs for Doodles". See more here.
Original Work and Creator's Choice of Doodle are eligible for the exchange.
RPF of famous people over the age of 18 are eligible for this exchange. There are some restrictions on RPF nominations. See Other Considerations for these restrictions.

How to nominate Characters

How to Nominate Characters

Just like in Multifandom Doodle, General AUs that can be summed up in a short tag may be nominated as part of the character tag. Any AU that can't be clearly summed up in one or two words should be saved for the optional details of your request. The mod will use their discretion accepting these tags.

Dean Winchester (SPN)
Glorfindel (LOTR - Tolkien)
Big Bird (Sesame Street)
Manfred (Dragon Age)

Female Dean Winchester (SPN)
Transfeminine Glorfindel (LOTR - Tolkien)
Fresno Nightcrawler!Big Bird (Sesame Street)
Non-Skeleton Manfred (Dragon Age)

How to nominate Relationships

How to Nominate Relationships

Relationships between two or more characters may be nominated in the character field using the "Group: " or "group: " prefix before before their names.

Group: Character A/Character B
Group: Character A & Character B
Group: Character A/Character B & Character C, etc.

How to nominate Settings and Objects

How to Nominate Settings and Objects

Settings and/or objects can be nominated as individual "characters" or as part of relationships. When you are nominating settings by themselves, use the "Place: " or "Setting: " prefix to distinguish them from characters and freeforms. If you are nominating objects by themselves, you can use the "Object: " tag or leave it off if that tag is already canonical/commonly in use in your fandom as a character.

When you are nominating a setting or object as part of a group, use the "Group: " or "group: " tag like you would for any other relationship nomination.

Place: Old Sonora (Psych)
Setting: The Enterprise-D (ST:TNG)
Object: The Time-Knife (The Good Place)
Impala (Supernatural)
Group: Chidi Anagonye & the Time-Knife (The Good Place)

How to Nominate Creator's Choice Tags

How to Nominate Creator's Choice tags

You may nominate "Any"/"Creator's Choice" characters and ships. You can nominate them into the "Creator's Choice of Doodle" fandom, or into a specific fandom.

If you are nominating into Creator's Choice of Doodle, you may use one of the several tag formats below. Accepted formats for CCoD tags include: "Creator's Choice of [x]", "As Many [X]", "Any Ship in a Remix of X Famous Artwork", etc.

Creator's Choice of Birb (CCoD)
As Many Unicorns As Creator Can Think Of (CCoD)
Any requested character as a mermaid (CCoD)
Any Ship in a Remix of The Kiss (Gustav Klimt Painting)

If you want your Creator's Choice tag to appear in a specific fandom, nominate that tag under that fandom. Be sure to add a disambiguation, so it does not accidentally get sorted into the wrong fandom bucket. If your tag ends up in the wrong fandom, please contact the mod on the most recent Nominations post.

How to nominate Crossover tags

How to Nominate Crossover tags

Crossovers should be nominated under the fandom "Crossover Fandom." When nominating a crossover, be sure to disambiguate the fandoms! If you are nominating a crossover relationship, use the "Group: " format, with the fandom specified for each character.

Character A (Fandom 1) as a Role in Fandom 2
Group: Character A (Fandom 1)/Character B (Fandom 2)
Group: Character A (Fandom 1) & Character B (Fandom 2)

How to nominate Original Characters & Relationships

How to Nominate Original Characters & Relationships

Original characters and relationships should be nominated under the fandom "Original Work." Descriptive character names are recommended. The more descriptive the tag, the better idea someone will have of the visuals or dynamics someone might be looking to request or draw. If you have a gender preference for an original character or ship, you should nominate the ship with genders included.

Blue-haired Merperson (OW)
Group: Radiant Knight in Black Armor/Page in Golden Livery (Any/Any) (OW)

Female Radiant Knight (OW)
Butch Radiant Knight (F) (OW)
Group: Radiant Knight/Golden Page (F/F) (OW)
Group: Non-binary Radiant Knight/Masc-Leaning Golden Page (OW)

If a tag is nominated without any gender, artists may take the requester's preferences into consideration, but they may also pick a gender or presentation that they feel like drawing.

How to nominate Specific and/or Pre-Exisiting OCs

This section is for OCs that are:

Characters that fit these criteria should be nominated and requested under the fandom "Recipient's OCs for Doodles". You can nominate these characters using the "Recipient's OC or TTRPG Character" tag and describing the character in your optional details, or you can nominate specific character variants like "Recipient's Rook from Dragon Age: Veilguard," or "Recipient's Warrior of Light from FFXIV".

If you are interested in receiving a creator's pre-existing OC, you can nominate "Creator's Choice of their own OCs" in the "Creator's Choice of Doodle" fandom, or Creator's Choice of their pre-existing player character in fandoms that have customizable player characters.

Signing Up

You can request 1-10 different fandoms, with 1-20 characters/ships per fandom.

You can offer 1-10 different fandoms with 1-20 characters/ships per fandom.

Requests

When signing up, you choose what characters/ships you'd like to receive fanart of, and what characters/ships you'll offer to draw fanart for. You can only request and offer characters/relationships that are in the tagset.

You can request a minimum of 1 fandom, and a maximum of 10.
You can request 1-20 tags per fandom.
You can repeat requests for a fandom, if you would prefer.
You can sign up with one fandom, but you must request 3+ different fandoms to be guaranteed a gift.

Details Box

In the "Description" section of the signup form, you can write prompts for your artist to get a better idea of what you want. You can provide tropes, kinks, or visuals that you like, as well as give some prompts specific to your requested characters/ships. If you would prefer to link a "Dear artist" letter, you are free to do so! You may also provide DNWs. See more about DNWs in their break-out section.

Offers

You can offer 1-10 different fandoms with 1-20 characters/ships per fandom.

DNWs

When you are signing up, you may include DNWs (Do Not Wants) in your description box. DNWs are things you don't want to see in your gift. A DNW could be a squick, a dislike, or just something you don't particularly want to receive right now. Listing them helps creators make a better gift for you.

DNWs should be listed on your AO3 signup.
DNWs can include anything, but you may not use them to railroad your gifter into making one specific drawing. Examples of railroady DNWs: "DNW anything except Link holding three bunnies while running away from a successful bank heist"; "DNW anything but sweaty Goku doing weight-training".
You may not use DNWs to contradict your requests (e.g. requesting a "/" relationship and then DNWing shipping; requesting the Creator's Choice of Doodle "any OW tag from the tagset" and then DNWing some or all of the OW tags.).
You are encouraged to list any stylistic preferences you have, and artists are encouraged to take these into account. Due to ambiguity, style- and medium-related DNWs will not be enforced (e.g. "DNW traditional art", "DNW CalArts style", "DNW anime style").

If you have a question about a DNW that you'd like to add to your signup, or a question about your recipient's DNWs, please reach out to the mod team.

Matching

Doodle 4 Doodle uses OR matching. This means that creators are only required to draw something based on one requested tag. If there's a recipient you cannot create for who is requesting the same tags you need to offer to be matchable to someone you can create for, you can send in a Do Not Match request by email, or through the screened mod post. You can do this for any reason, even low stakes ones.

If you aren't able to be matched as a recipient, your requests will go out as an initial pinch hit.

If you aren't able to be matched as a gifter (i.e. nobody's requesting what you're offering), you will be matched at random to a recipient who requested Creator's Choice of Doodle.

Assignments & Posting

Receiving Your Assignment

Assignments will be sent out no later than October 30th.

When you receive your assignment, you should get an assignment that matches one of your offers OR if you were unmatchable, you will have been matched to someone who requested a Creator's Choice of Doodle tag.

If you receive an assignment that doesn't vibe with you, you may use the Default button and pick up a new assignment from the pinch hit list. In this exchange, there is no penalty for defaulting.

Creating For Your Assignment

For your assignment, you are required to create a doodle focusing on at least one of your recipient's requested characters/ships while respecting their DNWs.

If you have questions about your assignment and want to ask something of your recipient, please do not contact your recipient directly. Instead, email the mod, and I will act as an intermediary.

Posting

Art created for this exchange should be posted to the AO3 collection using the "Fulfill Assignment" or "Post to Collection" function. AO3 does not currently host artwork. Art should be hosted on an image server that allows embeds and is broadly viewable by people on AO3. You can read more about art hosting here: Jamez’ Guide to Art Hosting for Exchanges.

Do not post artwork created for this exchange on public social media platforms prior to AO3 creator reveals
Do not use artwork that you have posted previously to fulfill your assignment for this exchange.
Your Art may contain a signature or small watermark prior to AO3 creator reveals.

After creator reveals, artists are free to post their art wherever else they may choose, or update their artwork with a more fitting signature/watermark.

Defaulting

If you feel you can't draw what your recipient is requesting, feel free to default ASAP so the mod can find a new artist for the request. You can default by using the default button on your assignment. You do not have to contact the mod to default.

There are no penalties for defaulting using the default button. This exchange is built on the idea that defaulting using the default button shouldn't be a big deal, and you can pick up another assignment that vibes more with you from the pinch hit list.
You are guaranteed a gift even if you default, so long as you have 3+ different fandoms in your requests.
If you no-show default at the deadline, you will not be able to sign up for the next round. Please do not no-show default! If you need to default, use the default button on ao3, or contact the mod through the screened mod post.

Pinch Hits

A pinch hit is an assignment that needs to find a new creator. Pinch hits can be created by the original creator defaulting, or by the luck of the draw (e.g. when AO3 matching does no assign a creator to someone's request).

Pinch hits will be posted to the Dreamwidth comm and are first come, first serve.
You do not have to be signed up for the exchange to claim a pinch hit.
Pinch hits must meet the minimum requirements for assignments (defined in The Basics).
Any pinch hits that are claimed less than a week before the due date will be due ASAP before the reveals date.
The collection will not open until every participant who has requested 3+ fandoms has received a gift.
If you have less than 3 fandoms and are out as a pinch hit after the assignments due deadline, you can expand your requests by leaving a message on the screened mod contact post.

Treats

A treat is an extra gift you've made for someone. Anyone is free to post treats to the collection, even if you are not signed up for the event. Treats can be made for participants (people signed up for the exchange), for pinch hitters (whose requests can be found on the Pinch Hitter's post), or for the whole collection (with no recipient at all).

Treats may be any art medium.
Treats must be for one of your recipient's requested tags.
Treats must respect your recipient's DNWs.
Treats need to be created by you. AI works may not be gifted as treats.
Treats may not be artwork that you've already posted publicly on any social media platform (twitter, tumblr, Dreamwidth, Pixiv, etc).

Emergency Pinch Hits

Emergency Pinch Hits are pinch hits that are caused by someone receiving a rule-breaking gift after the collection opens. Emergency pinch hit requests will be posted to the community, and are due ASAP.

If you have received a rule-breaking gift, please contact the mod team via email @ outstandingfroggie2 at proton dot me or through the screened contact post.

Other Considerations

Please try to follow these general guidelines to make the exchange a pleasant experience for everyone.

Well-behaved socks are welcome to participate in this exchange.
Apply any AO3 warning(s) that your work might contain, or mark it CNTW.
Kinkshaming, ship-bashing, harassment, trolling are banned.
If you are banned from the event for any reason other than no-show defaulting, you may not pick up pinch hits or post treats to the collection.
The following RPF nominations won't be accepted: people famous for participating in genocide; serial killers or mass murderers alive after 1900; 21st century political RPF.

Questions or Concerns?

If you have any questions, concerns, or comments, please comment on the screened mod contact post or email the nod at outstandingfroggie2 at proton dot me. I will respond ASAP.

If you'd like to chat, you can also discuss the event on the BFE Art Discord!

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Doodle 4 Doodle

Doodle 4 Doodle: Rules Post