My first 2014 Dean Castiel Big Bang went up yesterday. I seem to have forgotten how to livejournal, but here you are: [link] Direct link to the story which has pictures in it: [link]

The minimum for this is 1 500x500px picture. I feel really sad for whoever got the minimum. If I hadn't had my meds on Saturday, I'd have drawn her another picture. As it is, the "brother in law" picture is out of context because it was the last drawn and so didn't get prettification.

Nice, ita! I especially like the one toward the end of the story. I really like Dean's eyes in that one.

Thank you! Do you mean the one where they're cuddling?

Yep. Where Dean's on his back and Castiel's snuggled on his chest.

Aw, thanks. I have another Bang story illustrated, and they cuddle at the end of it too.

I should put up a shingle for huggery.

So, selfishly, what do you want from your Big Bang artist other than Van Gogh's talents? What makes for a good interaction? What's your side of the task list look like?

I have one more author. Just want her sent off in a good manner.

My first BB artist's esthetics were almost diametrically opposed to my own. I was gratified that she "had a vision" when she read the draft. But it didn't seem related, except tangentially, to what I wrote. When I tactfully suggested a softer approach, she informed me she wasn't "illustrating the story," she was creating art inspired by the story. So I shut up and put up with what she did. Some people liked it. It's memorable enough that some reccers have even ID'd the fic by the art. The following year was a sequel, and she chose my story again. Due to scheduling and illness, she finished cover art and one other art piece, but no icons or chapter headers, etc. The art was more in line with what I'd asked for the year before, but our tastes just don't mesh.

The second artist I worked with got a shitty draft and a few key scenes to work from, and in less than a week she sent a mix list, with links to the music, and a cd cover that when I opened it, made me gasp, lose my breath, and burst into tears. She got it so clearly. Everything she did for that story was dead on. I merely mentioned a handwritten letter, and all the chapter headers had pen and paper.

My most recent artist listened very carefully to a preference of mine. If it's digitally drawn, unless you're Petite Madame or Euclase, I dislike face forward. She did profile, three-quarter and one-quarter work that was great, with subtle shading and highlights. She did give me a scare when the post date was a week out and I hadn't heard from her in a month, but she came through fine.

I've gotten gift art for a timestamp that was simple photomanip--well, I say simple, it's far more than I can manage, but it was almost stark, and devastatingly effective.

I think the main thing I want from an artist is to listen. I always hope the fic will evoke feelings, hopefully inspiration. And really, I count myself lucky if that happens, even if it's not to my taste or my esthetic. But it is nice if an artist listens if I point out that the uniforms in the story are dull and colorless, rather than brilliant peacock colors.

OMG, getting Euclase as your artist! I don't think there's a bigger intersection of detailed art talent and zero inspiration.

I'd ask her (in the sense that I would never, but would cross fingers) for portraits of the main players. Something her OCD can feast on. Because the pictures I've seen where she's moved anything more complex than changing their clothes to armour start to look weird. Heaven forfend she put multiple people in the pictures.

Petite Madame, OTOH, would get free rein.

I do think the "no full on digital faces" would be a doozy to receive as a requirement--my full on traditional media faces look like my digital ones, except usually less good. I guess full on would be full out! But a request like that dictates so much (I'm trying to imagine reformatting the remaining BB to take out full on, and it's pretty much just all awkward.)

Someone should tell me to stop doing facing profiles, but that someone needs to be me, and the story may very well be the arbiter of that.

I've wanted to draw ABO because I've been reading so much of it, and I was worried one picture was a bit...off...and I realised it was ABO! When two true mates meet for the first time, not only is it going to be cheesy, but the omega will present their neck, and subconsciously, that's what I'd drawn.

(I like ABO for the cheesiness of the true mate tropes on the one hand and the horror of a well done omega exploitation story. But I swear, ABO PWP is the most repetitive thing ever. End of good dirty talk...

Well, the no full-on faces was in the preliminary discussion, before she'd read the draft. She was fine with it.

Oddly, if the faces are hand drawn rather than digital, I don't have the same aversion.

Yes, the first five or six ABO fics were interesting, but they get sort of by the checklist after that. It's fascinating that you'd drawn the picture of the omega offering his neck without your really being aware of it. Artists constantly amaze me, because I can't do what you do.

It's fascinating that you'd drawn the picture of the omega offering his neck without your really being aware of it

THe author saw it--she wanted a picture where they looked like they were off in their own little world, and even though I hadn't consciously taken that from the words, it's what she got--subconscious, plus after effects of the artists I've been drooling over.

She's an artist (ID=artsiel), so I felt more pressure than normal. And I couldn't make head nor tail of a certain layout key to the illustration, and I knew it was because she'd detailed it down to the finest minutiae, and then written at the level of detail that best served the story. So I didn't want to go wrong against the pictures in the head.

She sent me the pics she'd been using for imagery, and it really helped.

As ABO goes, artistically, I guess I'm not attracted to most of the visual signifiers, so I'd not really though them out. I *despise* overt feminising them in art (I've unfollowed at least one tumblr because Cas had hips in every picture.

If there are x% ABO stories I like, I don't think they have much common visual information.

I'm stunned that ABO has come along and made MPREG into an annoying distraction instead of instructions to nuke the story from fire. In general I don't like the reproductive biology, but I do like a writer who can take the status quo of "no one agrees" and make interesting worldbuilding out of it.

I'm also pathetically into soul bonds right now, so ABO is attractive like that. I IZ SAP.