Be sure to visit the JOURNAL with the collected SUBMISSIONS! [link]

Mood: ...random icon usage

Has also to do with this deviation

My last contest only got two contestants, so I cancelled it (I'd like to thank to and for signing up at the time even though it didn't work out.)
This time I'll make the prizes bigger and the theme more interesting (I hope).

Update: List of contestants/people that voiced interest (If I forgot someone please note me!):

Kaile and Lunaria from the NCD. [link]ITCH&Number=588906
Getting more and more


What to draw:
The embodiment of one of the 8 Elements (Material: Fire, Water, Earth, Wind. Immaterial: Light, Darkness, Life and Death).
Added 2.2.2006: The emphasis is on embodiment. How you express that in the picture is up to your interpretation. So, if you give the elemental a very solid/defined form that looks almost like real skin/fur/feathers... or if it's more something nebulous only alluding the shape you can decide. But it should always be clear what element and what animal the picture is about.

Rules:
- The elemental must have an animal-shape (can be any animal real or not.)
- You can submit more than one picture if you want, but you can only win once.
- I accept any media
- There can be more than one elemental in a picture
- If you have questions note me (or comment)
- Deadline is 12th MARCH
Added 11.Feb.06 - Something that just occured to me. No fanart please. The elemental should be your own design.

Prizes:
1st place: A half year subscription (2x 3 months), if I get many contestants maybe even a full year.
2nd place: 3 month subscription
3rd place: 1 months subscription
(Other compensations are possible as well though. Just ask.)

Judging:
I'll judge (either alone or with some others) who wins, based on the idea, composition, effort made and art.
I like original or unusual ideas. So I'll probably favor a fire-squirrel-elemental over the rather common fire-bird-elemental (phoenix) even when it's a bit better drawn.

Please reply to the journal if you want to participate.

The Elements

What effects are assigned to which element:

Fire: Anything that involves flames. But also pure heat. Electromagnetic radiation in the infrared and below (so microwaves, radio transmissions and radar fall also under the category fire [link] ).
Water: Anything liquid, not only water. This element also includes coldness (Not ice. Ice is just the result of water getting cold ^^). Illusions for taste also rely on this element.
Earth: Rocks and such. But also any other solid (non living) material. Touch-illusions can be produced with earth magic.
Air: All gaseous substances come here. But also telekinetics, Scent-illusions and Sound-illusions.
Light: Any radiation in the visible spectrum and above. (Also radioactivity comes here.) Needless to say optical Illusions.
Darkness: All that has to do with shadows... and anything dark. Also spells that effect the mind fall under this category.
Life: All living beings. Ability to communicate by thought. Summoning animals/plants (although controlling them by against their will would rather be darkness). Healing and transformation as well as some poisons and diseases are here included as well.
Death: Necromancer stuff. Being able to communicate with the realm of the dead. Control over undead, ghosts and spirits. Maybe also curses can be placed in this element.

How do the elements interact with each other:

The world this system is placed in is divided into different planes. The immaterial and the material plane (There are other planes as well, but they are not as well connected as these two). Those are again subdivided in the elemental spheres. In each sphere the connections are different. In the sphere of fire, fire is the dominant element.
The plane we look at is of course the plane of "Life", where the normal beings live. So every human, animal or plant could be considered a Life-elemental. ^^

Each element can have one of the 4 relationships to an other element:

Harmony: Two harmonising elements work very well together. So if you would use those two elements together (casting a spell that involves both of them for example) it would actually take less effort than using each element on it's own.
Neutral: These two don't interfere or reinforce. They're neutral in behaviour.
Disharmony: Combining two disharmonising elements takes much more effort than controlling each one by it's own, since you have to invest additional energy to compensate the differences.
Converse: Each Element has an opposing partner and I don't think it's necessary to write them down or? This is some kind of Hate/Love relationship. They are as different as possible, yet they also need each other to define themselves. Take one away and the other looses it's meaning (How do you explain the difference between light and dark to someone born blind? *also points to Yin-Yang like avatar symbol*).
So it's very hard to bring those two to work together, but if do manage it the results are spectacular.

So let's start with the relations:

Life: Harmony with Water, Earth and Light. Disharmony with Fire. Converse to Death.
Death: Harmony with none. Disharmony with Water. Converse to Life.
Light: Harmony with Life and Fire. Disharmony with Earth. Converse to Darkness.
Darkness: Harmony with Earth. Disharmony with Air. Converse to Light.
Fire: Harmony with Light and Air. Disharmony with Life. Converse to Water.
Water: Harmony with Life. Disharmony with Death. Converse to Fire.
Earth: Harmony with Darkness and Life. Disharmony with Light. Converse to Air.
Air: Harmony with Fire. Disharmony with Darkness. Converse to Earth.

As you can see, Life as the dominant element harmonies with 3 other elements. It's counterpart Death has no harmony at all. The other elements have 1 or 2 harmonies.
There are some effects (like lightening) that originate from interaction of two elements (Water and Air in the afore mentioned example).

Final notes:

My initial motivation was to find another system of classifying spells, other than the 'schools' from D&D. Each spell would fall into one element-category (unless some very rare spells reserved for NPC characters, like time travel)
So magic users would often select element groups on which they focus. Druids for example usually have the Life, Water, Earth combo.
A Necromancer (focuses on the element Death) on the other hand will most often stay within his element, since there are no harmonies. And if you work with things that can do worse than just killing you when you loose control, you of course don't want to waste much time and energy into learning other spells.
Then there are those magicians that focus on a converse element pair. Difficult to master, but very powerful when they succeed.

~~~Useful Stuff~~~

[link] - Journal Entry with many neat tutorials, which I will update from time to time.

~~~Clubs~~~

~austrians ~FanzOfZigZag ~ragnarok-addicts ~YaoChiFanclub ~CrookedCreatures *ThePencilClub ~talentclub ~Blood-Of-Heroes ~MutantCats