mjgolli, Billy Rex, and Piper would like to announce a contest!

The Back to School, Back to Storm Hawks Contest

As you may or may not know, episodes 40-52 will be coming to YTV in September. We thought it would be a good idea to celebrate by having a little contest. Why YTV? Well, YTV has been involved with the development of Storm Hawks from early on. You might remember the YTV logo that appears at the end of each episode. Also, YTV is the major channel that broadcasts Storm Hawks in Canada. And Storm Hawks is made by Nerd Corps, which is a Canadian company. This contest was also conceived in Canada. On another note, not everyone has been able to have Storm Hawks in their lives for some time. We know you can't all come out to the conventions, so this is a good way to get your hands on some Storm Hawks stuff--for free!

This fan contest will run from 12.00 am EDT on August 1 to 11:59:59 pm EDT on August 31. All work submitted must be done within this time period. (Meaning you cannot submit work you've done before this time.) There will be three categories for entry: Fan Art, Fan Video and Fan Fiction.

The categories, rules, and guidelines are as follows:

Fan Art:

1. Fan art should be related to the show.

2. Artwork should be uploaded somewhere, preferably Photobucket (http://photobucket.com/). DeviantART is also acceptable.

3. Please disable comments if possible.

4. The content should be clean and appropriate. This means: no NSFW art, no adult content, no graphic slash, etc.

5. We do not want memes. They're fun, but not the kind of thing we are interested in seeing for this contest.

6. NO COMMISSIONS. And absolutely NO STEALING. Artwork should be original and yours.

7. Once artwork has been submitted, you cannot edit it in any way whatsoever. If you edit it, your submission will be disqualified.

8. All artwork should include a brief description of the work, and what compelled you to create it. We want to know the deeper meaning behind your work. Feel free to include a caption as well (however, a caption is not required). The description is mandatory. Artwork should be titled appropriately.

Fan Videos:

1. Fan videos should be no longer than 7 minutes in length.

2. Videos should be uploaded to a video sharing website, preferably YouTube (www.youtube.com).

3. Videos should be related to the show.

4. The song chosen should reflect the subject matter of the video.

5. The song should be clean. This means no profanity or inappropriate lyrics.

6. A guideline: choose clips from various episodes. We understand that some characters did not appear in many episodes, so we understand if you choose clips from a small number of episodes. But we encourage you to be creative and take clips from a variety of episodes.

7. Videos should be of high quality. If it's blurry, it's unappealing.

8. Once a video has been submitted, it cannot be edited. Post-production editing is considered naughty and if you edit it, it will be disqualified.

9. Comments and ratings should be turned off for your video. We want to see your video, not what everyone else thinks of it. (After the contest, you can turn on comments and ratings and do whatever you please.)

10. All videos should include a brief description of the video, and why you created it. (See point 8 under 'Fan Art' for an explanation.) Videos should be appropriately titled.

11. Credit for any song(s) used should be given to the appropriate artist(s).

Fan Fiction:

1. Fan fiction should be no longer than 8,000 words.

2. No drabbles please. Chaptered fics are welcome.

3. Stories should be complete. Incomplete stories will not be accepted.

4. No original characters. This includes Mary Sues and Gary Stus. If you really want to write fan fiction with OCs, feel free to do that for fun, but not for this contest. We want to see what you can do with what’s there.

5. Fan fiction should be clean. This means: no NSFW fiction, no adult content, no profanity, etc.

6. Please use correct grammar, complete sentences, and capitalization. And don't forget to spellcheck! If it hurts our eyes and brains to just look at it, there's a good chance we probably won't read it.

7. A (maximum) 500 word summary should accompany the fan fiction. This summary should include any pairings, and a brief (but not revealing) summary of the plot line.

8. Chapters, if any, should be clearly labeled/titled. The piece should also have an appropriate title.

9. Please do not upload the work anywhere. Attach it to an email for submission. Please submit the story in Microsoft Word, OpenOffice/StarOffice, Notepad, or some other common format.

10. If we find that you have uploaded it anywhere, you will be disqualified.

11. Do not steal anyone’s work. This is called plagiarism and it is extremely naughty and will result in you getting banned from the contest.

12. Please use 11 point, Calibri or Times New Roman font. Refrain from using coloured fonts, please and thank you.

Submissions should be made via email. The official address is stormhawkspiper[at]gmail(dot)com. (Insert the appropriate symbols.) No other method will be accepted.

In your email, you should provide a link for the fan art or fan video. As stated in point 9 under 'Fan Fiction', works of fan fiction should be attached as an appropriately titled document. Office 2007 docs are ok.

This contest is open to all people from all parts of the world. We will not discriminate based on age, nationality, race, religion, gender, or species. The only thing we require is that you have a mailing address. If you do not have one, we cannot send you your prize!

General rules about submissions:

-You can make a maximum of one (1) submission per category. If you make more than one, only your first will be considered. The rest will be instantly disqualified. Please keep this in mind when you are submitting work.

-You can submit work in more than one category. (Refer to the first point.)

-Only submissions made between…12.00 am EDT on August 1 to 11:59:59 pm EDT on August 31

that’s 0300 GMT on August 1 to 02:59:59 GMT on September 1…

will be considered. All late entries will be disqualified. We cannot be responsible for delays in email transfers, technology kinks or other problems outside our control.

-You can make submissions in all categories, but you can only win in one. We want to share the prizes with as many fans as possible. We also want to see submissions of good quality over a large quantity of submissions of poor quality.

-We will allow people to collaborate, but keep in mind that there will only be one prize that must be shared amongst collaborators if you win. We cannot make any special accommodations if you work in a group.

-If we feel that you have blatantly disregarded our rules, not only will your work be instantly disqualified, but we also reserve the right to ban you from the contest. This is an extreme rule, and we hope we don't have to make use of it.

-Please indicate in your email of submission if you allow us to share your work with the world when the results are tallied. You will be credited of course!

-We realize that fans live in many different time zones. But you must submit by the times stated above. No exceptions will be made if you have time zone troubles. Make sure to check out the time difference if you're unsure.

-The “received” timestamp header on the email will be the deciding factor for consideration of on-time submissions.

All enquiries about submissions and/or the contest should be sent to stormhawkspiper[at]gmail(dot)com. We will reply to you as soon as possible.

Judging will take place after the contest has ended. The pace at which entries are judged will be determined by the number of entries we get.

Information about the winners will be released once the judging has ended. All who indicated that they are willing to share their work will have links to their work posted online. We will allow those with fan fiction to post their stories online and provide us with links which we will post.

Any and all submissions to the contest will continue to be copyright of the submitter. Those of us involved with the contest make no claim to your works insofar as they are an entry into this contest. We would only ask that you follow the rules above during the contest and until the judging is complete. You may, of course, do with your works what you see fit afterward.

We understand that we cannot go around checking if the work you have submitted has been done in the time period that the contest is open. We are trusting you to be honest. We consider it cheating to submit old work, and we hope you know and can live with that. You are not only betraying our trust, but you are hurting your fellow fans. Please keep that in mind.

Information about prizes*:

While we would love to give away a brand new microwave oven or Granny’s old Buick, all we have is Storm Hawks Swag!

The winners of each category will receive one (1) copy of the Storm Hawks comic #1 ashcan direct from AnimeNorth 09 Toronto. These are individually numbered (only 100 copies!) and signed by the always lovely Jim Su, one of the artisans! We will select one overall winner whose work exhibits the most compelling view of the Storm Hawks universe; one work that evokes the best that Storm Hawks has to offer; one work that upon being seen by a non-fan or n00b would make them rabid fans like us. This person will receive a copy of the Special Edition Storm Hawks comic book #1 in full colour, signed by as many of the artists and Nerd Corps personnel that can be found at Fan Expo Canada 2009! We also have one Sticker Collection album including 5x5 stickers! Those are only available in Germany!

The prizes will be shipped to anywhere in the world the winner might be!

* = Prizes will be finalized after Fan Expo. (Meaning there may be more!) But the prizes mentioned above are guaranteed.

Notes on judging:

All judging will be done impartially. We have our own opinions on things, but they will be disregarded in the judging for this contest. We will also not show bias for our friends. If one of our friends wins a prize, it is not because we know him/her, it is because they have earned it. You most definitely do not need to know us in order to win. This contest is for everyone who's a fan of this beautiful show, not just for our friends and acquaintances. We welcome all entries that fall within the rules stated above. If you do not win, it is not because we hate you. (We don’t hate anyone!) So please do not take it personally. We just want everyone to be excited about this show and express their love for it. You are a talented lot, so the submissions should be epic!

Notes on the judges:

mjgolli is a super cool network engineer from Ohio. He's a Trekkie, a ham (no, not the meat!), and a dog lover. mjgolli has a cool license plate (which you can see here). He knows all about telecommunications, and has some interesting stories about telephone companies from back in the day. He also tests out interesting new technology. When he's not watching cartoons or saving the world with his computer skills, he enjoys consuming kheer and other foreign foods. He also happens to have a soft spot for Pocky!

Piper (or shpiper or stormhawkspiper--whatever you know her as) is a biological chemistry student in second year at the University of Toronto. She likes to sleep and blog about Storm Hawks. She occasionally watches hockey and examines purple loosestrife. She has been known to go on weird adventures for the love of Nerd Corps (and because she's just a crazy obsessed fan).

Billy Rex is an electrical and computer engineering student in third year at an University of Applied Sciences in Bochum. He loves rock music, and performs in a band. His favourite Storm Hawks characters (can you guess?) are the Absolute Zeroes. Billy volunteers in his town's fire department, and loves to play video games. (The cake is a lie!) When he's not attending LAN parties, Billy Rex solves calculus problems and likes to eat bratwurst.

Disclaimer: This contest is not affiliated with Nerd Corps. Well, we will be trying to get autographed prizes so in that way, we are depending on Nerd Corps. But this is an initiative for fans by fans. We want to see that awesome fan spirit we know you all have, so we'd like to see tons of submissions. We hope you will enjoy this as much as we will!