The Elfwood Rules in Detail

  Your Elfwood Account

Membership to Elfwood is free of charge.You are responsible for maintaining and updating your gallery/library page and ensuring that all Elfwood Rules & Regulations are followed. Member must provide all required information, plus a current and working email address (accounts without working address will be automatically suspended) to obtain a unique Elfwood user ID and password. You have the option to hide your email address from visitors and only display it to Elfwood staff. Elfwood does not discriminate on the basis of gender, age, or ethnicity. Each Member is allowed to have ONE (1) Membership in each area, and the privileges associated with Membership. Membership is intended for personal use only and non-transferable.

You must be at least 13 years of age to join. This is to protect your own privacy if you're too young to be putting personal information online. Please go here for more information on The Children's Online Privacy Protection Rule (COPPA).

Artists and writers must be alive when signed up for Elfwood. If needed, please read our section about departed members.

There are a few things you’ll need to do to ensure that your Elfwood page is up to par and within guidelines. First and foremost, make sure that you at least have something in your short and long biographies within the Extranet. Remember that the short biography is supposed to be short… no more than a line or two.

HTML usage within your long biography should be within reason. Links and the like are allowed, but having thousands upon thousands of links is generally frowned upon. Use of tables, embedding pictures into your bio (apart from your me.jpg below), outside images, forms, buttons and other active HTML is highly frowned upon and could end in the removal of your account from Elfwood. Tables are allowed, but you must be sure the HTML is not breaking the entire page.

Your biography picture must be uploaded via the "Submit photo" function in the "Tools & Utilities" section of the Extranet OR via the "Picture" function in the "Profile" section at the top of the Elfwood main page, and should be called me.jpg. The picture can be a photo, drawing, painting, etc… and can be of any part of your body that’s not normally covered by your unmentionables. My own personal favorite example of this was when someone drew a smiley face on their big toe and took a picture of it… that is perfectly fine, and gave me a good chuckle. The picture can also be a picture of your anthro self, for example you as a dragon. Your biography picture may not be obscene, racist, sexual, not a picture of someone else and not someone else's drawing unless you have permission - which you must state in your long bio.

Depending on which area of Elfwood you are in, there are certain minimum and maximum guidelines that you’ll be required to follow as detailed below:

A: In the Library, you’re required to have a minimum of two (2) acceptable items on your shelf, and are limited to a maximum of fifty (50) total submissions, including some of the optional items (dictionary, thesaurus, character bios, etc… see Library Rules for more info).

B: In the SF/F area, you’re required to have a minimum of four (4) acceptable items and are limited to a maximum of one hundred (100) total submissions.

C: In FanQuarter, you’re required to have four (4) acceptable items and no more than fifty (50) total submissions.

D: Tours must have a minimum of ten (10) and a maximum of fifty (50) items within it.

  Conduct Within Elfwood...

A good rule of thumb is the golden rule… do unto others as you would have them do unto you. In other words, treat people as you would want to be treated. Elfwood is a large and free site, so as such you may encounter some people that disagree with your views on life and the like; that’s just a fact of life. Also remember that though you have to be thirteen (13) or older to get a page within Elfwood, all ages surf through our site.

First of all, remember the rule of the Big Three. There are three (3) words that will get you in trouble if you use them anywhere within Elfwood. Shit, fuck and cunt are those words, and I apologize for having to spell them out as bluntly as that. Any recognizable form of those 3 words will not be allowed. That goes for partially censored words like F*** or abbreviations such as WTF. You must either completely censor the word as ****, #&%$ or use another swearword. Using these words in your biography or in comments is bound to bring a quick visit from the ERB, and repeated abuse of it will result in the removal of your entire Elfwood presence. Using these words in picture descriptions or in stories will result in immediate decline of the items, period.

The comment field allows your visitors to express opinions and viewpoints on your particular artwork or story. Allow people to have opinions of your work. Never change a comment, even if it’s from an anonymous poster. You may freely delete any comment you wish, which is the better option. If you are having an infestation of anonymous trolls (people who leave nasty comments without any return address, etc), change your comments to “Elfwood Members Only” within the Extranet, which will solve the problem for the most part. However, you may edit a comment to fix formatting errors (such as a broken tag, etc) freely.

DO NOT ENGAGE IN FLAME WARS. There is no gray area here.

Hate and racial statements have no place within Elfwood whatsoever. Again, this is not a gray area. This applies to your biography, your comments, your stories, your artwork, and anything else you submit to Elfwood.

Responsibility for the gallery content and views expressed in the comment area resides on the posting Member/User. Elfwood is not responsible for the content of any Member gallery or the views expressed in the comment areas of the Site. Elfwood is not responsible for any damage caused by loss of access to, or deletion or alteration of Member gallery space. Finally, Please read the Elfwood Legal Agreement as well.

 Forbidden Content...

The following is a non-exclusive list of actions and content that are not permitted on the Site:

• Any use of copyrighted material without the express permission of the author or owner.
• Any material that encroaches the rights of others, including clear expressions of bigotry, racism, or hatred.
• Any material that is perceived by Elfwood as abusive, deceptive, profane, slanderous, offensive, or inappropriate, including explicit pornography in visual or written form.
• Any use of material that contains viruses, corrupt files or other content which may compromise the Elfwood Project or any user there of.
• Any material that violates any laws or regulations of any governing body with jurisdiction over The Elfwood Project, its affiliates and users.
• Any materials inconsistent with the values of the spirit of the Elfwood Project community.
• Adding links to your gallery that promotes any of the above.

 Submission Guidelines...

• Each section will have its own unique submission guidelines. As follows will be generalized guidelines that apply to all areas; for more specific guidelines, be sure to visit the specific page for your area.
  
  
• Photography is perfectly fine within Elfwood as long as it follows genre rulings. You must state who took the picture, even if you took the picture yourself; state that you have permission to use the photo; state that you have permission from any and all people within the photograph to use their image; and provide links to all involved if any links exist. If it's a photo of you, it's of course fine, just remember to state in the description that it's you in the photo. You need to state that information in every description. It's not sufficient enough to write it in your biography.
  
  
• A special note on Pern artwork. Anne McCaffrey requires that EVERY picture that is from her series must have the Pern trademark �® in the picture description. If the information is not there, the picture will be declined. Additionally, Ms. McCaffrey has said that no slash pictures what-so-ever are allowed. All Pern artwork should go into your SF/F gallery. http://www.annemccaffrey.net/fan-fiction-rules.html
  
  
• Quoting from already-established works of art or text is allowable, within reason. You may quote from poems, songs, text and the like, but you may not quote the entire poem, song or text, unless it is in the public domain. A good rule of thumb is to only use a few stanzas or so. If the quote is not in English, a translation must be provided in the description (or footnoted if in a Library submission).
  
  
• Submissions that are too violent and/or sexual in nature will be declined. Pictures showing internal organs that are spewing blood and gore everywhere will be declined. Stories describing in graphic detail the disemboweling of someone or excessively graphic torture will also be rejected. Pictures of an erect penis are too sexual in the male fashion... and for females showing more of the genitalia than the outer line of the labia is considered too much. All such pictures will be judges on a case to case basis.
  
  
• Submissions suggesting sexual situations involving minors, whether it's minors vs. adults or minors vs. other minors, are NOT allowed in Elfwood, and will be judged more harshly than pictures involving only adults. This includes common slash submissions, such as Harry Potter sleeping with Snape.
  
  
• Model and/or kit sets that you assemble and paint are not acceptable by Elfwood standards. This includes preformed sculptures, miniatures, molds, etc.
  
  
• Product logos (Nike’s swash, Coca-Cola’s trademarked bottle, etc) are not allowed in any artwork submission.
  
  
• Celebrities, by themselves, are not allowed anywhere within Elfwood. Celebrities drawn in the roles they play are allowed in FanQuarter as long as they abide by all other restrictions for genre and copy/reference regulations. Just sticking fairy wings or similar to a celebrity is also not allowed, since it's still celebrity art, just with a twist. Example: Sarah Michelle Gellar as herself is not ok, SMG as Buffy the Vampire Slayer is fine for FQ, SMG depicted in any role she did not play is not ok.
  
  
• Censoring pictures is allowed to an extent, but when it comes to censoring things that are inappropriate in Elfwood, such as rude gestures, sexual situations and the like where you can still clearly tell what's going on, it will not be accepted. This will be judged on a case-by-case basis.
  
  
• Anime and goth styles of artwork are not considered in genre by themselves. Other elements must be present to show genre beyond just the style of artwork.
  
  
• Rude gestures (flipping the bird, the inverted victory sign, etc) are not allowed within Elfwood and will be declined.
  
  
• Abstract and surreal pictures must still have extremely obvious fantasy elements to it to get approved. Even if an abstract picture has a good, solid fantasy or sci-fi description to it, the picture will likely still be declined. A black smear of paint across a brown and orange canvas might represent the battle at the gates of Heaven during the apocalypse to you, but if we can’t tell what it is, it’s going to get declined.
  
  
• Art trades are allowable within Elfwood as long as all artists in question have given permission for their work to be shown on your page. You must state that you have permission and give appropriate credit to the artist(s) in question, preferable with a link to the artists gallery. Additionally, the picture still must follow all genre guidelines and all other applicable guidelines to be accepted. This also applies to a recolor… if someone else gives you permission to color their black and white submission, all of the above rules apply.
  
  
• All non-English language requires an English translation to accompany it. In the art sections the translation should be in the description, for Library see the Library rules page. This includes any made-up languages and 1337-speak, and also any words or symbols on the clothing or bodies of characters or on buildings or any other part of the picture. If the runes or text in your picture are just for decoration and have no meaning, you can simply write “All runes in this picture are for decorative use only” or something to that effect in the description.
  
  
• In SF/F and FanQuarter, no drug usage is allowed at all. Underage drinking and/or smoking are also automatic declines. For Library restrictions on the same, visit the Library rulings.
  
  
• Historical figures (ie… dead people, not current celebrities or anyone who’s been dead less than fifty years) are allowed within Elfwood, as long as the final submission is in genre and follows all other Elfwood guidelines. In other words, Jeanne d’Arc standing with a sword by herself would be declined, Jeanne d’Arc receiving words of advice from the light of God would be acceptable or having a description that indicates why it's fantasy or sci-fi.
  
  
• Religious figures will be judged based on their content. For example, Jesus standing on a rock by himself, with no other fantasy reference, will likely be declined. Jesus, standing on a rock with angels in the background and the waters parted before him will be approved with no problems at all. In simple terms… other genre elements must be present or it will be declined.
  
  
• You are allowed to state in your bio and/or descriptions that you do paid commissions, but you're not allowed to put price tags on your art or state how much a paid commission will cost. Please refer to your homepage or other web page from where you're selling it. You're allowed to link to the site you're selling it from.
  
  
• Copied pictures (in other words, reproductions of someone else's work, whether traced or drawn freehand) is NOT acceptable in Elfwood. They are copies and do not belong anywhere on Elfwood! Partially copied art will most likely also be rejected. A rule of thumb is that if it's obvious where it's from, then it's most likely a copy and as such will be declined.
  
  

 About Elfwood staff and Elfwood's creator...

There are three (3) types of staff that work behind the scenes of Elfwood. All three have specific things that they are responsible for, and the vast majority of them are actually nice people as well. A good portion of them have their own pages within Elfwood.

You have the moderators, who help keep the account queues running. Moderators are entitled to making sure that all submissions fit within the rules and regulations of Elfwood. When you hit “Submit Ticket” through the Extranet, it is a moderator who will eventually be reviewing your ticket for processing.

The ERB (Elfwood Review Board) are the people who take care of things after publication. If a submission slips through that goes against the rules, or if someone’s swearing profusely in their biography, or a flame war has erupted on your Elfwood comment page, it will be the ERB that contacts you about this matter.

Thomas Abrahamsson is the creator and owner of Elfwood itself. He is unto a god… er, no, wait. That’s his cat, Klimpen… Thomas is actually a very normal guy who created Elfwood as a hobby. It is hosted through Link�öping university's computer club Lysator and is fully nonprofit. Donations are, of course, happily accepted whenever Thomas has time to process them, but are never required.

 Moderator Dictionary...

The Elfwood moderators use a dictionary posted at an external site as a help in their work.

The Dictionary contains the results of group discussions by the Elfwood moderators, and rule clarifications provided by members of the ERB and senior Elfwood staff. Do not consider them official rules, but guidelines the moderators use when faced with difficult decisions or unusual material in the tickets they process. All information in the dictionary is subject to change without notice, and is updated regularly. In cases where the moderators dictionary and the actual rules pages seem to disagree, the rules pages are always more correct.

Go to the Mod Dictionary




Please take some time and make your image presentable. Elfwood is a place to display your artwork; given this, make it presentable to be displayed. Spend an hour or two playing with the following basic functions of your graphics program: cropping, brightness/contrast/gamma or level adjustment, saving in a suitable format and compression. Not only will this make your image much less likely to be declined for quality issues, you’ll be learning how to give your artwork the full effect of viewing that it deserves.

One requirement for all artwork submitted to the SF&F areas are that they follow some clear quality guidelines. The picture below is formatted exactly correct, and was used by permission from Sarah "Gealflings" Trumpp.

(A) Image quality issues.
1. Cropping issues. If a large amount of white space remains on any side of your work, the picture needs to be cropped to remove a majority of this white space. This also is an issue if the edge of the paper can be seen, or if the back of the scanner can be seen. All of these issues must be corrected before you upload your picture, or it will be declined.
   
   
   
   
   The only exception to the edging rule is when it’s required as part of your picture. For example, an ancient map that has burned and torn edges and shows a bit of the background color behind it would be allowable, or in cases where the edges have been cut to match the shapes of the figure in the drawing.
2. Color issues. If your image is too dark or too light to make out the details of the work, it becomes a color issue. Colored bars along any side of the work also need to be removed, unless the picture is being presented in a matte finish (framed).
3. Quality irregularities. Holes in your work, creases, and things of this nature will get your work declined. If you assemble two (2) large images together (say, if your work was too large to scan on one try) and it left an extremely visible line down the center of your work, this is considered an irregularity and will get declined.
   
   
4. Background issues. Homework notes in the side of your picture, being able to see images and writing in the background that got scanned along with your image, and lined work that hasn’t been edited will fall under this category.
5. Timestamps on photos are NOT a quality issue. If you want to edit them out, that's fine, but you don't have to.
6. Finally, please make sure that your pictures are all saved in RGB mode, not in CMYK mode. CMYK mode images are not allowed, as most browsers are not capable of displaying them at all.

Lined paper will take some work to remove the lines, usually. A few good programs for this are Gimp and Irfanview as of this writing. Gimp is located at http://www.gimp.org/ and Irfanview is located at http://www.irfanview.com/

Of course, there will always be exceptions to all of these rules. One example of this is when page irregularities, background effects, lines and/or schoolwork notations are used to enhance the actual picture or used specifically for the picture. One good example of this is below. Drawn by Fox Matthew Bruner and used with permission.




(B) Picture size rules and minimums.


1. You are required to have a minimum of four (4) pictures on your Elfwood page at all times. Please make sure that you have at least four (4) unique pictures if you’re publishing for the first time. Different versions or colorings of the same picture are okay, but they won’t count toward the minimum of four (4).
   
   Example…
   1. 1 black/white drawing + 1 colored version of the B/W drawing = counts as 2 pictures in a 1st publish.
   2. 1 B/W drawing + 2 colored versions of the B/W drawing = counts as 2 pictures in a 1st publish
   3. 1 B/W drawing + 3 colored versions of the B/W drawing = counts as 2 pictures in a 1st publish.
   4. 1 drawing + 1 detailed version of the drawing = counts as 1 picture in a 1st publish.


(C) Picture size.

Your picture resolution can be no larger than 2000x2000 pixels in size. Anything larger than this will be automatically declined.
1. File types. Your pictures must be saved as either a .gif or a .jpg file and NOTHING else. Animated .gifs are allowable as long as they do not exceed the maximum file size.
2. File size. Your picture files must be 1Mb or less in size. The Extranet will not allow you to create a ticket if any of your uploaded pictures are larger than this.

1. Read the decline carefully. All moderators place their decline reasons in the declining email, so if you don't read this email, you'll never know the exact reasoning behind why your story/picture got declined. Match up what the decline reason was against the appropriate part of your story/picture. If you can see what the moderator is talking about, fix this problem and resubmit.
2. If you don't necessarily see what the moderator was talking about, review the rules above. Find the appropriate rule that covers the reason why your item got declined, and compare it to what the moderator said was wrong with your work. If you can now see what the moderator was talking about, fix the problem and resubmit.
3. If you still disagree with the moderator on the rejection, understand this. People DO make mistakes. Go back to the email you received your decline in, and hit "Reply. " Describe in this email what your concerns are, and be SURE to attach the picture in question to the email before you send it.