It all started with the Big Bang

[owlmoose]

So as often happens, I got to talking with people about fandom projects, and what all we'd like to see, and one idea that came up was the possibility of doing a Big Bang in Final Fantasy fandom.

What's a Big Bang? The short answer is: a fanwork challenge where authors write longer stories over a time period of a few months (most Big Bangs run 5-6 months, and goals are usually either 20,000 or 40,000 words), and artists collaborate with the authors to illustrate the stories, and everyone gets lots of shiny longfic to read and arts to admire. (The long answer is here.)

The discussion went on for awhile, and naturally the first logical step was a poll. To that end:

Here's a poll.

It's based in Google Docs, so you don't need to have an account on any particular service to fill it out. Curious who's responding and what they said? Check out the responses here. Leave your answers in the poll, then come back here to share your thoughts! (Anon and OpenID commenting are on.) And please feel free to send it on to your long-fic writing friends! The more, the merrier.

Comments

[auronlu.livejournal.com]

I filled out the whole thing and then realized (a) I'm so slow at writing bigfic I could never participate in a Big Bang challenge and (b) I started fantasizing about some artists getting inspired to illustrate my current bigfic, but that's not fair because I started posting it long before this Big Bang challenge will start.

[rabbitprint.livejournal.com]

That's really tempting -- art is such a great bribe to dangle too, not to mention an event where everyone's joining up together. If it wasn't for the length, I'd be inclined to sign up; the length alone doesn't bother me, I'm just not sure when I'd be able to fit 20k-40k reliably on top of everything else going on. :/ Though the advance notice of when during the year it might be helps a lot.

[ovo-lexa.livejournal.com]

I am frightened.

[chaosraven.livejournal.com]

I mentioned this briefly to Nay but I would also like to put it out for the general public: basically, I feel like artists get a sort of second class treatment in Big Bangs since we usually have to wait until the authors have written stuff before we start illustrating... and we're illustrating for the author instead of having things written for us.

I don't have a good solution (except maybe pairing artists and authors earlier in the challenge) but I would like it to be something that is considered when the challenge is structured.

[wounded-melody.livejournal.com]

Well, I intended on writing this long FF fic, soooo...I guess it all depends on whether this happens or not XD

[regann]

I have to say I am interested, if for no other reason that I would have a reason to work on the many self-indulgent plotbunnies I've been storing up!

[justira.livejournal.com]

Soooo what does one do if one both writes and draws? >.>

[darthneko.livejournal.com]

The later timing actually would be ideal imo - so many big bangs schedule earlier in the year to avoid winding up anywhere near nanowrimo or yuletide, but it means the first part of the year is jam packed and there's next to nothing later on. Which is to say I'd be all for it!

(I've also writing and drawing for several other big bangs, which will end before this one would start, but yeah - writing and drawing for the same bang is totally possible. ^_^)

[xianghua.livejournal.com]

Have to admit, a bigbang would be SO much easier than the fic exchange, where I ran into so many issues with making the story compact that I ended up with length issues from lack of plots.

[cygna-hime.livejournal.com]

So I really have no right to stand around going "Yes! Yes!" considering that the last and only Big Bang I tried participating in I didn't even make the minimum wordcount (I need to actually write that story...), but... *waves pompoms* Yes! Yes! Please yes!

[nan (from livejournal.com)]

So I kind of feel this is necessary for my continued well-being! \o/

[seta-suzume.livejournal.com]

I don't know if I have any long ff fic ideas, but I would absolutely love to illustrate someone else's fic!

[nagia (from livejournal.com)]

I want this so badly I can taste it.

[imadra-blue.livejournal.com]

This could be incentive for me to write the FF7 longfic that lives in my brain, and this happening later in the year would be fantastic beyond all reason...

[ellnyx.livejournal.com]

Answering belatedly, yes!

Would this challenge be prompt-based?

*is very, very late, and apologises*

[heaven-monument.livejournal.com]

This sounds like fun. I can fit it around school deadlines, which is great, and 20,000 words over six months isn't too arduous, but it's enough to make me focus.

[sarasa-cat.livejournal.com]

I've been meaning to reply to this but stupidly forgot in a storm of busy.

I would love to see this happen, as long as it starts after June 15th. Conflicting with NaNo isn't a problem at all.

I already have many of epic ideas that want my attention so I'm less inclined to participate in something that is a gift exchange or prompt based.


As far as ideas for collaborating with an artist, I'd would gladly share my plot notes, outlines, and early drafty scene drafts during the first month. I sometimes use fanart to inspire my writing so I can easily imagine a symbiotic writer-artist relationship.