As you may or may not know, I use fake movie posters for the Multiplex eBook covers (and any marketing materials) that will also appear on the Chapter opener pages in the print book. Partly, this is because I don't want to use a copyrighted image to promote Multiplex, which I think gets outside of fair use*, but it makes the images more timeless, I think, too.

* In the strip itself, where the use of real-life movie posters is for parody and/or commentary and criticism, I believe the use of copyrighted movie posters is fair use.

Creating art for these fake posters that might appear in perspective and be unreadable for each cover gets kind of overwhelming at times, so I've decided to see what you (my lovely readers) might have for me.

Go to http://impawards.com/ for ideas. I am interested in submissions for all genres of film: comedies, dramas, action movies, even animated movies. Obviously, because this is supposed to look like a professional movie poster, quality of the photo or image is VITAL. I'm a photo retoucher, so I can doctor up some things, but I'm no magician, either.

The rights I need are perpetual, non-exclusive print and web rights for the Multiplex eBook cover, print comics (if I bother doing more of them, which I may not) and the Multiplex print book, as well as any marketing materials (as part of the cover it's used on). I do not own your submission in any way; I just want the rights to use the winning submissions for the fake poster design!

Obviously, most movie posters are photographic, so photos are the most obvious thing to submit, but you can also submit a drawing or CG rendering!

The winner (or winners) will get a photo/illustration credit plus a link/URL to plug in the books it's used in, plus a free copy of the eBook it appears in, and also the print book when it's available.

• Photos must be available in high resolution (i.e. 300 dpi at 5" wide or so), even though they will most likely appear much, much smaller than that in the books.

• Submissions can be a single photo or a more "designed" poster, but of course, if I like your photo but not your design, you'll be hurting your chances.

• You must own the copyright for your image/design including any images or designs you use within your submission.

• Do not include or suggest a movie title, title treatment or credits. I'm doing all that; I just need the image. It should probably be VERTICAL, although an especially good horizontal photo could win, as well. It can be a new photo created for this contest or an existing photo that you already have handy.

• You may enter (or even win) more than once, but, you know, please be reasonable.

To enter, simply post links to your photo(s) in a response here! The submission period for this contest ends at MIDNIGHT, December 31st.

Its kind of a generic horror set up, but it can be cropped in a few different ways.
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And another one (out of ideas now...)

i feel like this is narcissistic but if that isn't an image for "hipster: the movie" or it's sequel, "revenge of the douche"

i dont know what is.

A photo of yourself is perfectly appropriate. (Nice quality photo, by the way!)

I'm already on the covers of #1 and #2 (although you'd be hard-pressed to recognize me), so I wanted to switch it up.

It looks like #3 will have one photo. #4 and #5 I haven't figured out what I'm doing yet, but there will be posters on at least one of them. Like the others, it will have one of the main characters looking at the reader from somewhere at the Multiplex 10 — so #3 will be Melissa at concessions; #4 will have Becky up in booth; and #5 will be Franklin somewhere.

My company made fake movie posters for various fair events at our state fair this year. These are all my artwork, and any elements can easily be changed out if you want to use them (dates, text, logos, etc). I'm too lazy to do it now, but if you're interested, Gordon, I'll pull logos and change the text.

Here's the two best ones that I did. I have other ones, but their almost direct parodies of movies, versus these ones being parodies of genres.





edit:BTW, other than tag lines, the text at the bottom is not mine, so don't judge them or me harshly by them. They are what I was told to place, unfortunately.

Those are quite good, spoonTrex — but:

1) In order to be considered as submissions, I need you to remove ALL of the text on them first. Sorry! But I do say this in the rules in the first post: no titles, no credits.

If you don't want to go through the hassle on both, I can tell you right now the Demolition Derby one is the one I'm more interested in.

2) Do you own the copyright to all the images used in them? If you made them for your employer, for instance, then they might own the copyright, not you. Any submissions need to be wholly owned by you. No stock artwork, no Googled images, not even Photoshop brushes that you don't own.

Wow, if only I could read, I suppose I could save myself some trouble. Yeah, there's some stock art in there. The copyright is always iffy with my company, as in, they are a couple of idiots, and don't protect anything. They don't try to, and they flat out don't want to. As such, any work I do, is my work. But if stock photos are an issue, don't worry about those posters. Just thought I'd see if they could be of use, but apparently my inability to read got in the way once again.

Oh well, I've got more in me. I'll have something else later on (hopefully).

(Hopefully I've read everything right this time.) Okay, this one's an old one and all mine, free for use, as it's me:



Text would look best, in my opinion, at a -20 degree tilt. Like so:



Blah, blah, blah, more text and titles to fill it out.

Please note that that is not in any way a title or design suggestion, just pure lunacy. I do have a full size copy, or, rather, full size for your requirements (5" at 300dpi).

That's pretty freakin' awesome.

Hey, looks like it's got about as much of a plot as any summer action movie. Have you pitched this idea to any studios?

In all seriousness, though, it looks pretty rad indeed.

Thanks for this contest, GM! It provides me with two things I've wanted: an excuse to look back through some of my favorite pictures, and an opportunity to contribute to one of my favorite webcomics (I haven't yet been able to join the backers' club... it's been a reeeeeeally lean fall for me )

Anyhow, I tossed a handful of my favorite photos into a MobileMe gallery for you: http://gallery.me.com/robertdwilson#100134 I'm no professional- in fact, several of these photos were taken with the camera on my first-gen iPhone- but if there's anything there you can use, please just let me know. I'll gladly sign over the rights you mention to any of those photos.

This one particularly caught my eye, even though it's horizontal:
It's a statue in the Sculpture Garden in downtown DC that I think has a delightful invasion-of-the-spider-aliens feeling to it.

That last one reminds me of those campy pop-art movie posters from 50's. You know, because of the spider-alien things à la Them!

Well, these are my submissions, nothing exciting or great, these are pretty plain (or boring, or useless). Hey, the bridge one up there is pretty cool btw.



I hope I got all the requirements correct. :X I'll probably add some more pictures if I find any decent ones later on...

Some generic shots you can cut up p'rhaps.