FamilyMart and PIAPRO Hold Illustration Contest Celebrating 5 Years of Miku
A new post on the PIAPRO blog points to an illustration contest they are holding with convenience store chain FamilyMart to celebrate 5 years of Hatsune Miku. This appears to be part of an ongoing collaboration between FamilyMart and Miku. The contest consists of two categories — A) an illustration depicting Miku’s birthday, and B) a single panel comic depicting the same. Each category has a required template that must be followed and all entries must be submitted by 5PM JST on May 7. Winning entries will be printed on merchandise/stickers to be sold/distributed in FamilyMart stores starting this summer.
For category A, three winning entries will be printed on plastic sheet protectors to be sold in FamilyMart stores. The theme is “celebrating Miku’s 5th birthday” and all of Crypton’s VOCALOID characters (Miku, Rin/Len, Luka, MEIKO, KAITO) can be used in the illustration. The image must be drawn within the bounds of the template that is available for download. The submission must be an illustration only and should not contain text. Finished images can be submitted as JPEG files, but winners will eventually need to provide Photoshop (PSD) files. For the latter, CMYK is recommended, as all images must be in that format for printing, and converting from RGB to CMYK may change colors slightly from what the original artist intended. If any of the following appears in the images, submitters would be asked to remove them before the deadline or they would be disqualified: FamilyMart’s logo or company name, images of the inside or outside of FamilyMart stores, FamilyMart signs, FamilyMart uniforms, and product lines managed by FamilyMart such as Sweets+, FamiChicken, Ajiwai FamiCafe, etc.
For category B, five winning entries will be used for stickers that will come on products sold in FamilyMart stores. The theme is the same as above and the same set of characters are available as well. However, the entries for this category must contain both a drawing and text, as this is supposed to be a single panel comic. Artists are asked to refrain from attaching credits, etc. to the submissions. The illustration should be 84mm x 66mm and drawn at at least 350 dpi. Just like category A, entries will be JPEG files, but the winning entries would need to have PSD files supplied (CMYK preferred). The same restrictions as to what can be contained in the images applies here as they do in category A.
Entries in category A should be tag-locked with “ｆｍｉｋｕ０１” and entries in category B should be tag-locked with “ｆｍｉｋｕ０２”. Step-by-step instructions on how to do this are available at the bottom of the contest details page. Images must be locked by the deadline, or they will not be eligible. Winners will be notified via email to the account they used to register for PIAPRO. However, if they don’t hear back from the artist in 3 days, they may decided to pick another entry. Winners will receive prizes, but the particulars are not available yet. Also, upon winning, rights to the entries transfer to the contest holders. There are already a few entries submitted already.
