Banners

Every website and blog has a theme that it follows faithfully with its subject matter and accompanying images. Since I call this site “The GradBlog”, I figure that the appropriate imagery to use here is the attire associated with University graduation… academic dress… scholarly regalia…

In simpler words, the cap and the gown.

So as you view the site, the header image will randomly shuffle through various works of art created by my (more artistically gifted) friends and colleagues. For your viewing pleasure, the entire gallery is also available below: click on the thumbnail to view the full-sized images, and visit the links to the artists’ sites to see more of their work!

With the permission of the artists, these banners are free to share under the same license as the rest of the blog, the Creative Commons Attribution – Share Alike license.

If you would like to contribute a banner, first of all, THANK YOU. Here are some rough guidelines for what makes a banner that fits with the theme:

• Generally speaking, the focus of the picture isn’t the character so much as it is the clothes themselves. A good banner should feature and accentuate the square cap and gown of Academia (and optionally, the Doctoral hood). When the cap is worn, the tassel falls in front of the face on the subject’s left side (meaning that if the subject is facing the reader, it would appear on the reader’s right).
• My blog focuses on American Academia, but if you’re an artist from somewhere else in the world and would like to contribute an image featuring your culture’s academic attire, let me know about it and I’d love to showcase it!
• The banner should be mostly black on white. Inked drawings work the best with the theme of the site, but grayscale (especially in the background) is appropriate.
• The banner should be exactly 940×198 pixels in a lossless (PNG) format.
• Drawings are strongly preferred to photos.
• Due to the balance of the site, it’s best if the subject/character of the picture appears on the left side of the banner, though for certain scenes, this may not be appropriate.
• Large text and watermarks should not appear in the banner. The artist’s name and webpage should definitely be included in the picture, but not in a way that might confuse the reader into thinking that they are the author of the website.
• Last, but certainly not least, you must be willing to share your work under the Creative Commons Attribution – Share Alike license. Understand that this means that others can use your banner, share it, print it out, sell it online, use it as carpeting, and do essentially whatever they want with it, provided that they credit the original artist (you) when they do. This is essential to preserve the spirit of collaboration that is so crucial in the Free Software and the Academic worlds.
• In accordance with the above rule, copyrighted fictional characters should not be used in the banners. If you need to find remix-friendly characters, you can always use the characters that I’ve drawn. In the same vein, trademarked symbols (such as actual University seals, logos, crests) should not be featured, and should instead be institution-agnostic.
• I strongly believe in rewarding artists for their work, especially when their work is made available to the public at large through Creative Commons. If you would like to do a banner as a commissioned piece of art, just let me know.

If you have any questions or comments, please let me know! I’d love for your work to be featured as a part of the site!