The Castleland Style Guide
a quick artist's brief
Humans only ... no AI
This rebuild project exists because AI-generated art felt wrong here. Every submission must be made by a human being.
Any tool is welcome: Procreate, Photoshop, Krita, Clip Studio, Affinity, Fresco, traditional watercolor or gouache, colored pencil, marker, gouache on paper that you scanned in, mixed media. None of that matters. What matters is that a person made the choices.
What's not allowed: Midjourney, DALL-E, Stable Diffusion, Firefly, or any other generative image AI — including using AI to "finish" or "enhance" a sketch. AI-generated submissions will be removed.
The vibe
Think Candyland board game meets a worn paperback children's storybook. Soft, warm, hand-painted. Watercolor or gouache feel. Whimsical, friendly, slightly magical. Nothing harsh, nothing photoreal.
If your piece looks like it could sit on the same page as the others without any one of them feeling out of place, you've nailed it.
Medium & texture
- Emulate: watercolor, gouache, pastel, or soft oil painting.
- Brush strokes: soft but with visible texture. A little organic variance ... never sterile.
- Edges: shaded edges, not harsh black outlines. If you do use line work, keep it extremely subtle.
- Subjects: slightly exaggerated whimsical proportions, never hyper-realistic.
Color palette
Stick to warm, medium-low saturation tones. No neon, no digital brights, no pure black.
Highlights: natural sunlight warmth, subtle diffusion. Shadows: warm neutrals, soft blending — never pure black.
Lighting
Softly diffused natural light, like a late afternoon in a storybook. Gentle highlights on raised surfaces. Avoid hard high-contrast shadows or photorealistic lighting setups.
Composition & technical specs
- Background: always transparent PNG, alpha channel preserved.
- Margin: leave roughly 10% transparent padding around your subject. Don't let it touch the edge of the canvas.
- Centering: center-weighted or slightly off-center focal point.
- File format: PNG only. Max 8MB. Max 2000px on the longest side.
- Suggested size: each item has its own approximate dimensions on its detail page — use them as a guide, not a hard rule.
- Color profile: sRGB for screen.
What to avoid
- Hard black outlines or pure black shadows.
- Photorealistic textures, photo filters, or photo collage.
- Metallic digital shine (unless it's a coin or a gem).
- Cropping the main subject at the canvas edge.
- Neon, fluorescent, or fully saturated digital brights.
- Backgrounds that aren't transparent ... they'll clash when layered.
Subject-specific notes
Characters: natural welcoming poses, slight 3/4 or front view. Storybook fantasy clothing, never hyper-complex.
Animals: gentle, magical, innocent. Visibly soft or fluffy. Standing, sitting, or mid-motion — never aggressive.
Trees & flora: rounded canopies, asymmetrical trunks, soft edges. Impressionistic blossoms, not botanical drawings.
Buildings: storybook fantasy or quaint whimsical. Painted stucco, stone, or woodgrain implied by soft strokes — never realistic textures.
Water: soft gradients with barely visible ripples. Waterfalls: diffused white/blue brush texture blending at edges.
Galaxies: soft spiral blending, pastel nebula tints. No black space ... use deep navy or midnight purple for darkness.
The yellow road: painterly gouache feel, not hard-edged bricks. Organic curves.
Before you upload, check:
☐ Subject centered, not touching the edge
☐ Transparent PNG (alpha preserved)
☐ Soft edges and visible brush texture
☐ Palette within warm, low-saturation range
☐ No pure black, no neon, no photo textures
☐ Feels whimsical, warm, friendly