We will be aiming towards a "relaxed" realistic style. That doesn't mean photorealistic, but the animals need to be at least anatomically correct as much as possible and have mostly correct proportions. We will not be accepting anthropomorphic bipeds in clothes, or kawaii. But some cute facial features (like smile or bigger eyes) are allowed and encouraged. We are also require animals to be chosen from currently existing on planet Earth. This mean that this time we will not be accepting any extinct animals (for example dinosaurs) and fantastic, fictional or hypothetical animals (dragons, unicorns, aliens, cryptids, etc.).

We hope that the whole collab will look coherent; so the proportions in sizes between the animals will need to be somewhat realistic. We will not be able to correctly represent the size of an ant and a whale, but they need to make sense, so: ant < rabbit < wolf < elephant < whale. We will be sorting your choices into canvas size categories - the smallest will be 32x32px for animals like insects, small birds, rodents etc., and 160x160 for the biggest ones like elephant. This could change as we might need to adapt while the collab develops; but only by including additional rectangle canvases as needed using 32x32 blocks.

Everyone is required o use the Comfy52 palette made by bess. And to add "white" outline made with the brightest colour from the palette - #e5efef. You can do only one "white" outline or double outline with "black" (#1a1f2e) outline or selective, creative outline under it (for example, if your animal is a snow owl or a polar bear). Whatever outline option you choose, the most external outline have to be full "white".





As the collab progresses, we will compile a list of species already used, sorted in alphabetical order, to make it easier to join.



Rules summary:

- choose your animal species form existing, earthly animals;
- ask mods if it is still available (or check the list), and if it is specific enough;
- ask mods which canvas size category is your animal;
- provide a WiP within a week, and a finished entry in a month to keep your species claim,
- draw only a non animated sprite with no background, using the provided palette;
- aim for the "relaxed" realistic style, as far as you can, and if you approach any struggle, feel free to ask for help on discord # animal-atlas-collab channel.
 

Examples made by PJ staff:

- Sea otter by Irenaart on 64x64 canvas.
- Black and rufous sengi by Gawrone on 32x32 canvas.
- Vangunu giant rat by The Nerd on 64x32 canvas.
- Aldabra giant tortoise by Carl the PJ Discord bot on 96x64 canvas.
- Silver gull by Vrine on 64x64 canvas.
 

Let's use our pixels to show how beautiful and diverse the animal kingdom is.




BONUS:

This is a group picture to which you may bring a companion. Do you have a spouse, a partner, a sibling, parent, kid or a best friend who loves pixel art and animals, but doesn’t pixel themselves? Or maybe does, but doesn’t have a PJ account? You are allowed to chose and draw a second animal to represent them. However, you may only do one extra, and you will not get a second trophy for it.