- Preferred format for submissions is .doc or .docx, but Google docs are also acceptable. No .pdfs please!
- We aim to publish blog posts approximately one week before the film’s first screening day. To help us facilitate this timeline, please send a rough draft of your post at least TWO WEEKS before the movie or series is scheduled to screen. This will give artists and editors enough time to do their thing. We’ll send you feedback ASAP and work with you to craft a solid piece for the blog.
- Try to keep pieces to 1500 words. If your post is longer than 1500 words, we may ask you to cut it down and resubmit before we send it to our editors.
- We try to limit posts to two per calendar for each author, because we want to include a diversity of voices on the blog.
- Generally, it is okay for two writers to cover the same film: a diversity of voices/viewpoints on a particular movie is welcome and leads to good discussion. But we try to avoid more than two pieces on the same film.
- Please share three or four stills from the film or images that you’d like to include in your post at the time of submission, and tell us where you would like to place them in the post.
- For original artworks, artwork size is 1024×576 and .jpg is preferred.
- When selecting screenshots from films, try to find images at least 1000px wide.
- Please consider writing a short alt text description of each image (ca. 125 characters). If you would prefer to not send alt text descriptions, Perisphere editors will add alt text to the images. For more on alt text and accessibility, one useful resource is the WAI (Web Accessibility Initiative).
- If you cite online sources, please include hyperlinks. For all sources, please use endnotes and format your citations according to the Chicago Manual of Style.
- Please italicize all film titles.
- If this is your first contribution to the blog, please share a short bio (100 words or less) with your piece.
A few notes on writing for Perisphere:
- Your writing does not need to be formal or academic. It’s a blog! Have fun with it.
- Do not plagiarize or infringe on copyright (either verbally or visually). This might seem obvious, but if you feel like you’re in a gray area, let us know and we can help.
- We will not post something that is racist, homophobic, sexist, ableist, or offensive in some other way. On this note, we ask that you be open to revising something in your writing should our editors suggest that it might exclude some members of our audience/readership.
- We encourage our authors to get creative and submit non-traditional written/visual pieces for the blog. We’ve published comics, crossword puzzles, think pieces, reviews, artwork, and a series of stills with a few poetic captions. Let us know what ideas you have and we’ll do our best to format it.
- We also encourage our authors/artists to write about topics that are only tangentially related to their chosen film/series. Feel free to use the film as a jumping off point instead of the entire point. Find something weird or prescient in these films and talk about that; don’t be afraid to make connections to other movies, personal experiences, historical events, or larger trends that interest you.
The perks that come with writing for Perisphere:
- Once your post is published, two Trylon admission tokens will be left in your name at the box office. They each count as a regular ticket and you can use them for any film that is part of the Trylon’s regular programming. Note, however, that the tokens are only good for in-person ticket purchases—they cannot be used for online ticket reservations.
If you have any questions or concerns or if you are interested in contributing to Perisphere, please contact us at perisphere@trylon.org.