You can participate in the Banner Art Collective in two ways:

1) by hosting or sponsoring work from the collection;

2) by creating and submitting work that adheres to the voluntary guidelines of the Interactive Advertising Bureau.

As you browse the collection, you will see two hosting options: "get tags" and "get randomizer."

If you see a work in the collection that you would like to incorporate into your own website, simply click the "get tags" button and paste the provided html tags into the appropriate place in your website's html. If you want banner art which will randomly change every three minutes, click "get randomizer," define the size and file types you want to include, and paste the resulting code in the appropriate spot in your html. To maintain the spirit of the project, please only place works in areas that are common for web advertisements.

If you run a commercial website, you can sponsor works from the collection by donating advertising space so that works from the collection can be distributed within that space. If you are interested in donating space, please contact us.

You will find that creating banner art is a practice in formalism and efficiency. The Interactive Advertising Bureau maintains strict guidelines for both the display size and file size of advertisements and for the structure of rich media ads (those incorporating Flash, Shockwave, or JavaScript). All artists should download the Banner Art Collective's Artist Kit (available in two formats: PC .zip format or Macintosh .sit format). The kit provides empty templates for all banner formats and types and summarizes all rules to which banner art must adhere Please download and review the kit carefully as you plan your work. Here is a rundown of some of the more important restrictions:

1) Standard banners are 468x60 pixels and can interactively expand to 468x240. Rectangular Interactive Marketing Units (IMUs) come in a variety of sizes: 336x280, 300x250, 180x150 or 240x400 pixels. Skyscraper IMUs can be either 120x600 or 160x600 pixels. Small popups must be 250 x 250 pixels, while large popups can be as big as 550x550 pixels. You can view examples from the IAB's ad unit guidelines.

2) Initial loading file size for both static and rich media banners should be under 15 Kb. Static rectangular IMUs should be under 20 Kb. Rich media banners can load an additional 85 Kb of information only if the user moves the cursor over it or clicks it. Rich media rectangular and skyscraper IMUs can intially load with 25 Kb and can have three interactive loads of up to 50 Kb each. Small popups must be under 20 Kb, and large popups must be under 100 Kb. You can view examples from the IAB's rich media guidelines.

3) A work can perform certain behaviors only after a user interaction. For instance, a work may play audio or video content only after a user clicks on it. Once the sound or video starts, a visible button which mutes the sound must be displayed.

Be aware that all works must have a clickthrough link to an artist credit page that will open in a new window. If your work is an image, the link will be in the html tag we create for your work. But if you make a Flash or Shockwave work, you must include a button that, on a click, opens an URL that we will give you before you upload your work.

After you've created a work which you feel adheres to all the restrictions, click on "submit," which will take you to a form which will walk you through uploading the work to our server.

The clickthrough URL will be "http://www.bannerart.org/works/popup.php?id=XX", where XX is a number that will be assigned to you after you complete the first submission form. If you are submitting a DCR or SWF file, you will have to plug in that number before uploading your file.

An administrator will review your application, and if your work meets all requirements, it will be added to the collection as soon as possible.