What is Modster?

Modster is a graphical exquisite corpse, each of which are drawn by three people. Participants draw a portion of the corpse in sequence: head, torso and leg. Each of the three participants must contribute and submit a drawing – otherwise the corpse will never be completed, making the creation process truely collaborative and participation dependent.

Account Creation

To begin creating your own modster, you will need an OpenID account. You can obtain one through a number of services including myopenid.

Corpse Creation

You can participate in constructing a portion of the corpse by either starting a new one or be invited to work on one by another participant. To begin creating your own corpse, you need to click on New Corpse, and specify a title. A descriptive title can set the theme for other participants.

The creator of the new corpse will begin by drawing the head portion. Only the creator can draw the head. Before submitting the drawing, the creator will also select the next participant, and they will be notified of their request for participation by email. The same process will continue for the torso, and once the legs are drawn, the corpse will be publicly available for view in Corpses.

Corpse Drawing and Submission

The corpse is drawn on the corpse canvas. For the head and torso, a dotted line appears for the bottom 40px of the canvas. This is the portion of the image the succeeding participant will get to see; for torso and leg, the previous 40px of the drawing will be displayed on top of the canvas. Pressing Save will save the drawing, where you will be able to edit later.

Once the drawing is completed; for head and torso, a successor needs to be selected. You can select the next participant by clicking on the radio button next to their name on the list of participants. Once a user is selected, the Submit! button will be enabled in the Toolbar. You can finally submit the drawing by pressing submit. Warning: You will not be able to edit the drawing once it is submitted.