Coming up ...

[Nathan Caroland]

Well the next Wyrd Painting Contest was supposed to kick off on the 1st of this month but with software upgrades, e-mail issues that just became apparent and with some family stuff going on around here right now which I'll be out of town for here shortly, its been delayed.

So, heads up, next contest starts up here this month for Femme Fatale for those of you that want to start digging through your metal piles. Might be low on the sponsors due to some e-mail issues but hey, I'll fill it right in nicely with our own swag.

-
Nathan

[Thryth]

Well the next Wyrd Painting Contest was supposed to kick off on the 1st of this month but with software upgrades, e-mail issues that just became apparent and with some family stuff going on around here right now which I'll be out of town for here shortly, its been delayed.

So, heads up, next contest starts up here this month for Femme Fatale for those of you that want to start digging through your metal piles. Might be low on the sponsors due to some e-mail issues but hey, I'll fill it right in nicely with our own swag.

-
Nathan

Whoo-Hoo! New contest! :D

Thanks FF!

[matty1001]

Can anybody enter?
And what is the mini that has to be painted? Just any female character? Or does it have to be a female Wyrd sculpt?

[Nathan Caroland]

Yup, anyone can enter and like the last Femme Fatale contest, it is open to any manufacturer though the miniature itself has to be decidedly female.

[Ritual]

And, for those who haven't entered any Wyrd contest yet, the entries must be anonymous until winners are announced, so don't go telling what you're planning on entering. :)

[Duende]

Well, that's a good motivation to finish my several WIP's which all seem to be females for some reason.

@ matty - HERE's (http://wyrd-games.net/showthread.php?t=454) a link to the announcement of the first Femme Fatale last year if that helps you understand it a bit better until FF gets a new announcement for this year's up. Also, it contains a link to the official rules, be sure to read those.

Will the categories be the same?

:)

[pae]

I'm hoping I can squeeze one of these in. Between entries for GenghisCon (mid February) and GD:Atlanta, I might not have time.

[Nathan Caroland]

Yup, Categories will be the same.

[wiccanpony]

Yup, anyone can enter and like the last Femme Fatale contest, it is open to any manufacturer though the miniature itself has to be decidedly female.


darn! no "man boobs" :\

[lauth81]

Well, time to speed up the projects I've already started ...

[Nathan Caroland]

I'll go ahead and post this here since it has to do with the contest coming up.

So, I'm going through and checking out the options with the contest gallery in which I've uploaded a 'Cute Animals Contest' in the gallery where you folks can go and vote, upload, etc.

Now the one thing that I notice right off the bat is that it only allows for one vote. Would ya'll rather have an option like this where each gallery only gets one vote, the top three earning places, or would you rather do it where you get to rank each photo from 1-10 with the top three get ranked. Or, last option, stick with the old tried and true?

Open to thoughts and options here as I'm looking over this to see what will work and what won't before running the next contest.

[gi6ers]

Yup, anyone can enter except Cindy as she's too bloody good at winning.
:tongue2:

I like the 3 votes system, it gives more people a chance...you could conceivably have a situation where only 1 mini gets all the votes. It gives us mere mortals a chance of getting a vote (especially those of use who don't vote for ourselves).

1-10 is too much like CMON, and i'd rather this place was kept different.

[Ritual]

Yeah, if those are the alternatives I think the "old" system is the best option.

[Skya]

I'd have to say that given those options I'd go with the old 3 vote system. Given my preference though I'd go for a 3 vote system that allows you to rank 1st, 2nd and 3rd and wieghts them differently giving a much more acurate representation of what people think.

Also, I'd like to mention once again that I *really* dislike the way the old system would tell you what the votes that had already been cast were. It very much means theres a motivator in place to encourage people to tell their friends, "this one is really close to winning and and you should go vote for it." Or even to game the system a little by looking at what is winning before deciding how to vote. It's this aspect in particular that adds that bit of CMoN feel....

[Thryth]

I vote for the old system. I thought that it was a good one, allowing more people to get votes.

While I'm chiming-in, is there a way to have the original image size show in the gallery? I find it annoying to have to click on each image to see it at the full resolution.

[matty1001]

Cool, iv read through the older comp thread, and il reckon il give it ago, iv just got a mini which would be perfect for this so il paint that up.

[Jubilee]

I prefer the award three votes system

/ali

[Wren]

The three votes system would be my first choice in the current menu of options. Second choice would be the ranking. Third would be the one vote only, it's just too hard!

[Jubilee]

Ooh, I like the clear my vote option.

[lauth81]

My favourites in order for the voting are:

best: 3 votes

ok: 1 - 10 scale

worst: 1 vote

Another notion:

I noticed the "clear vote" button in the test vote gallery and tried it. It works. I would like to see it disabled for the "real" contests.

[Hinton]

I like the 3 vote system. It seemed to work pretty well for the Rotten Harvest.

[cdukino]

I added a whole bunch of cuteness to the lot. No point keeping up my touch apearance... I admit it. My name is Cindy and I'm a cuteness addict.

I prefer the 3 vote system too

[Duende]

I like the 3 vote system too because it's too hard to pick just one.

Hmm, I see it's possible to add to a contest gallery, Cindy's post kinda confused me for a moment until I tried doing it myself and added a couple of cuties in it too. I suppose Nathan needs to do someting about locking galleries so people can't go adding entries willy-nilly to official contests.

And I'll join Cindy in admitting to be a cuteness-addict too. ;)

[Jubilee]

Awww.. I can't vote for my own kittens!

/ali

[Akenmaat]

I'd have to say that given those options I'd go with the old 3 vote system. Given my preference though I'd go for a 3 vote system that allows you to rank 1st, 2nd and 3rd and wieghts them differently giving a much more acurate representation of what people think.

This is the system I prefer as well - with each spot having different weight (i.e. 1st = 3 pts, 2nd = 2 pts, 3rd = 1pt.)

[Duende]

Awww.. I can't vote for my own kittens!


That's another thing... the inability to vote on your own entries. What if in an actual contest, you think your own entry is one of the best? OK, that probably won't happen in my case.. but what about when Cindy or Anders tries to vote? ;)

[pae]

The Golden Toadstools are like that. I feel sorry for Cheeba who always wins but can never vote for his own.

[Wren]

I never vote on my own entry in any contest, whether I'm allowed to or not and regardless of whether I think mine is the best entry. It's one thing to vote your mini a point or two higher than the average on CMON or something like that, but I feel weird about it in a contest. (Though I won't say I've never been tempted.) I appreciate every vote I get whether I win or not, so I try to use mine to show some appreciation for others. (And I must have somewhat left field taste, cause a lot of the times stuff I like doesn't win. ;->) But that's not to say I think anyone who does vote for themselves is morally bankrupt or anything. :->

[Ritual]

Usually I don't vote in the categories I enter myself! I don't want to vote on my own entry, but I don't want to vote against it either, so I think the fair way to deal with it is to not vote at all...

[Nathan Caroland]

Back in town now.

I'm looking to have some mod work done on the gallery which will allow for three votes, but that likely won't get implemented until after this upcoming contest so we will most likely go with keeping it gallery/forum poll voting but in the near future I will want to move this over to gallery completely.

You can't vote on your own stuff, yup, your right, but that's only because I haven't fiddled with the gallery yet and when it comes to being uploaded and displayed next time about, all the entries will be displayed as coming from 'contest' so that would allow for votes from you, not that it matters this time about.

Which brings up another question - do ya'll like to keep everything anonymous or just open? I like anonymous but at the same time, there are some painters out there that you can just recognize, no matter what, or someone will out, or out themselves and I may not find out about it, and then you get friends and family doing the vote thing anyhow. So, public knowledge or anonymous (keep in mind I'll make up my own mind about this, but I am curious to thoughts on this).

[Ritual]

I like it to be kept anonymous, even though I recognise some people's work. I think it's fun to guess who done what and even though some painters are instantly recognisable I think that keeping things anonymous prevents biased voting quite well.

[Wren]

Anonymous does have its attractions. I'm not a great one for playing the guessing game of who painted what, but if the name was just sitting right there, I can't say it wouldn't influence me one way or the other. Which might be positive sometimes (wow, this is a step up for X), and negative (well I think Y can paint better than this). Also some people do play the guessing game, and I think it's fun for them to try and figure out painters and then see if they're right when everything is revealed at the end. Anonymous also generally ensures that it's mostly new work being shown, not some Demon winning piece from two years ago.

On the down side, it can have a limiting effect on the number of entries. If I've just finished something or I've got a commission or for whatever reason I have something that fits the contest wonderfully but I've already shown WIP or I can't guarantee pics won't come out before the contest, I just can't enter it. There have been some disqualifications because of stuff being shown by people other than the painter, and that's a shame. Also it can be painful to folks to feel like they're waiting forever to show off their latest and greatest.

On the whole I think I lean to anonymous. I do find it annoying to have to choose between entering Wyrd contests and another contest/commission on occasion. But I'd hate to see this turn into a contest where people are just entering the best thing they've done in the past 5 years even if it's already won other contests or been showcased extensively. It's work to moderate the contests to ensure people are abiding by the anonymity rule. I think it'd be nigh on impossible to try and enforce a 'it must be new work' rule or something. Golden Toadstool has a rule like that and uses the honour system, but there are no prizes for GT, and very nice prizes for Wyrd contests, and let's face it, the shiny pewter goodies will tempt people to the dark side. ;->

[Thryth]

Hi,

I'm a really big fan of the anonymous entries (one of the reasons that I enter the Wyrd contests). As far as enforcing the rules, I think that you've done a great job. You could probably improve the "friends and family" problem by requiring membership for X months and/or having made Y posts before being allowed to vote, if you wanted to. The only thing that has crossed my mind to change from the current rules would be to not allow you to vote on your own entries.

To sum-up, I really like the rules the way that they have been for the year that I've been entering the contest. :)

[Skya]

I'm a strong opponent of the annonymous theory. I very much feel that a significant percentage of painters that enter either have a very distinct painting style or a very distinct photgraphy style. Not only that, but truely annonymous means hiding out in your basement and not painting when others are around, not getting critiques of inprogress work and so on. Given how much of this community builds itself on the sharing of ideas, annonymoty not only seems impractical, but also counter productive.

As for for the friends and family thing, I really just dont see it as an issue, but then a lot of my friends and family are into painting and would be rahter insulted to think that their vote shouldnt count, so I'm probably not the person to talk to about that issue.

In terms of the point Wren brings up about people just entering the best thing they've done in the last five years, we've found a reasonable way to deal with that at the GenCon painting compititions. Stipulate that it has to be a peice that has not been previously published online or elsewhere. That means that anything that has appeared anywhere from on someone's personal or proffessional website to CMon, White Dwarf or any online competition is not eligible. However, that's GenCon and I tend to think this goes a bit overboard for your average online competition. I would be inclined to state instead that it must be a piece that has not previously placed in any competition and has not been used for advertising purposes. A piece done for an online catalog would definately have been done for advertising, and if you really dont want pieces that were entered in other contests replace "placed" with entered, but I tend to think that giving a second shot to those who are not placing really encourages people to enter. Not only that but it means people who dont normally do a lot of work and might otherwise only enter one contest a year can expand out into the larger community.

Anyways a lot of how the wording is is done depends on what you're trying to do. Are you trying to encourage more entries or are you really gung ho about wanting pieces done specifically for the contest you're putting on? These questions decide the tone of a contest. Not caring about if the pieces have been seen previously, or even entered previously works well for a manufacturers contest were the idea is to get as many entries as possible of a particular line, or a set group of minis. If your miniatures selection is much wider, then limiting it newer less shown work encourages creativity, which can also be done by adding interesting secondary prizes like Most Bizzare, or Most Colorful, things of that nature.

So yeah that's my 2 cents, can you tell I've thought about this a lot?

[Ritual]

So yeah that's my 2 cents, can you tell I've thought about this a lot?

I guess the length of my post above shows that I HAVEN'T thought much about this subject... :D And actually, I wouldn't mind either way. There's some good points for both sides and, while if the decision was mine I'd go for anonymous, I can easily live with public entires too.

[Skya]

I guess the length of my post above shows that I HAVEN'T thought much about this subject... :D And actually, I wouldn't mind either way. There's some good points for both sides and, while if the decision was mine I'd go for anonymous, I can easily live with public entires too.

Heh. I can live with anonymous, I'd just very much prefer it otherwise. However I cant take seriously a contest where the current winners are tabulated up to the minute and available to see before deciding how to vote. Wont neccissarily stop me from entering given that I've come to appreciate this crowd, but I definately cant take it seriously.

[cdukino]

I prefer the anonimous, more due to new never enteerd anywhere antries than actually knowing the painter. But then again anonimous does make you judge the paintjob more perhaps instead of how well did that painter do or did he do less well than normally and so on and have that count towards the voting.

But I definatly vote for hidden scores till the very end to prevent (well for a part atleast) strategic voting or following masses when in dount... the I don't know which one to pick... oh most people voted for nr 5... must be then best one then I'll join in.

[Hinton]

I'd say that the anonymous option is the way to go. Without it, there can be all kinds of problems.

[Nathan Caroland]

Alrighty, added a new option to the polls in order to keep everything hidden. Its going to be up for the next day or so, and ya'll can vote three times in there, and then take a look and see what happens.

Hopefully it'll work out like I want it to. We'll see. Input is appreciated.

[Duende]

Oops, I only voted on one and now I'm shut out. The old system actually had it where it said "you can vote on three" and wouldn't shut itself out until it got the three votes. Now the only way I could change my vote or any mistakes would be to contact and bug Nathan about it.
I do like that it hides the vote tallies, though. Seeing who was winning before kinda took away the suspense.

I also prefer anonymous submissions, it ensures paintjobs that haven't been seen upteen times already and provides a better test of personal skill since painters can't post WIP's for input. (Kinda like school, you can get homework help, but during test time, you can't bug your buddies for help.) And sure, some people have painting styles that are easily recognizable, but lots of others don't. And some still surprise you, like Cindy did in the last Rotten Harvest, I was really NOT expecting that Rackham zombie dwarf to be hers, I'm used to her doing more "cutesy" minis.

Well, that just my 2¢ worth. :)

[wiccanpony]

adding my two cents.......I like the 3 votes and anonymous .

I also never vote for myself.... it's a personal thing with me.

[Ritual]

That new poll with the hidden results seems to work nicely! :)

[vincegamer]

Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn.
As long as there are random schmuck prizes I'll keep entering since that's the only way I'll get something (though to be fair I did come in 4th in the Something Wyrd comp so you never know....)

[EricJ]

I sort of think similar to Skya on the issue of anonymity. I don't really see the point to it, I think we've all graduated gradeschool and issue of popularity contests dictating voting results is largely left in our past. I definitely think that this crowd is generally mature enough to handle it. Also if the results of the vote are hidden until the polls are closed, then there is no scheming to get those votes you need. And if you've noticed, once results are released, the comments and views for minis goes WAY down. Thus is the artist actually wanted to have a dialog about their work, they couldn't really do it anymore in the comments section and would likely have to repost it as it's own thread elsewere. I think the potential for participants to benefit is greatly reduced keeping entries anonymous until results posted.

I like the 3 vote system, but also think they should be weighted for 1st, 2nd and 3rd.

[Thryth]

I sort of think similar to Skya on the issue of anonymity. I don't really see the point to it, I think we've all graduated gradeschool and issue of popularity contests dictating voting results is largely left in our past. I definitely think that this crowd is generally mature enough to handle it. Also if the results of the vote are hidden until the polls are closed, then there is no scheming to get those votes you need. And if you've noticed, once results are released, the comments and views for minis goes WAY down. Thus is the artist actually wanted to have a dialog about their work, they couldn't really do it anymore in the comments section and would likely have to repost it as it's own thread elsewere. I think the potential for participants to benefit is greatly reduced keeping entries anonymous until results posted.

I like the 3 vote system, but also think they should be weighted for 1st, 2nd and 3rd.


I just wanted to comment on your comment. :)

Even if you say that everyone is is mature (thanks for the complement!, BTW :D) I think that it really opens-up the competition to abuse. All it would take is for someone to wants to game to system to join and do-so.

Just my two cents...

[Ritual]

Technically it should be possible to have a 1st, 2nd and 3rd vote using a similar poll, but I'm not sure the software of this forum has that alternative.

In the current voting poll the boxes you check are so called "check boxes". Their function is that you can check any number of boxes in a given set. The other alternative is the so called "radio buttons" whose function is that you can only chose one from a given set. So, three sets of radio buttons (one for 1st place, one for 2nd and one for 3rd) should solve the problem. But that would mean having a bit of code that does the numbers... and I'm not sure there is.

[Nathan Caroland]

When I say having the knowledge of the individual painting I don't mean that it can be shown anywhere else, just when it is posted, it automatically has that persons name instead of 'contest'. The entry would still have to be painted specifically for the contest and not shown elsewhere, wips or otherwise.

[Skya]

EricJ, you make my point very clearly.



I just wanted to comment on your comment. :)

Even if you say that everyone is is mature (thanks for the complement!, BTW :D) I think that it really opens-up the competition to abuse. All it would take is for someone to wants to game to system to join and do-so.

Just my two cents...


See I dont get that. Excactly *how* does it open it to abuse? Do you think that people are going to tell the whole interent, "I did this one go vote for it?" Even if they do, if it's anonymous people can still do that in private anyways. There's no way to truely police it so what's the point in trying? You could I suppose make rule that if you're going to link to the contest you have to link to the main page so that people are at least forced to see everything, but it doesnt seem neccissary given that Nathan already keeps track of votes from people that dont actually look through the pictures.

As for the new poll it appears to work, but I checked three, voted and then later realized that I could check all of them and didnt find out what would happen if I did so and voted.

[Nathan Caroland]

I simply would have voided all your votes if you had checked all of them as I've done in the past or when folks only vote for one and don't bother with the rest.

[EricJ]

I think that as long as you need to be logged in to vote, and there is someone making sure 50 new accounts aren't created from the same IP and do nothing but vote, then the potential for abuse does go way down. And since there is someone making sure new fake accounts aren't popping up, then I think we're ok.

[callumrice]

I think it works grand the now. No need for tinkering, there are enough police and regulations out there without throwing another one in the pot. Its all a laugh anyway, This site, to me, is much more about fun than competition. Thats why I like it here. Lets keep it that way.

Now, whos up for a game of paintball???!

[Hinton]

I think that as long as you need to be logged in to vote, and there is someone making sure 50 new accounts aren't created from the same IP and do nothing but vote, then the potential for abuse does go way down. And since there is someone making sure new fake accounts aren't popping up, then I think we're ok.

Of course, there are ways around that as well. There really isn't any guarenteed way that will stop the potential for cheating. I agree that we're all adults here and we are, for the most part, mature. Personally, I know I would never do anything like that because what would be the point? Winning by cheating in any way, shape or form is a hollow victory and I don't want that.

Thryth had a great suggestion saying that a person had to be a member for "X" amount of time or had to have "Y" amount of posts in order to vote in a contest. For example, let's say that they have to be a member at least 30 days prior to the announcement of the contest and must have at least 25 (or some other number) of posts in order to vote. This encourages people to be active on the forums instead of simply coming in, voting and then disappearing until the next contest.

Just my thoughts and opinions on that.

[Stupidcow]

I'll personally go for 3 votes, with weightage for 1st 2nd & 3rd, hidden till poll is closed & the painter anonymous.

We all know the disadvantages of the 1 vote system. The 3 vote system is good but then its not so fair if the best get the same 1 vote as the 2nd & 3rd. By awarding 3 pts to 1st 2 pts to 2nd so on we get away with this problem.

Keeping the votes hidden till poll is closed helps eliminates some unwanted votes manipulation. It prevents the voters from keeping their votes and watching how the results are before casting votes.

Keeping the entries anonymous prevents voters from voting based on the usual standards of the painter rather then the model itself. Eventhough we can spot someone's work its still a good idea to keep it that way.

[Nathan Caroland]

Well, as for this contest, it'll remain the same ol' same ol' with the voting in the forums through the polls, the entries through the gallery and anonymous and with the same 3 votes in the poll.

As of right now, there is no way to give extra votes or a weigh system to particularly entries (1st, 2nd, 3rd) and that would require some serious mod work which would entrail hiring a coder, which of course entails money. Maybe down the road if we are financially sound and I can afford something along these lines but odds are, not going to happen any time soon.

At the very least I have managed to mod the voting system so that votes can't be seen until the contest over which seemed to be the biggest gripe folks had.

As for the rest of it, I'll mull it over. Good points on both sides.

[pae]

Nathan, I'm a code monkey, and I've messed with php before. Maybe it's something I could mess around with on my own server.

[demi_morgana]

heya, and greetings to all wyrd users :D
looks like I missed interesting discussion here... :(
as for me annonymous entries + 3 votes per IP are best choice :)
can't wait to see the contest gallery