Format for Monthly Competitions

[Pounder]

Regarding unit animation previews. I would like to retract my entry in this month's competitions because I only have the preview of the run for the kriegsmarine. When I applied the sharpening of the image I applied it to the storyboard, not to the individual images. When I made the preview with Animation Shop I used the Run.flc file to make the preview.

Thanks.

Are you saying that you want to replace the preview or withdraw from the competition, I hope that you stay in the competition.

Edit: and this post should have gone in the submissions thread

 

[Gary Childress]

Competition with ones self is done at home and Competition in a Contest is done against another individual's work.
Therefore, no contest should be held with only one individual's work involved. The Artist can submit their work and unless there is at least one other individual who has entered the contest, the contest should be postponed until there is another entry from a different individual.
If an Artist Creates something in December, it could not win a Monthly first to be eligible if the Annual Competition is held at the same time so it could not be entered...I therefore suggest that the Monthly Competition be held Before the Annual Competition in December. This would provide the means to allow all work for the Year to be voted on for the Monthly as well as the Yearly Competitions in all Areas.

Naturally, since the Annual Competition is to decide what work is best for the Year...it should include all work done in the Year. Because the Annual Entries must first Win a Monthly Competition, it is best to hold the December Annual Competition for the Year after the December Monthly Competition.

Edit: Concerning the Entries in any of the Contests... If there are few entries in any area such as Leaderheads and there are no Monthly winners, then I believe all could be entered in the annual Competitions because all of these competitions are to select the Best in it class. Monthly and then what is Best for the Year. If there are too few to have a monthly, then enter all in the Annual...simple.

The only problem I see with holding off until there are more entries is what do you do if in a month's time the original submitter may have come up with nother LH worth submitting into competition?

 

[Pounder]

The only problem I see with holding off until there are more entries is what do you do if in a month's time the original submitter may have come up with nother LH worth submitting into competition?

They can have one entry per month, I think it is still up in the air whether to have anything other than monthly and annual competitions.

The consensus seems to be not to change anything about the competitions.

 

[againsttheflow]

The consensus seems to be not to change the content and/or number (3) of the competitions. I was one of the naysayers in the other thread put I'd still pull for a quarterly LH comp to make them more competitive. If the best two went you'd still only have max 8 LH's at the end of the year. I'm happy either way.

 

[RedAlert]

I haven't really thought either of them through, but here's a couple of ideas for the leaderhead competition, assuming the number of entries does not increase. Probably bad ideas, both, but I think it's obvious that the leaderhead comopetition, as it is currently, isn't working too well.

Option One
- Wait until the end of the year to see how many leaderheads have been submitted.
- Divide the year into subannual competitions based on the number of leaderheads submitted that year.
- Hold all the subannual competitions once the year is through.

Option Two
- Hold no subannual competitions
- Hold only an annual competition, all leaderheads submitted are eligible.

Opinions?

 

[Pounder]

I haven't really thought either of them through, but here's a couple of ideas for the leaderhead competition, assuming the number of entries does not increase. Probably bad ideas, both, but I think it's obvious that the leaderhead comopetition, as it is currently, isn't working too well.

Option One
- Wait until the end of the year to see how many leaderheads have been submitted.
- Divide the year into subannual competitions based on the number of leaderheads submitted that year.
- Hold all the subannual competitions once the year is through.

Option Two
- Hold no subannual competitions
- Hold only an annual competition, all leaderheads submitted are eligible.

Opinions?

If there is only 1 or less per month, we may have to just wait for an annual competition.

Question, if there is only one entry this month (January) and lets says there are multiple entries in one of the following months (lets say March), do we then have a quarterly competition or do we wait to see what happens in April and May.

I say declare Varlin the monthly Winner for January, if there is no competition.

I don't think we can know what to do yet until we get a guage of how many entries we get in the next couple months.

I don't think we should declare a quarterly winner (for example) if there are only 2 entries in the 1st quarter and then lets say if later in the 3rd quarter we get 6 or eight entries, fairness becomes a problem.

Maybe we should ask the people who have been regular contributors in the past, if the have any plans to contribute in the future. We have seen a marked decline/halt by some of the past contributors.

For now the fairest thing may just be to leave things as is, because we can't predict the future, monthly's and annually.

 

[RedAlert]

If there is only 1 or less per month, we may have to just wait for an annual competition.

Question, if there is only one entry this month (January) and lets says there are multiple entries in one of the following months (lets say March), do we then have a quarterly competition or do we wait to see what happens in April and May.

I say declare Varlin the monthly Winner for January, if there is no competition.

I don't think we can know what to do yet until we get a guage of how many entries we get in the next couple months.

I don't think we should declare a quarterly winner (for example) if there are only 2 entries in the 1st quarter and then lets say if later in the 3rd quarter we get 6 or eight entries, fairness becomes a problem.

Maybe we should ask the people who have been regular contributors in the past, if the have any plans to contribute in the future. We have seen a marked decline/halt by some of the past contributors.

For now the fairest thing may just be to leave things as is, because we can't predict the future, monthly's and annually.

On the issue of predicting the future:
That's why I made the suggestion of holding all (if any) of the subannual competitions after the end of the year, as we would then know exactly how many entries were made and when they were made over the course of that year. This way, the issue of not being able to predict the future becomes moot. We would be in a much better position, with the benefit of hindsight, to decide on an appropriate format for the leaderhead competitions.

On the issue of fairness:
You could make the argument that having, as in your example, two entries in one quarter and six or eight entries in another quarter is unfair. But I would like to point out that such a format would be no less fair than, and certainly consistent with, the format of the monthly competitions. Look at the similarities - In your example, there is a large difference in the number of entries from one competition to the next. In the montly competitions, there is nothing to prevent just such an occurance, and in fact, it happens all the time. Both the monthly competitions and the proposed quarterly competitions are set by fixed timeframes, regardless of the number of entries. The only difference between the two would be the span of those timeframes.

 

[Pounder]

Good points.

So should we forgo the HOF entries for LH for the next few months, until we see the amount of competition.

 

[againsttheflow]

You could, I would suggest making April Fools the deadline if you are going to have quarterlies. If you decided it would be cool to have quarterlies and an annual come January again like Red is suggesting you could do that. I would just rather not see the format change mid-year.

 

[Kyriakos]

Im in favour of keeping everything the way it is. Either way it is known that not many LHs will be submitted. For all you know there may only be a couple this year. If a work is the sole one for a month, and is submitted, it should still win the trophy imo.

 

[RedAlert]

Good points.

So should we forgo the HOF entries for LH for the next few months, until we see the amount of competition.

I'm going to contradict myself a bit here and say that postponing the competitions is a little drastic, even if such a measure helps with certainty. And even considering that, it's not entirely necessary: As Varwnos has mentioned, we already have good reason to believe that the number of leaderhead entries this year will be similar to last year - that is, not many. But you're the boss, it's your decision. If you want to be safe, then maybe waiting a few months is the way to go. Whatever you decide, I agree with againsttheflow: consistency is important. I think once you decide what format you'll be using, be it now or a few months from now, you should stick with that format for the entire year, even if the amount of leaderhead entries changes.

Im in favour of keeping everything the way it is. Either way it is known that not many LHs will be submitted. For all you know there may only be a couple this year. If a work is the sole one for a month, and is submitted, it should still win the trophy imo.

I don't think it's a problem that a lone entry in a competition wins the trophy by default, I don't think that's necessarily unfair. I do think it's a problem if such instances aren't the exception, but the norm. This has become the case, and there is now a severe lack of actual competition in the leaderhead competitions. I believe this must be rectified.
I don't think it should be looked at as denying entries that would have recieved a trophy that trophy, because we have to remember we're dealing with two seperate trophies/competitions here: monthly and quarterly (or whatever super-monthly, sub-annual format is decided on). These are different beasts. We would simply be handing out trophies to the best entry of every few months; not in place of giving trophies monthly, but as an alternative to doing so. Those entries aren't not winning the [monthly] competition (they would be leaderhead of the month by default whether we held a competition or not), they're simply competing in a different competition. But I don't see the point in continuing going through all the trouble of holding official monthly competitions and recognizing monthly trophies, given the present situation.
While I agree that it is possible that there may only be a few entries at all this year, I don't think the fact of that possibility means that we should just stick with the current system. I believe that the subannual competitions should be x months in scope, where x is the optimal number of months at which single entries per competition cease to be the norm, but the exception.

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I hope some leaderhead makers will give their opinion on the topic. This effects them most of all.

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Also, has anyone given any more thought to a nominating system for wildcards in the yearly competition?
Are we still giving thought to that?