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Really nice work... good stuff, as always. Thanks to Daz for a good time in this one.
Impressive.
Congratulations to winners!
And best wishes to all participants - hope you got interesting experience by that.
Congratulations to the winners. Well deserved. The images posted here in this thread are also very impressive. I am disappointed that I cannot see all the submissions.
Where are the winners of the Sword and Sorcery contest posted?
DAZ posted the winners to their Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram accounts. There are links to the Twitter announcements in posts I made on the previous page of this thread if you want to see an "official " announcement. I also posted the winners here with the winning images for anyone like me who doesn't do social media so they can be seen here. I also tried to find the associated qualifying social media or gallery post for each image and added that link near the image title (DAZ didn't provide the image title or where it was posted info in their social media posts).
Since DAZ never put any info about the winners of the first season pass contests here in their forums, I thought I'd try to provide the winning images, and the additional info here, since they probably won't. It seems as if they may be trying to use social media (Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram) to interact with the user base and move away from using the forums. Social media does provide greater visibility outside the existing user base, so I can kind of understand why they might do it. But in the process they are leaving their long time users out of the loop. For me personally, if the trend continues I may finally be forced to get a social media account to "stay informed ", or just use what I have and move on. IMHO it seems increasingly clear that DAZ3D is more interested in growing their business with new users that buy lots of stuff than retaining the business of the long time users. I guess like everything else in tech, you either adapt and move forward or get left behind.
Forums are best things ever for me.
I'm glad this specific one is alive and crowded. Unlike polycount and others, whose userbase moved to discord, facebook or whatever.
No other format provides as useful information hierarchy and usability than this. Also years and years of valuable information and advice to access.
Modern social media are too focused on "only the current moment matters" idea, which is why instagram, twitter and others only have functions to show "recent stuff".
DAZ has also put up a few honorable mentions now. Here is the twitter link: https://twitter.com/daz3d/status/1425112213480779784 or the link to their Facebook page (they have two more images here): https://www.facebook.com/pg/DAZ3D.FanPage/posts/?ref=page_internal
Congratulations!! Here are the Honorable Mentions from Greendragon Gecko, Rafael D., James O., Color Galeria, Mizh K..
I was only able to provided the image with image title and artist name, and links to the original post for one image
. I couldn't find the others, so I just linked to the image that DAZ3D provided. This is something that I think DAZ3D should do. The Honorable Mention artists provided free advertisement for DAZ3D with their entries, yet DAZ3D is not providing them with the potential for additional traffic to their "portfolio" or Social Media page with a link (kind of disappointing that they don't honor the artists by adding information to help promote them, and they have ignored posting information in their own forums).
OK off the soap box and on to the fantastic Honorable Mentions!!!
Greendragon Gecko posted this image on DeviantArt
Image Title:Hello I am Fi (Gallery Link)
Image Title: Outrider by rafaeldew in the gallery here (Gallery Link)
Image Title: Eleven Blademaster by electromemphis in the gallery here (Gallery Link)
Edit: WOOT!! I found two more of the images in the gallery here!
Thanks DustRider for keeping us posted... I have NO idea WHO any of the winners are :( One gentleman who won has an 18+ web page and I don't look at those pages. Only PG for me :)
Congratzi to the winners!
Congratulations to all the winners! So many amazing entries!
Congratulations to the winners! Beautiful renders!
In line with the others that responded. Congrats to the winners!
Most of them are exceptional, but there were a couple that I thought were on the meh side and it has me wondering what the judges were thinking with those. Among those, one clearly looked like it was slapped together in a couple hours.
Perhaps I took the Sword and Sorcery theme too literally as I tried include both a sword and an element of magic in my three entries. Many of the winners didn't have either. So then it was just a general fantasy theme?
Oh well, I guess I just will see what the next contest will be and will try again.
Sooooo, not wanting to come off as a sore loser or anything, but by I am given the impression that what you are saying is that unless you are on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram, your entry probably wasn't given much thought? I am VERY surprised that Daz didn't post the winners here on their own forum and it took someone (like yourself) to do so. I am on DeviantART and sadly, part of the contest did mention how popular your submission would be on social media and I doubt the vast majority of viewers are there. Still, I don't feel that should have been a requirement to be on one of those big three as I don't feel a need to be on them. Further, I don't get the reason why as those big three are really not art related sites. So this has me wondering that if all contests have this requirement, that it will be always shifted in favor of those that post on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram, making it more of a popularity contest first before the submission is even taken into consideration. Perhaps those that headed up the contest on Daz could chime in on that as that is the impression that I am given.
Maybe they will post it in their DAZ 3D site blog?
Or maybe they will create a new DAZ 3D site tab for archival of past contest entries and results, or at least the winners of those past contests.
It's not very effective advertising reach when even the entrants into a contest don't know the results and see the winners of the contests. Didn't see their renders, didn't see a list of the products they used, didn't see any explanation of any post work methods and filters or any background images used to inspire interest in good techniques and styles. No talk from DAZ 3D or PixelLogic about how ZBrush was used to sculpt say DAZ Dragon 3 or one of the DAZ 3D female models. Seems like a wasted opportunity.
I think the greatest number of winners posted their entries here in the DAZ3D Gallery, but there were also winners fromm DA and ArtStation, so I don't think posting to social media made a difference. However, with this contest, and the contests associated with the first Season Pass, DAZ has made it clear that they have no interest in posting the results of their social media focused contests anywhere but on their social media accounts (Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram). One can only guess at the reason for this, and my guess is to get more followers on those platforms (more followers means greater visibility). Also keep in mind that these platforms reach beyond the online art communities, giving DAZ3D visibility to a larger and more diversified potential audience.
For the season pass contests, forum participants had to post links here in the forum to the announcements on social media so others here could see the winning images if they wanted to (I was interested in the contests to see if it might be worth getting a future season pass and enter the contests to recoup some of the cost, but decided the contests and results were too unpredictable to be a viable strategy). I expected that DAZ would do the same with this contest, but hoped my expectations would be proven wrong, I waited for over an hour after the first announcement on twitter to post the actual images and links to the original entries just in case DAZ was going to prove me wrong. Unfortunately they didn't, no post(s) here or on their blog. Due to the prizes available, I put a great deal of work into my image (around 40 hours), and I expect many others did as well. Posting the images here, and links to the entry where anyone interested in learning more about it, was just my way giving them the recognition that DAZ3D seemed uninterested in giving (especially in the case of the honorable mentions which I don't believe got any prizes). Yes, they posted their names, but didn't give the image titles or where they could be found. Just a personal thing, I thought they deserved the potential extra traffic to their galleries.
I'm not sure just how much weight "how popular your submission would be on social media" actually had in the final results, my guess is very little. For example, several contest entries were on the first page of the "Popular" category in the DAZ3D Gallery, none of those entries were winners or honorable mentions. Using my own entry (on DA) as an example, it had a lot more favorites, comments and views than the winners from DA did. The comment made by Daz-Bryce here in this thread "For judging we mainly look at composition and proficiency within 3D skill and storytelling, but as we narrow down our selection our judges do look at social media posts as they are linked." indicates that these would not be a primary factor in the judging, and the results support that idea.
I grabbed an explanation of the judging criterial posted by DAZ on one of winning entry posts on FaceBook. You can see it below. I think the fact that the question was asked there, and it's being asked here as well, may indicate that DAZ needs to be a bit clearer on contest rules, judging criteria, etc. A contest with serious prizes like this one had, also brings serious competition. IMHO they need to up their game to ensure everyone feels like the competition was fair and equitable for everyone. The simple fact that all the entries are essentially "hidden" from the participants (i.e. no easy way to find them, they are all visible on the internet, but finding them is not easy) creates an air of secrecy (no, I'm no accusing DAZ of trying to hide things, I just think organizers might not be looking at the big picture from the outside in).
Every serious competition I have ever been involved in both as a participant and as a judge has had very specific judging criteria, with points associated with each criteria. That way the participants know exactly what is being asked and what will be important for judging in the final entry. The judges also know what is important, and are "guided" by the score sheet to sort of ensure they judge in a consistent manner (i.e. no winners that didn't follow the entry guidelines and win just because their entry is simply "better art" than all those that did follow the guidelines). Any art contest is very subjective based on the likes and dislikes of the judges. The role of the contest organizer(s) should be to make the contest as objective and equitable as possible. DAZ may have had a score sheet for the judges, and had specific parameters/points for judging. Unfortunately everything we (the contestants) were given was rather ambiguous and very open for interpretation. I'm guessing that was intentional to get more interest in the contest and encourage more entries. This is great for a "let's have some fun" contest, because your kind of just throwing stuff at the wall to see what sticks. However, the prizes for this contest pushed it past the "let's just have some fun" and I'm sure there were many people entering to win, and not to just have fun.
Another potential issue with this contest was that DAZ2D selected which category your entry went into. There were entries I saw that I felt easily fit into more than one category. So the question is did the images that fit more than one category get to compete in more than one category or only the one DAZ thought it should be in. Yes, not a big issue, but again another point that can create distrust among the entrants (i.e. the entrant believes their entry must have been placed in the wrong category because they "should" have won in the other category).
Of course it's easy to criticize and say what could be done better. It's not easy to run a big contest. I just thought I'd throw out a couple ideas in case anyone is interested. Bottom line though, it would seem that this was a contest to 1) help advertise DAZ3D in social media circles and 2) to provide some awesome art work to be used to advertise what can be done with DAZ3D assets (I could be wrong, there may be other reasons, but these seem the most logical to me).
With respect to my own entry, and how I personally feel about the contest, I'll share a few things. First, I feel I need to improve a lot to ever even come close to winning in a contest of this caliber. The winners are all great images, and they should be very proud of their efforts!! The only way you improve is to try, so I did (try), and I'm happy with my attempt at making art. I entered knowing I probably would not win (like 99% sure), but the theme fit the type of image I like to make. I did the best I could, and am very happy with the results. My official entry was at DA, and it has done extremely well there. It has over 4K views (on the gallery page - 5.3K views on the stats page), 69 favorites, and 12 comments. I also put the image on Renderosity and here in the DAZ3D Gallery. It's exceeded my expectations in both of these galleries as well. It actually made it onto the first page of the popular images in the gallery here, and has remained there for several days (55 likes - woohoo!!). This is the first time I've ever made it to the first page for the popular images in the new gallery!! At Rendo - 23 favorites 118 views, 28 likes, and 22 awesome comments. Yes I would have loved to have placed in the contest, but I'm still a huge winner because the response to the image has been so much better than I ever thought it would be. I use the gallery responses to tell me if I'm doing something right since you never get feedback on loosing contest entries.
Sorry for the wall of text - I should just stick to making images and not participating in the forums.
"...but as we narrow down our selection our judges do look at social media posts as they are linked."
This should not even be a consideration if the contest is really about storytelling, 3D skill, or artistic talent, period.
Agreed, a lot of what you mention here is why I decided not to enter, even though this contest and the prizes were right up my alley. I am happy to see that, at least in my opinion, very deserving entries won their respective first place prizes. However, I'd really like to see the other entries, not to judge them or point out that one should have won instead, but just to see a lot of art that interests me in one place.
When I saw one of the winners in particular, it wowed me - seriously I said 'Wow!' outloud. It was just so dam good! Maybe some day I will reach that skill... but then again probably not. I am not able to do some things because of an illness (temporary), and I am happy to be back to Daz and having fun creating stuff that might not be on that level... but I am having fun.
Sword and Sorcery is an established fantasy genre, with a fairly classic pseudo-medieval theme but usually focused more around personal quests and small adventuring parties. Dungeons and Dragons can be close if it's a player driven plot, but one of the classic examples is Conan. The Hobbit might just about count, but the Lord of the Rings less so, because the former is a dwarves' quest to reclaim their home, but the latter focuses on big world ending threats that elevate it more into the high fantasy genre.
If you just said "Fantasy" though, that could be Alice in Wonderland, Dracula or even Star Wars, so I suspect they wanted to narrow it down.
TL;DR: Swords and/or sorcery are not necessarily mandatory for a "Sword and Sorcery" render.
Yeah, hopefully "popularity in social networks" isn't very impactful, otherwise talented newcomers or just those who are not as social/popular for whatever reasons, would have no chances.
Yes, I have been doing some research myself and I have noticed some of the winners did come from other places than just the big three social media groups. Still when I read that Daz posted the results of the contest ONLY on those sites, I was thinking that their judging might have been skewed to favor those. So I am glad to hear that wasn't the case.
Yes, I had put quite a bit of time in the three pieces I posted for the contest as well and that did bring me to the second thing that I was miffed about, but more on that later.
Probably little, but initially, when I read that AND then found out that the results were only posted on the "big three", I started to think otherwise.
Okay
I have noticed this as well from past contests which I didn't enter. Sometimes the rules are vague and with the contest prior to this one, I had asked a question and I never received a reply to that. Also, in terms of the judging, while most of the picks were great, there were a couple of winners that left much to be desired even for an honorable mention. These couple winners. Well, I could see the items they used it and it really didn't look like they put more than a couple hours into the render. So that was another thing I was miffed out. The judging seemed inconsistent.
Understood. But like I said above, I feel the judging was all over the place and while some pieces it could easily be seen that a lot was put into it, there were those that I felt were too simple and really didn't convey the theme. However, like me, there were those that took "Sword and Sorcery" to a literal level and incorporated both a sword and some kind of magic in their scenes as I have. Granted, from what I read above, Daz mainly was after a medieval fantasy theme, as fantasy could main sci-fi or other branch of fantasy. Okay, so I get that, but if they said "Medieval Fantasy," I think more people would have gotten the picture.
Yeah, I didn't know they would have separated them like that until the end. I thought your render was going to be judged in all three areas, so there was some ambiguity there too.
Yes, I got that gist as well.
I think what you created certainly exceeded my own works. The time you put into it is clear as well. You had some lighting issues, yes, but to me it wasn't glaring.
For the most part yes. But there were a couple that I would argue against easily.
I didn't think I would have won, but perhaps gained an honorable mention. I know that my main render I put far more time into it than at least one of the winners that I been griping about. In fact some of the honorable mentions were better. So again, it makes me wonder what the heck the judges were thinking when they awarded those as winners?
Same here, but the funny thing is that the one I put the most time into I didn't deem to be the best one. I thought the best one was the one I put the least time into and that was the one with a dragon in it. And it was a Dragon that I created with morphs and not just plonked it down into the render. But that said, it seems that the one I put the most effort in was the one that garnered the most likes on DeviantART.
Sweet! I think my top one, also on DA, garnered 3k views 17 favs and (sadly) one comment.
Nice! That is a good feeling. This wasn't the first time I was on the main page though, but lately my posts have been making in there.
I don't have a Renderocity account as of yet.
That's fine. You certainly have given me more insight into what was going on. At least with some of the winners being picked from other sources other than than the big three social media sites, that puts me more at ease knowing that perhaps my pieces were looked at. But I am still infuriated that the judging seemed all over the place and that something that was just plonked together in a couple hours shouldn't have been considered to place.
That was a nice clarification and it would have been nice if those heading the contest would have explained it that way. Still, if they said, "Medieval Fantasy", that would have been specific enough for me. Sword and Sorcery hinted at that and I took it literally, so all of my renders that I have posted have a sword and some magic element involved. The fact that it was pointing towards medieval quest adventures...well, that I didn't know. BUT thanks for clearing that up.
Yep, it seems their big contests are consistently inconsistent
. Having clear communication with regard to their rules and judging criteria, and how many points are associated with each would help out a lot (and making sure the judges actually follow it as well).
I tried to find your entries, but my Google-Fu failed me. Would you be willing to share a link to them? (Sounds like your gallery on DA does much better than mine. But I have the artistic vision of a rock ... lol - But I do keep trying,)
LOL! Indeed they are. Yeah, if they had multiple judges, it seems like thier criteria was all over the place. As I said, there were two winners, one in the 2nd place and one in the third place, that I feel shouldn't even have received an honorable mention. Both renders looked like they were slapped together in a few hours. I am not going to say which ones they were, but if you looked at all the winners, you probably can pick them out...easily.
Artistic vision of a rock? You are kidding me right? Your's should have been in there with the winners. When you said how much time you put into your piece, I believe it. There is a LOT of detail there. You captured the theme well and your lighting was great. I think I told you that if I was a judge, that one would have been one of the winners.
I am just steamed when I look at a piece and know that it was something slapped together and yet, it wins?!?! Yeah, I am bothered by that. One didn't even use the time appropriate animal, as if one cannot notice the difference between a dragon and a dinosaur. But apparently the deception worked and that person won.
As for my entries, here they are:
This was my first entry and it got the most views and favs on DeviantART:
https://www.deviantart.com/ravendiablo/art/Faun-VS-Drider-Alondra-and-Dragana-Contest-Entry-887016337
Ironically this is also the one I put the most time into.
Next up is this one:
https://www.deviantart.com/ravendiablo/art/Baylana-Guardian-of-the-Sword-Contest-Entry-887477766
Again, fairly time consuming, but not as involved as the first one and it received some attention.
Ironically, the last one I submitted, while it took me the least time to do, I thought would garner the most attention because it has a dragon in it:
https://www.deviantart.com/ravendiablo/art/Ragna-Rocks-with-her-dragon-Blaze-Daz-Contest-887735332
This one is my favorite and mainly because it isn't static. The dragon is flying over a river and belching fire. Then there is the burning forest in the background. I really thought this one would garner the most attention, but it actually received the least. Of the three, that one took me three nights to do, which was the fastest. Really, most of the work went into the lighting and the dragon I had made earlier, but never released it. I think it would have taken me much longer had not for that.
Enjoy!