yeah, you are mega right about that, something i have learned from this comp. I had no idea they were going to come up this big, lesson learned i guess, I reckon i could be scoring a lot higher if i had have followed that tip of yours. in the flesh it is a very crisp, unified paint job of which i am relatively proud of.
I think you'd be better off with smaller pix. The large picture size is magnifying all the flaws, while diminishing the overall effect. The lighting could also be a bit better - a softer, more diffuse light is better for photographing minis.