Canadian Golden Daemons: Your thoughts?

[Chrispy]

Okay, by now everyone\'s had a chance to look over the winners, but I would just like to get everyone/anyone\'s opinions.. Mine are as follows, fig by fig according to White Dwarf #275.. If you don\'t have it, then I\'ll link images from the Canadian GW page then:
WH40K Single Miniatures:
1st place Brother\'s Keeper
Wow. the idea, modelling and painting are smooth, so I would give it a 9. Only reason it didn\'t get a 10 is that every pic of it looks a little dark in the center, so I rationalize it must be the mini. Also, GW should figure out what fig they\'e talking about, as they say its a DE Lord, when obviously it\'s Urien Rakarth...
2nd place Scourge Sybarite
Everyone by now knows how I feel about the evil one, so no comment.
2nd Place Karandras
Okay, what gets me here is that while this fig is well painted, I would only give it an 8. Reason being there is nothing new about it, it looks like an Eavy Metal mini... I personally think the honorable mention is much better.. and no, I play eldar so I\'m not partial to Space Marines..

Warhammer Single Miniature:
1st Place: Dark elf Sorceress
Same problem as above, not really interesting and no real interplay of colors or anything to make it stand out. I\'d give it a 7, a witch elf with a staff. Big whoop.
2nd place undead Brettonian Sorceress
Now this I\'d give a 8.5 to. Once again, though red is the main color, but the smoothness of the painting and the moddeling on the base is what sets this apart.. Maybe GW is thinking that Belladonna is being done to death at the Golden Daemons.. which it seems she is.
3rd Place Champion of Slaanesh
Now I give this a 9 but I\'d like to see more shots. I had a tough time figuring out which arm goes where. For the first time, the colors are getting contrasting with each other in this category along with good moddeling and basing.

WH40K Best Squad:
1st Place Banshees of Ulthwe
9.5.. Finally a bright enough entry for me! The dark banner offsets the white base which would look a little weird. I also like the praetorian holding his ears but the sandbangs could have ben a bit better. To me, the swords also look wierd, like he was going for lightning but it came out as scales.
2nd Place Ravenborn Squad
8.5 based on the moddeling work and painting but this pose is too static for me. A banner would have made the whole thing a lot less flat.

3rd Place Children of the Light HQ
10.. See, this looks a heluva lot better than 2nd place because it flows and the colors are limited but play off of each other.

Warhammer Regiment:
1st Place Dire Wolves
6.5.. I like the idea but it does not make up for the horrific base and painitng. There are things in there that make me say \"what the heck is that about?\"

2nd place Brettonian Men at arms
I give it a 6 because again it\'s too bland and normal looking. This looks like a regiment for playing if you wanted to spend that much time making it look decent.

3rd Place Stone Trolls
5.. even uglier than the rest! to me this said \"Ill black prime and highlight with nothing in between\". Bases are dull and not that well executed either.

WH40K Large Monster:
1st Place Tau Commander
10. Absolutly stunning. While I can pick out the brush strokes in the big pic, the blending, moddeling and little extras like the Tau language scrolls make this stunning.

2nd place Biel-Tann Wave serpant
A wave serpant is a large monster? Oh, right we combined those categories.. 8 for everything, but If I picked a square inch and looked over it I\'d give it a 7.

3rd Place Hive Tyrant
Now, I\'m split here so I\'d have to give it an 8.5.. Once agian, the red tyrant with wings has been done and the bone while smooth could have been used a lot more. I give a higher score though for the guy having the bollocks to use a dread as a base!

Warhammer Large Monster:

1st Place Daemon Prince
9.5, cheif reason I did not vote higher is because of the flame on the wings.. this tells me the daemon\'s going to crusie the local car hop for chicks rather than kill people. Base looks like Ratfink\'s nightmare too.


2nd Place Archaon
I take that back about Belladonna, Archaon\'s waaay over done. I have also seen better models than this so 7.5.

3rd place Snotling stand
What the hell did this guy do, bribe the judges? Ugly, ugly UGLY!!!! 5.5 and I\'m being generous.

Best Battle Scene:
1st Place Blue Thunda
8 overall for idea but a bit more could be done, your not telling me a little poof of smoke is what a fighta bomma leaves.. where\'s the smouldering crater.. in etither the bomma or the ground?

2nd place Skaven
9 for being faithful to the book cover and good painting and all that, but who are they fighting?

3rd Place: Stop in the name of.. uh oh
8.5 for idea, presentation and extras. However, if you look closly the books on the shelf are waaay out of proportion.

Large Scale Model:
1st place Orc Bust
Ahh, now I se Jordan Wright spent all his time on this.. but again, I\'ve seen better (Dirk\'s for example). 7.5

2nd Place White Panther
7 because the painting\'s good but it needs basing and little extras like insignias and such.



3rd Place Sergant Uziel
7.6 because the robe looks funky but I realize how hard it is to get a bolt pistol for Inquisitor.

Youngbloods:
For obvious reasons, none of these get above 7. The only real slight interest is that the 1st place winner sword looks like it\'s blue see through.. may or not have been intentional, though...

LOTR Film Scene:

1st Place: You Shall not Pass!
First Time I looked at this, I thought \"He got a piece of the movie framed, big whoop..\" Then I realized those were actually th LOTR minis! 10 because this is the best balrog ever! I\'m dying to know the lightbox secrets.. now if there was only a bigger pic... sigh...

2nd Place: Attack at weathertop
6 because it\'s just not that interesting or well executed. Not realistic or true to the movie. Where\'s the hobbits, eh?

3rd Place: I think I\'m getting the Hang of this..
7 for idea, mostly, but again it\'\'s not true to the movie and you have only 4 figs in a huge area.

Open Category:

1st place Goblin Fanatic
Kudos for scratchbuilding and skin tones. However, the face is off as well as the tunic, so 8.

2nd Place Tau Sniper
Torn here again.. while I\'d give the model and paint job a 9, the base has flash everywhere!! This is really distracting, so it would pull the whole thing down to 8.7

3rd Place Ogre Unit
Proof again Jordan is smoking crack! This is much better than the trolls, 8 even!! Maybe it\'s something to do with size restricitions.. But he could have made a bigger display base for these guys... size restricitons are pretty big in open category..

So that\'s my criticisms snd such. I tried to be unbiased about these scores. My congradulations to all the winners and best of luck in the future!

 

[Mengu]

Okay I can\'t resist the temptation and will comment on the categories that are interesting to me (in other words, fantasy).

In best single fantasy category, I think they were all kind of blah as far as concepts go. The third piece is the most interesting one. The paint job in all of them of course is quite good, no doubts there. If I was rating them, I\'d give them all 8\'s.

WH regiment category: Need bigger pics to judge these, but I\'d place them as they have been placed. I like the 1st place composition best. I\'d rate them 8, 7, 7.

WH Large Monster: 1st place has a superb base. I\'d give it a 9. I\'d rate 2nd and 3rd places at a 7. Yes the Archaon has been done to death, and I too have certainly seen better ones.

Best Battle scene: These are all awesome IMHO. I\'d give them all 9\'s. With better and closer up pictures, they may all get 10\'s.

LOTR Film Scene: Ugh... Need bigger pic for the 1st place, I can\'t see a thing. 2nd place is ok, I think the flames need some help, but I really like Aragorn\'s cloak. I\'d give it an 8. Again need bigger pic to understand what\'s going on in the 3rd scene.

Open Category: 1st place is really cool, but what\'s the scale on that guy? 8 if it\'s large scale, 10 if it\'s 25-30 mm. 2nd place is also a nice composition for a single, 9. The Ogre\'s are kind of boring to me. I\'d give them an 8.

ps. I did take a peek at the 40k categories too, and can\'t help but ask myelf, why oh why is there so much more effort going into 40k, than fantasy?

 

[Jericho]

I just gotta say that I was there and all the models, as well as mine, looked a lot better in person. Almost none of the photos in the mag or on the website do the models full justice. The lighting setup they had wasn\'t that great.

And Mengu? There were a handful of amazing 40k models and tons of great Fantasy models that were all about equal. There were regiments that I think could have placed but didn\'t even make first cut. Suffice it so say that there were many great Fantasy entries that didn\'t get showcased.

 

[Badaab]

Is it just me, or has the photography of the US and Canadian Golden Demon entries gone down the crapper?
If its your job to use the equipment, and you\'re taking photgraphs in a situation where you can control everything, there\'s no excuse for lousy photography. Please, GW, train your US staff.

 

[Jericho]

They couldn\'t really control everything given the setup they had. And that\'s what I meant... the lighting equipment at hand was inadequate to make the high dollar cameras worthwhile. At GD Canada I don\'t think they had much more than the green cloth backdrop and a lamp or two...

 

[nvstudios]

I have only one comment (for once). IT\'S A FLIPPIN\' PAINT POT LID!.... it LOOKS like a flippin\' paint pot lid.

See, only one comment.

:innocent:

 

[Impernouncable]

It is a paint pot lid. But I think it looks pretty snazzy as a piece of archetecture.

 

[nvstudios]

I know it is an actual lid, but it reminds me of the artist who cleverly fooled people by saying a toilet was art.

(No derogatory comment intended to the toilet artist, as he did nothing wrong, it\'s the idiots who followed him. And the hippies who said, if you say it\'s art, it\'s art. Damn hippies.)

 

[halon]

Crispy
I\'m afraid you\'re ratings are forgetting the point of why the competition exists. Your personal opinion is valid but completely overlooks GW\'s perspective. If you want to know why something was chosen while something else wasn\'t ask the question....\"will this figure help us sell more stuff?\" There will only be so many legitimate \"9\'s\" in any competition. Certainly not enough to fill the winners ranks. So for the 7\'s and 8\'s that make up the rest of the winners they have to fit the GW style mold in order to win. So a figure or regiment may not have the most interesting paint job from your perspective but it most closely fits into their mold of how the company wants the public to view the product. Creativity isn\'t really a judging criteria. If it was there wouldn\'t be 5 Gold Demon winners that painted the Brettonian Green knight just like the box lid. These pieces you rated 5\'s and 6\'s filled that perspective. Once you accept that this is how they are going to judge any piece they all become 8\'s. Some of the multiple Demon winners have figured this out and capitalized on it. How else can anyone explain someone winning with empire regiments more than once? Answer...they fit the style mold better than the other entries.

 

[Chrispy]

You make no sense halon.. creativity is definatly a judging criteria.. that\'s why there ISN\'T 5 Green Knights.. Bobby Wong won not only because of technique, but because he had creativity to make figs into a totally different scene. Heck, look at Jen Haley! Even though she was working with someone elses\' idea from the rules of a dark eldar scourage, she used a different look to it.. Heck, last year Jason Richards won in many categories and he only used a few peices of actual GW stuff!! True enough, most winners seem like the judges ask \"how much did they spend on this?\" but the conversions add to the artist\'s vision they had for the mini.

 

[Impernouncable]

Originally posted by nvstudios
I know it is an actual lid, but it reminds me of the artist who cleverly fooled people by saying a toilet was art.

The artist\'s name was Marcel Duchamp. A replica, the original was lost, of that piece was sold at Sotheby\'s in \'99 for $1,762,500 US. He was a founder of dadism, he also worked in surealism, futurism, and conceptual art as well as being a classically trained painter. And Fountain is art, no foolin\'.
As far as something being art because you say it\'s art, that\'s true. If you are an artist or a critic, or an art historian. At least that is the current social construction. Those three occupations make up a social group used to define the art market for the art consumer. Typically out of the three the artist actually has the least pull in the process and is regularly stuck in it\'s own category. A diagram of the art market would look a little something like this:
artist - critic/historian - patron/consumer
I\'m all three; artist, critic, and historian, as well as being a sociologist.
I appear to have gone a bit of a rant, sorry.

 

[halon]

Chrispy
I\'m afraid you\'re incorrect. Go back and look at your old White Dwarves. Over the years five different people have won Golden Demons by painting the Green knight like the box lid. In fact, two people won with it in the same competition. This is a contest to promote a specific painting scheme that fits within the general mold of their artistic and thematic conception. They do this to promote the product. So Mr Wong\'s Marines are a perfect example. Well painted, well converted, and well executed but he chose existing chapters with a standard paint scheme. I put it to you we would never have seen any of his pieces if he hadn\'t done this. Some further examples You will never see a non-green skinned ork, a metallic colored dragon, or a turquoise colored marine chapter. Why? because they own the visual rights to the green skinned orks and red painted blood angels (etc), while TSR owns the rights to metallic colored dragons and brown skinned orcs belong to Tolkeins estate. If they can\'t put it in the magazine you can\'t win with it. No matter how well it\'s painted. And for at least the American version it better be something new as well. An oop figure that you can only get from England won\'t get in either. So people can be as creative as they want with conversions but don\'t paint the space wolves anything but light blue, or Khorne figures without red armor or orks without green skin. IT can be done, and done well, just don\'t expect to win with it. Conversions and basing are the only real place where creativity is allowed. It\'s not stated in the rules, but it sure appears to be the case in the judging. So paint it well and use one of the existing color schemes and you have a shot at winning. Don\'t, and you won\'t.

 

[Chrispy]

Again, you have holes in this hypothesis.. take this for instance:

2nd place winner, Baltimore 2001. It\'s turqousie. It\'s not even a GW chapter, it\'s totally from the player\'s imagination.. True, the Green knight won that year but even then it too was turquoise and not green. Another point is that GW is not the only one with green orcs, WOTC (who has owned TSR for awhile..) have them in Magic: The Gathering. I\'m not going to get into a big heated debate here, so I\'ll just say once agian that the judges are subject to discrimination agianst cheaper, older models to sell more things but if they look ded \'orrid there\'s no way we would let them live..

 

[victoria]

Brown Ork

Im one of those multiple demon winners (8 and a sword) so I guess ive worked out a formula. When I design an entry the most imporatant thing for me is that I like it. Im never going to get inspired about recreating a paint job that someone else has already done. I am always concious of making their \"product\" look good but at the same time I like to push the envelope in terms of coming up with something interesting and unusual. This seems to work pretty concistently for me although sometimes \'pushing the envelope\' can backfire. This year I entered a converted squiggoth in the WH large category (there arent even any squiggoths in WH) and to add to this I painted one of the ork crew with brown skin. I half expected this model to bomb out, but didnt care as I was pleased with it and had fun making it. To my delight it won gold in its category, so if you really want to paint your orks brown do it!




\"I would rather attempt something wacky and fail than to be booring and succeed\" (or something like that )
Cheers
Victoria Lamb

 

[halon]

Chrispy
This is just a friendly discussion I\'m certainly not getting heated about it and I hope you aren\'t either. My opinion is based on two things, observation and the comments made by the GW judges. And one of the things they have said is \"Is the piece representative of the race it is trying to depict?\" Or, put more plainly does it fall into our visual conception. Add this to the Perry brothers stating that it should be possible to win with unconverted figures and you get standard box figures with standard box paint jobs. And isn\'t that the original complaint for your lower rated figures?

Victoria, first let me say your work is amazing and I\'m striving to do as well some day. But my argument seperates out conversions from paint pallet. Jason Richards Khorne Chaos figures are beautifully converted and technically well painted. But his paint pallet is still Khorns red and black theme, and Bobby Wongs Ultramarines are still blue and white, and Brian Shaw\'s eldar are a standard craftworld coloring. And so for every exception I see there are 10-20 that follow the rule.
I do completely agree that I\'d rather paint something in a new way. I\'m just not sure that the US and \"celebrity\" judges actually view it favorably. I\'ve seen too many pictures of well painted and converted pieces that didn\'t make it past the first cut to believe that the box lid figures weren\'t actively selected for. Especially when they\'ve won and these other figures have not.

 

[wightzombie]

i like grey orks. blue ones give me the whilleys.

 

[Jericho]

Bah, all this conspiracy theory crap is making me sick. There have been plenty of out of the ordinary models to win Demons... hell the Slayer Sword winner at the UK show this year was a Soviet-styled Ork Warboss in Mega Armor. Battle-scarred red armor with a big star on top... and light green skin on the face. That doesn\'t necessarily depict the race 100% and it still won best of show... so I think that says a lot to debunk your ranting and raving.

If it\'s very painted, tastefully converted, and has a good color scheme it usually wins. Period.

 

[Chrispy]

Actuyally, my cheif reason for rating the lower figs so low is that they were just uninteresting. I could see the paint swatches and thus it comes across as a painted mini, not an orc or a space marine or whatever.. that and in some cases it was just bland.. Large scale has huge (realitivly, to mini painters ) surfaces that look dull as one color.. freehanding could have been done, and in droves! Well, whatever..

 

[FantasTech Designs]

I don\'t think there is any real hard and fast criteria for what type of entry will win, and if there is, GW doesn\'t stick to it. From contest to contest, the judges are different, the models are different and there is always new talent and new techniques on display. Heck, many times the team of judges doesn\'t even include an \"artist\" or someone that has a basic knowledge of design. They just like what they like thats all. Not that there\'s anything wrong with that. But don\'t make the contest something it is not. Sometimes, the very best models win. Other times they don\'t. It\'s all a big crapshoot.

If you plan to enter the Golden Demons, do the best work you can on a model that you really like, enter it and just walk away. At the end of the day if you have won something, consider yourself very lucky. If you have won more than once consider yourself very lucky AND maybe a little more skilled than most. Sure there will be people who win from year to year...but that\'s no guarantee that they have a formula down for winning. There are several guys that win consistantly but still haven\'t won the big prize. I don\'t think that proves anything...they could still win it...or maybe not. Maybe their work will never be good enough to win the overall...or maybe they are just unlucky. Unless GW start publishing their judging criteria, how will we ever know?

Nah, there\'s no conspiracy. The judging is too haphazard in my opinion for that to happen.

 

[Shroud]

\"So Mr Wong\'s Marines are a perfect example. Well painted, well converted, and well executed but he chose existing chapters with a standard paint scheme. I put it to you we would never have seen any of his pieces if he hadn\'t done this. \"


If you mean, had he painted pink marines and called them Space Wolves then yah, I might have to agree with that. If you mean he only won because he painted a well known Chapter, and not because he\' incredibly talented, I\'d have to say yer cracked.