Change over time

[CELPainting]

Hi all,
I have been out of the CMoN area for about 2 years, mostly because my digital camera broke, and I have only just replaced it.

Long story short....have we all had our standards raised over the last 2 years. I am trying to figure out why my current minis are about 2 full points in score lower than my old ones used to be.

As I figure it, ether
A. my new pictures are crap (a strong possibility)
B. We are all a bit harsher as standards have changed over the last 2 years and what was once a 7.5 is now a 6.0-5.5
C. my painting has gotten worse, which I doubt, but it may appear so, online but that would refer me to option A as I think in person my painting is on par with where it was.

Attached are a few links my my minis past and current.


Current
http://www.coolminiornot.com/204267
http://www.coolminiornot.com/204269
http://www.coolminiornot.com/204159

Older
http://www.coolminiornot.com/119501
http://www.coolminiornot.com/118514
http://www.coolminiornot.com/113627

Please dont misinterpret this as a whiner post. I am not overly concerned with my score or bitching that its low, but i do want to know if my photos are crap or if im painting in an inferior way to my old stuff.

 

[ScottRadom]

I thought your potion girl was underated myself. I didn\'t think the pic\'s were all that bad though. There\'s an awesome tutorial in the articles section on using GIMP to correct light levels and to make multi views if you\'re interested in checking it out.

But the standards across the globe have shot up and are continuing to improve. Last weekend I played in a warhammer tourny and I had the priveledge of playing against an army that I petitioned to win the \"Best Painted\" at the 2002 Grand Tournament in Calgary. The other Judge and I disagreed and this players Dark Elf army came in 2nd out of the 75ish players, with honorable mention.

In the tournament I played at last weekend that players army that I considered the best of the bunch at a large scale tournament came in the bottom half of a 24 man event. The standards that nearly brought home the gold in \'02 were below the average in \'08.

 

[freakinacage]

you new pics are defo worse. show us some better ones and then we can tell you if you are getting worse too!! voting is harsher now too though

 

[squidders]

yeah, voting is right harsh these days... it only takes a few minis that would rate 13 or 14 on a few years ago and everybody else\'s minis drop a few points.

It\'s fair I guess but I think too many people consider 7 a low score - I don\'t get it really.

 

[CELPainting]

I appreciate the input, the main reason I post pictures on this sight is to know if im improving, and the feeling that after getting everyones oppinions I improve and change in the best possible direction. I actually dont mind if my scores are lower that just means the range to improve is more sensitive to any changes I might make and I can certinly understand how things can use more gradation at the top. I feel that any time I paint to get a higher score here on CMoN I am painting my best/improving the most.
I take it the GIMP is an image editing software? That may be part of my problem as before I had photoshop and could make the pictures look better. I had thought that I was not using it to its fullest and so it wouldnt be worth the cost. But I am very interested in any photo editing software that can get the light levels correct that have a nice histogram and can pick out true white for my photos.

In regards to the painted army improvements over the last years. I am crazy obsessive about painting whole themed armys and i am waiting to get my pictures prefected, but soon I will post a Space Marine army I have painted that I think is some of the best work I have done. I will be very interesed in comments when I get that out.

 

[ScottRadom]

7 as a low score.... I\'d kill my Wife for a 7! My latest self dubbed masterpiece is at 5.6 and falling.

I used to say \"I am my own harshest critic\" but now I know better. You\'re all Bastards!lol

The hobby has grown quite a bit in the last little while. It was a rare beast 10 years ago that knew what I was talking about when I said \"I paint miniatures\" for a wargame. Now it seems if they don\'t do it themselves the people I talk to at least know what I mean. More people gives us a bigger talent pool.

What get\'s me is all the 15 year olds half my age running around doing work after mybe a year of practice I can\'t do after 22 years of effort. They\'re double-bastards!

 

[BarstoolProphet]

I\'m not sure I agree that the general standards have gone up. I do, however, think that many of the painters who consistantly do brilliantly are being judged a great deal more critically. Particularly by their friends.

We forum using paint-aholics and brush-lickers tend to seek out the critical eyes, the comments, the ways to find those flaws so that we can improve. So, the people asked to look at those minis in particular are going to rate it more harshly, and look longer, than ones they casually vote on after a 5 second look.

We\'re asking for it, and we get it. 7 isn\'t a low score. I\'m damned proud of my lone 7. It\'s my best posted mini to date, and I hope to top it, but when I\'m asking people to really judge it, as opposed to just casual voting, I have to expect that it\'s going to lose points for each and every thing that\'s wrong with it.

And personally, I wouldn\'t have it any other way. I intend to get damned good at this stuff. Maybe one day, I\'ll even enter a contest.

 

[ScottRadom]

I agree with the Prophet 100%. I actually posted some stuff of mine on the Flames of War site and the problem was I was getting _No_ critical comments. After about the 20th \"They look great\" I came and posted them here (6.2 and 5.8 for the models I posted) and actually got great advice and tips on what to do better. I love this place, I\'ve never in 22 years enjoyed the painting side of my hobby more, and as a bonus everyone seems pretty respectful and intelligent on the OT posts as well. I am doing my best to dumb it down though.

 

[Trevor]

I\'m not sure I agree that the general standards have gone up.

You\'re not serious? Go look at the top minis from each year, really the quality has gone up massively. Look at the golden demon winners from last couple of years and compare to those from 10 years ago, amazing difference. Oz golden demon in particular has improved a lot in the last couple years.

 

[Sukigod]

The two biggist issues I see with yoru newer minis is the images themselves, not the work. All three have yellow color casts over the entire photo which seems off and can easily skew the score as it\'s hard to tell what the real colors should be.

The second is your cropping/size. The older minis took up much more of the frame and you could see much more of your painstaking blending and the contrast was better. The smaller images have a tendancy to make it appear as less detailed and some people might see it as a way to try and \"hide\" imperfections.

Long story short, it\'s your photography that\'s suffering here, not your painting work. GIMP is a freeware \"photoshop\" style image editor that many use to make these kind of corrections, much like you did in Photoshop in the imaegs previous. Google and download it, get used the interface and you\'ll see your scores imrove - at least back up where they should be.

Good luck!

 

[BarstoolProphet]

Originally posted by Trevor

I\'m not sure I agree that the general standards have gone up.

You\'re not serious? Go look at the top minis from each year, really the quality has gone up massively. Look at the golden demon winners from last couple of years and compare to those from 10 years ago, amazing difference. Oz golden demon in particular has improved a lot in the last couple years.

Different standard, there.
I\'m referring to what the voters think deserves higher scores, not the painting standards of the artists.

They\'re two very different things.

 

[Wren]

I think voting standards get around .5 or so more stringent each year as the top painters push the envelope of what\'s possible and raise people\'s expectations for what deserves a 9 or 10.

An important factor to consider is that your latest minis are still in the early days of voting. Scores can fluctuate wildly until something gets a full 50 votes.

I think the new pictures aren\'t so great. The potion girl looks pretty good, but the picture is on the small side to really see the work that\'s gone into the painting, particularly if people are just browsing and voting quickly. Try photographing against a mid blue or mid gray background, a white one can cause minis to look faded or otherwise not show up very accurately. The white backgrounds are a bit harsh looking for the viewer, also.

I do see some differences in the painting. The old succubus has a nice smooth skin, even at the really large size of the photo, where the new one has harsh shading lines on the abdomen and legs, and less depth and richness to the skin. (Though that might be a photo/lighting thing.) The older demoness you did has a higher level (or flashy, depending on one\'s POV) technique of SENMM, which done nicely impresses voters and can inflate scores over a mini that\'s well-painted but doesn\'t employ such techniques. The NMM on your new bugbear is pretty nice, though needs a bit more of a range of highlights from the midtone to edge white, but the piece as a whole lacks the colour flair of your earlier pieces (or the potion girl) and the brown fur just kind of blends into the gray armour, they\'re very similar in tone. The blue in the sword adds a bit of colour to the piece, but seems very isolated.

 

[Jericho]

Some good critique there Wren, said a lot of what I was going to say.

The old minis looked really solid, and the pics showed them off nicely. The new images aren\'t put together as well (mostly the white balance issue) so they take away from the model a bit.