Wanted to wait until all of the entries were in to comment. Looks like
commenting and voting shuts down at the end of the round, so I guess I
missed my chance to comment "the right way." Here they are:

"The Time Machine" by Rick:
More _The Science of History_. A nice but underdeveloped take on the
subject. I hope turned-around and punny interpretations of the topic
remain a part of the RTC. Given the preponderance of religious items in
the scene, the presence of the "Mona Lisa" begins to suggest an "art as
religion" angle, but this is inadequately reinforced and likely just a
product of a randomish web search for items.

"SotSoG" by ThomdeG:
Now this is evenness in tone. Along with those discussed in your image
description, there exists the concept that, as we look outwards to the
far reaches of space and inwards to the building blocks of matter, our
world is shrinking and growing at the same time. The Earth below,
appearing both primordial and modern-idyllic at the same time,
appropriately reveals nothing - the same cannot be said for the pants.

"X-ray" by JimCharter:
Definitely titillating. With the media-filled-models method you used,
this X-ray is as much simulated as imitated. I also notice how well the
faked background noise plays the same role as Miro's "infinite soup" (if
you remember that conversation). An extremely rare example in this
community of a concept that is perfectly realized - there are no
apparent concessions to the medium or subject.

"Revolution" by Andrey_K:
An excellent metaphor. The stacked boxes aesthetic is worn out, but
cliches are cliches for a reason, and this particular cliche owes its
popularity to more than just ease of creation. This geometry could work
as-is with better lighting.

"Fundamental Re-Creation" by milco2006:
Your modeling and texturing skills are improving. This has a retro
sci-fi look to it which makes the simple CG techniques work pretty well.

"Evolution" by Seb_3D:
An ambitious concept. What I found most interesting is how the older
parts of the car have degraded. The car as a whole is falling apart at
the same time it is evolving.

"Science at Work" by steve:
Fire; dripping, boiling, and rippling liquids; foam; smoke - typical of
your ambition. These effects are achieved with varying degrees of
realism, but there's something to be said for your persistent refusal to
be limited to what is "doable" in POV-Ray.

"Pool of Science" by lequenne:
Rewriting your macro to build hallways instead of shelves would add a
lot more books without altering your composition. The lack of reflection
in the literal pool is in my opinion a missed opportunity to expand the
metaphor.

"Black Death" by Michael_H:
No posies? Don't know if damask screams Elizabethan to me, but I guess
it is period correct. I like the picture, but more obvious clues would
help those of us who do not possess you knowledge of the subject.

Post a reply to this message

Thanks for taking the time Shay.  Yeah I got shutout from commenting and 
voting on the last few entries too.

Post a reply to this message

Thank you Shay, for your comments.

I did voting and commenting yesterday without a problem. So maybe there was 
a site problem?

Thomas

Post a reply to this message

I've been looking at the images for a couple of days here.

Honestly, I think there's no contest. Michael Hunter's "Black Death" is 
the best image here, and the best image I've seen in the tc-rtc/irtc in 
a long time. It looks to me like someone took a 14th or 15th century 
manuscript and digitally edited in photographs over the drawings. :-) 
This is a piece of art.

James Charter's "X-Ray" is probably my pick for second place, and in my 
mind "Science at Work" and "Pool of Science" are tied for third place. I 
have to echo Shay's comment that the pool could really use some 
reflections. :-)

Looking at the scores, I see that my opinions are not widely held. :-) 
Ah, well. Fantastic work.

I should enter again some time here, now that I have a shiny new 
computer. :-)

-- 
William Tracy
afi### [at] gmailcom wtr### [at] calpolyedu

You know you've been raytracing too long when you think 80s movies have 
the funniest special effects.
Aaron Gage a.k.a Slartibartfast

Post a reply to this message

William Tracy wrote:
> I've been looking at the images for a couple of days here.
> 
> Honestly, I think there's no contest. Michael Hunter's "Black Death" is 
> the best image here, and the best image I've seen in the tc-rtc/irtc in 
> a long time. It looks to me like someone took a 14th or 15th century 
> manuscript and digitally edited in photographs over the drawings. :-) 
> This is a piece of art.
> 
> James Charter's "X-Ray" is probably my pick for second place, and in my 
> mind "Science at Work" and "Pool of Science" are tied for third place. I 
> have to echo Shay's comment that the pool could really use some 
> reflections. :-)
> 
> Looking at the scores, I see that my opinions are not widely held. :-) 
> Ah, well. Fantastic work.
> 
The scores are a puzzle to me, seems the winner is the one that gets the 
most responses of average or better.  For the system to work it seems 
that every reviewer must judge every work.  If you look at the current 
scores as ratios of points/potential points the ranking would be 
different.  But that is not 'fair' either.  Seems the only fair way 
would be to enforce that all review all, or else somehow attribute each 
entry a dummy average score for each potential reviewer, then have the 
reviewers in effect altering one of the scores up or down from average.

Post a reply to this message

"Jim Charter" <jrc### [at] msncom> schreef in bericht 
news:46dcaa58$1@news.povray.org...
>>
> The scores are a puzzle to me, seems the winner is the one that gets the 
> most responses of average or better.  For the system to work it seems that 
> every reviewer must judge every work.  If you look at the current scores 
> as ratios of points/potential points the ranking would be different.  But 
> that is not 'fair' either.  Seems the only fair way would be to enforce 
> that all review all, or else somehow attribute each entry a dummy average 
> score for each potential reviewer, then have the reviewers in effect 
> altering one of the scores up or down from average.


I have been surprised too...

Thomas

Post a reply to this message

"Thomas de Groot" <t.d### [at] internlDOTnet> wrote:
> "Jim Charter" <jrc### [at] msncom> schreef in bericht
> news:46dcaa58$1@news.povray.org...
> >>
> > The scores are a puzzle to me, seems the winner is the one that gets the
> > most responses of average or better.  For the system to work it seems that
> > every reviewer must judge every work.  If you look at the current scores
> > as ratios of points/potential points the ranking would be different.  But
> > that is not 'fair' either.  Seems the only fair way would be to enforce
> > that all review all, or else somehow attribute each entry a dummy average
> > score for each potential reviewer, then have the reviewers in effect
> > altering one of the scores up or down from average.
>
>
> I have been surprised too...
>
> Thomas

Ye, I am slightly puzzled by the rating system. Is it just me or has it not
been possible to rate the pictures since the competition finished? This is
certainly unfair on the pool of science which has only had one rating as it
was put up on the deadline and then I found i couldnt rate it!

Malcolm

Post a reply to this message

>
> Ye, I am slightly puzzled by the rating system. Is it just me or has it not
> been possible to rate the pictures since the competition finished? This is
> certainly unfair on the pool of science which has only had one rating as it
> was put up on the deadline and then I found i couldnt rate it!
>
> Malcolm


page. I tried the next day and got in just to find that voting was closed.

About a month ago I wrote to Steve and told him about my concerns about the

working as people were already voting for the three images already
uploaded, but there was no guarantee they would come back and vote for the
rest!

Steve by the way kindly replied to my e-mail and said this would be looked
into.

At that point I had no idea that voting would be closed just as soon as all
images were in!

So this is basically how the voting system currently seems to work:

Images uploaded early get all the votes. Late submission get hardly any as


Also this system allows people to vote only for some images (their peers
maybe) and ignore everybody else.



Those who upload late are often those who have put most work into their
submissions and they are those who get "punished".

In my e-mail back then I suggested a system that blocks the votes from each
single voter, until all images have been voted for. Which means that voting
can not start until after the deadline. One week should be enough, then a
winner can be declared.


fair voting system.


Hildur

Post a reply to this message

Hildur K. wrote:


> fair voting system.


Hi,

I guess Steve and Colin are already trying to work something out. Web 
applications can be a pain to modify.

I got bitten by the same "voting bug" over at irtc.animations :) i guess 
some changes are indeed necessary. We had five entries this round, i 
tested voting, and presto: now i'm not even on the ranking page any more 
:) because voting on one's own entry isn't possible (which is OK), but 
with nobody else having (a chance to have) voted, this means my (0/0/0) 
doesn't even get listed anymore except on the "all entries" page...

Two thoughts:

1) either all entrants must complete their voting on all entries for the 
points system to work, or none at all - that's where "panel judges" 
become necessary. A partial vote obviously puts the entrant voters into 
disadvantage.

2) Voting needs a second timeframe (deadline thru deadline + 1 week 
sounds reasonable, i guess) so that the line-up doesn't change after 
voting has started.

Well, if 2) gets implemented, it shouldn't be a problem to have another 
voting period on the last topics by simply tweaking the timeframe's 
end-date...

-M

Post a reply to this message

"Markus Altendorff" <maa### [at] panoramasde> schreef in bericht 
news:46de8dc9@news.povray.org...
>
> I guess Steve and Colin are already trying to work something out. Web 
> applications can be a pain to modify.
>
>
> Two thoughts:
>
> 1) either all entrants must complete their voting on all entries for the 
> points system to work, or none at all - that's where "panel judges" become 
> necessary. A partial vote obviously puts the entrant voters into 
> disadvantage.

Yes of course. My impression was (but I didn't control at that stage) when I 
voted (sept. 1st) that all(?) images had got 8 votes... But I seem to be 
wrong there.
>
> 2) Voting needs a second timeframe (deadline thru deadline + 1 week sounds 
> reasonable, i guess) so that the line-up doesn't change after voting has 
> started.

Indeed. That seems obvious. I thought this was also Steve's intention, but 
as there was a problem with the site at closing time, maybe that dropped 
out...

>
> Well, if 2) gets implemented, it shouldn't be a problem to have another 
> voting period on the last topics by simply tweaking the timeframe's 
> end-date...
>


Thomas

Post a reply to this message