WEST WING: ALLDAWSON VS XERO GRAVITY

[Lord Nibbler]

To be honest, i don't think seeing your opponent's entry is much of an advantage anyway. If Blink posted his up now, I can't imagine it making me change what I'm working on. Unless it was just plain awful, then I might say "fuck it" and post mine up more hastily.

[Cactus Drags]

That judgement is laughable, it really is. Marking Ad down for using VG zombies is stupid, because it links back to the game, which would be appreciated by gamers/RE fans. The colour picture juxtaposes well with the zombies, making it stand out more. It wouldn't be nearly as effective with just the red eyes and a blue face. the Extinction font isn't the best, but it fits alright. The logo was still far better than Xero's, which is choppy and horrible. Surely the logo is a key feature of the poster, and when you admit that it was choppy, and quite frankly it looks incredibly amateur, it really makes me question how you could give XG the win. As if the acres of white space wasn't bad enough. I get the simplicity, and the handprint is a very nice touch, but as Kaney said, it should be far grungier and rougher, it's too pristine.

Edited March 21, 2006 by Dragsy Twenty Seven

[K]

For me at least, all it comes down to is the Resident Evil poster looks more like a Resident Evil poster than the Saw poster looks like a Saw poster.

[SeanDMan]

Contraversy. Nice.

[Guest muddatrucker]

Its always going to happen when the graphics are judged by an individual, at the end of the day if the people disagree then he knows hes truely won.

[Draevyn]

That judgement is laughable, it really is. Marking Ad down for using VG zombies is stupid, because it links back to the game, which would be appreciated by gamers/RE fans. The colour picture juxtaposes well with the zombies, making it stand out more. It wouldn't be nearly as effective with just the red eyes and a blue face. the Extinction font isn't the best, but it fits alright. The logo was still far better than Xero's, which is choppy and horrible. Surely the logo is a key feature of the poster, and when you admit that it was choppy, and quite frankly it looks incredibly amateur, it really makes me question how you could give XG the win. As if the acres of white space wasn't bad enough. I get the simplicity, and the handprint is a very nice touch, but as Kaney said, it should be far grungier and rougher, it's too pristine.

Since when did empty space count against a movie posters...have you seen some of the movie posters out there.....Hell, there are a lot of posters that simply have a symbol or logo, simply to not give away much. XG's could have been grungier but as has already been stated, the simplicity worked for the "SAW" franchise.

[Cactus Drags]

Like Keith said, the RE poster is more like an RE poster than the Saw one is a Saw one. Pristine white space isn't really in keeping with a gritty horror film.

Edited March 21, 2006 by Dragsy Twenty Seven

[Liam]

Considering it got mentioned outside of this thread, I thought I'd check it out, even though I usually don't foray into here too too often.

Coming from someone who doesn't know what techniques are harder to utilise, etc etc, from a purely visual standpoint I prefer XG's. I think the opposite to Keith, in so far as I don't think that Ad's one looks overly like a Resident Evil poster, whilst XG's does to me look like the kinda thing they'd use for SAW. Dragsy has a valid point in that there probably is a bit too much white space, but the simplicity of the poster works for me.

With the Resi Evil series having its third incarnation, you'd already have your target audience (someone who hasn't watched the 1st or 2nd one probably won't go to see the 3rd just because), so I think a simpler posted would have been more effective.

I guess the best way for me to put it is that Ad's probably is the more impressive when it comes to techniques used, but XG's is simple and effective to me (an effect that I like in most movie posters).

But I do find the judging being down to one person a little....weird. Maybe a set panel, or something?

[Docpepper]

First i want to say that both graphics are great . but as far as movie posters go , XG's looks the part imo . AD's has it all together but in the end it just doesn't seem to fit as movie poster . Does this mean its a bad graphic ? hell no ! imo the cg zombies ruined the graphic . Overall it was a great battle with both guys producing great graphics. good job guys

[ChrisSteeleAteMyHamster]

A couple of SAW posters I've noticed on the net:

These were used alongside stuff like:

The posters used on the tops of buses also varied between plain black with an image (like the two fingers) and plain white with an image.

[Lord Nibbler]

Marking Ad down for using VG zombies is stupid, because it links back to the game, which would be appreciated by gamers/RE fans.

[The Mask of Norro]

That judgement is laughable, it really is. Marking Ad down for using VG zombies is stupid, because it links back to the game, which would be appreciated by gamers/RE fans. The colour picture juxtaposes well with the zombies, making it stand out more. It wouldn't be nearly as effective with just the red eyes and a blue face. the Extinction font isn't the best, but it fits alright. The logo was still far better than Xero's, which is choppy and horrible. Surely the logo is a key feature of the poster, and when you admit that it was choppy, and quite frankly it looks incredibly amateur, it really makes me question how you could give XG the win. As if the acres of white space wasn't bad enough. I get the simplicity, and the handprint is a very nice touch, but as Kaney said, it should be far grungier and rougher, it's too pristine.

Too pristine? Look at the posters Hamster posted, those are pristine white as well with something that contrasts it. SAW posters usually have either some sort of harmony in grunge, or a stark contrast with calm and dark themes.

I didn't mark him down for using video game zombies-- I actualyl thought it was a great touch using video game ones to relate back, however I DID mark him down for the quality of the picture. The zombies looked too grainy and in poor quality, moreso then they should just by being faded into the fog. Read my judgements closer before you try to bring up points against me.

The Extinction font I wasn't fond of, but I clearly stated that the main logo was great, and that with the SAW logo it really put me off how small and choppy it was. Yet if you actually looked at some movie posters, the logos aren't always the most dominant thing on the poster, so you can't honestly say it's always the key feature.

The color photo offset the rest of the poster in my eyes, the harmony of it all ruined by it. If anything, my eyes would be closer drawn to the face then the zombies when I first saw the poster in a theater. When working with things like posters, you either want balance, or you want to draw attention to a key part of the movie. If anything, the zombies should have been more prominent.

As far as me being the only judge-- I stated in the sign-up thread I was taking advisors to send me ratings of graphics for the tournament, but no one signed up for the position. And the hardest thing about having a panel (which has been proven by the monthly contests) is that not all the judges are there to send in their scores, and personal things happen that interfere. I don't want setbacks holding off the results of the matches.

It's either people complain that one person is judging or people complain that it's taking weeks for a match to finish getting judged. I don't want the tournament going on forever, I want it to go at a good pace.

[NobBe Nobbs]

I think most people have really said it before me, but one aspect of XG's that appealed to me was the teaser quote above the handprint - that fitted in with the SAW style perfectly, and while it may have been wrong to have judged it on that alone, I didn't, it just added more emphasis to my preference for XG's poster.

[alldaws1]

The color photo offset the rest of the poster in my eyes, the harmony of it all ruined by it. If anything, my eyes would be closer drawn to the face then the zombies when I first saw the poster in a theater. When working with things like posters, you either want balance, or you want to draw attention to a key part of the movie. If anything, the zombies should have been more prominent.

The eyes were supposed to be the main focus of the poster, not the zombies, so in that department I've clearly done well as you stated that your eyes were drawn to the face. She's the main character, therefore she's the main focus of my poster.

As for the voting, I agree it would be better to have a panel or even better than that have it open to anyone who wants to vote and make it best of 5 or whatever.

The only thing I'm really complaining about is that I asked whether we could edit our entries and you clearly stated that we could up until the deadline. You also clearly stated the deadline as being Sunday but then you go ahead and do the judging and reveal that you have a 'policy' of judging as soon as both entries are in, something which you never even mentioned before.

[The Mask of Norro]

The eyes were supposed to be the main focus of the poster, not the zombies, so in that department I've clearly done well as you stated that your eyes were drawn to the face. She's the main character, therefore she's the main focus of my poster.

You've not really done well-- by saying that my eyes were drawn to the face, I wasn't complimenting it at all. The face doesn't look good at all, in my opinion, on the poster design you've gone with. It disrupts the harmony-- there's an inbalance of red due to it, and there's no colors supporting her skin tone. Like I said, by going with what you did, I think you'd be better off changing the skin tone to a pale blue and keeping the red eyes for your harmony.

However, if you're going to approach a poster design like that, might I suggest taking a full-body shot of the main character, putting her at the center of attention in the graphic rather then obscured in a small part of the poster and drawing attention to it with offsetting colors? You could have those zombies behind her, acting as a part of the background in the fog, and even have the setting be a graveyard... but if you wanted her to be the main focus, you could have done better drawing attention to her by making her more prominent then the zombies. The only thing drawing my eyes to her is, as I've said, the offsetting colors.

As for the voting, I agree it would be better to have a panel or even better than that have it open to anyone who wants to vote and make it best of 5 or whatever.

The primary problem with opening it to everyone is that I'd rather not have participants in the tournament vote in the tournament. AJ did the same thing with a tournament held awhile back if I remember correctly, to prevent people from simply going "Hey vote for me in this, but give a reason so it doesn't look like I'm vote hunting"

The panel would work, but we've had panels before for contests and there are times when something happens that interferes with a judge's ability to send in his scores. I'd prefer that people be given reasons for their score, also, rather then having the scores simply slapped there.

By initiating a panel I have to be able to know that that panel will be reliable when the graphics are in to send me their scores and reasons for them to be posted, combined with mine, and then used to determine a winner.

The fact is, too, that even with a panel... people will still be upset about the results. I've seen contests before where people call bullshit on an entire panel, and the majority ruled for the other graphic when the panel, who was non-bais to begin with, went with the one the people didn't like. It happens, it happens with one judge just like it could happen with 50. Fact is, there's always going to be someone to debate a decision.

The only thing I'm really complaining about is that I asked whether we could edit our entries and you clearly stated that we could up until the deadline. You also clearly stated the deadline as being Sunday but then you go ahead and do the judging and reveal that you have a 'policy' of judging as soon as both entries are in, something which you never even mentioned before.

This, I do admit, I made a mistake with. This is my first time running a major graphics tournament, so obviously next time things will go smoother, but for now this tournament is exactly as I described it to be-- an experiment to draw attention to the graphics board and get more people visiting and posting in it. It's an experiment, experiments wield setbacks and problems... and obviously, that was a problem I forgot to go over.

So I do apologize for not stating in advance that once both graphics are in, I can submit my judgement whenever I have the ability to. That's an error on my part, so yeah.

[Guest muddatrucker]

I completely disagree with the point that people will write off a panel, surely that means people would be even more inclined to write off an individual.

[The Mask of Norro]

MY biggest problem with the whole 'Norris is the only judge' debate is that I offered the position to be advisors for me-- that means you'd judge the graphics and send them to me, and your opinions would decide how I'd go with things.

I had those positions open during the sign-ups, and I stated that too, and no one offered to fill the spot.

Now... if everyone would be more inclined for it to be so, and I actually get people who would be willing to fill in for the spot, then next round I'll get some people to work with me on judgements.

Just know that if you get the position you need to get me your ratings and reasons as soon as you can after both entries are in, otherwise I'll make judgements without you.

[alldaws1]

If you will have people who have been knocked out I'd be willing to give my input judging-wise from the next round and on.

Edited March 22, 2006 by alldawson

[Wildcat]

I second that, if you want to use former contestants as judges WC would gladly help out.