[Discussion] Improving the Art Contest + Creative Side of ToS [closed]

[lilblkrose]

Work in Progress, feel free to toss in some ideas.

This is just a discussion and list of possible solutions with pros & cons that are achievable/can be achieved with the current staffs authority and ability. Though this is mostly useless chattering, it is a repeated discussion in the Tree Of Savior Art Discord every time a contest rolls around and I would like to compile all of these ideas into an organized format, maybe in hope staffs take notice or reference these ideas…

Current Notable Ideas
Feel free to add to pro or con, or any ideas you’d think would help staffs improve the next contest.

1. Participation Prize
2. Screenshot Contest
3. Gallery Page
4. Showing WIP on Second Post
5. Sharing Social Media Gallery
6. Rewards based on Entries Number
7. No Reward Info until After Contest Result
8. Votes by Steam Accounts Only
9. Voting on Facebook
10. Vote in Game
11. Past Winner as Judges
12. Separate Sub-Forum for Art Contests (Related to Gallery Page)
13. In-Game Notification

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Participation Prize

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Pro

• Encourage more players to participate
• Won’t feel wasted effort
• Prize may encourage more active players
• More players participating, easier to call out any illegal entries
• Encourages those without drawing capability

Acceptable mediums:

• Illustration
• Comic panels
• An image that utilizes in-game screenshots or material.

*Reducing the amount of traced entries^ (The belief only drawn entries will win)

Con

• May invoke a lot of zero effort entries
• Spam entries
• Floods of entries (Making more work to staff)
• May reduce amount of art contest or prize?

Summary

This one concerns me, but a GM had this idea long ago after the dreaded V-Day Contest of 2017 (How would you feel about dumpling award?). I feared many would just toss ms-paint stick men entries in for the sake of the participate prize, however, it occurred to me that many entries do not utilize in-game resources and resort to tracing in the belief only drawn entries will win. Even if they doodle a Kepa scribble (as I was informed that is what JP-ToS did), it would be fun for participates and may reduce the need for traced entries while encouraging maybe more screenshot entries/edit or “for the Lols” participates that aren’t traced (which takes a lot of effort and it puzzles me why not just draw or learn to draw from it).

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Screenshot Contest

[Screenshot Contest]

Pro

• Easy to judge
• Encourages those without drawing capability
• Easy advertisement to the game beauty by Players PoV

Con

• Spam entries
• Floods of entries (Making more work to staff)

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Gallery Page

[Gallery Page]

Pro

• Easy to view entries
• Easy to view past entries/timeline
• Easier for people to Vote
• No endless scrolling and waiting to load

Con

• Require revamp/reprogramming of website or forum

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Rewards based on Entries Number

[Rewards based on Entries Number]

Pro

• Encourages others to Participate
• REALLY encourages others to get friends to participate
• Minimizes overwhelming prize for low # of entries

Con

• May discourage some participates due to “winning chance” despite it’s a contest/competition.
• Participate may feel cheated if not enough join
• Requires staff to choose proper tier reward
• May result in spam entries by alt accounts to accumulate tier prize

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No Reward Info until After Contest Result

[No Reward Info until After Contest Result]

This one just posted out of frustration of people who don’t read the rules and only see the TP prize… Be good to work with the previous topic.

Pro

• People would join for fun
• Force people to read the dang rules

Con

• People may not feel motivated

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Showing WIP on Second Post

[Showing WIP on Second Post]

Note: WIP means Work in Progess

Pro

• Discourage Theft and Tracing
• Easy for others to determine who is genuine
• Shows work artist put into their entry
• Shows a before and after, which is amazing

Con

• Some thieves can fake a WIP (pro: but easily noticeable)

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Sharing Social Media Gallery

[Sharing Social Media Gallery]

Pro

• Shows who is legitimate artist
• Easy for others to determine who is genuine

Con

• Invasion of Privacy
• Some artists have private gallery
• Some artists are shy
• Some participate may have started drawing

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Votes by Steam Accounts Only

[Votes by Steam Accounts Only]

Pro

• Assures votes are by players or possible players
• Reduce Same IP/Bot Votes
• Discourage mass votes by new accounts

Con

• May reduce forum traffic (depends)
• Connecting/Reprogramming Forum Account to Steam Account

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Voting on Facebook

[Voting on Facebook]

Pro

• Easy to determine who is a person
• Better gallery display

Con

• Personal information publicized may cause harassment
• Discourages public votes (read above)
• Easy to buy/receive fan (non-players) votes

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Vote in Game

[Vote in Game]

Pro

• Active Player Votes
• Easy to notify players who don’t frequent forums/news
• Encourages new players by participates fans

Con

• Bots
• Programming a voting system in game
• Players may not have time to log in to vote

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Past Winner as Judges

Similar to Staff pick but by previous contest winners.

Pro
*Community activity
*Commentary
*Known/Recognized Artists Choice

Con
*Reward/Payment required for Judge time (Unless Volunteered)
*May want to participate in next contest
*Bias voting towards friends

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Separate Sub-Forum for Art Contests

The fan art thread is now filled with mainly entries and not artists showcasing personal works outside of entries & contests.

Pro
*Clean and Organized
*Easier to navigate entries

Con
*Confusion to those not custom to forums
*Mistaken posted entries on wrong place

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In-Game Notification

Notification in Game of when Art Contest or Voting Period starts.

Pro
*Notify actively online players
*Notify in-game players who don’t forum frequently or at all

Con
*Easy to Ignore

Current Rules of Art Contest as of April 2018

Art Requirements:

Format: JPG/PNG/PSD

Size: 1920*1080px, 300dpi

The art must be related to the theme

Acceptable mediums:

- Illustration

- Comic panels

- An image that utilizes in-game screenshots or material.

- Real-life photography, or images that utilize such, will not be accepted

- Please note: We will exclude votes cast by forum accounts that shared the same IP addresses after reviewing the accounts. The results of the user vote are a reflection of this change. 

 


Policies and Disclaimers

imcGAMES will not be held responsible for (a) any contest disruptions, injuries, losses or damages, caused by events beyond the control of imcGAMES; (b) damages caused by plagiarized work submitted by the artist; or (c) inconvenience caused by human error or typographical errors in the rules or promotional material.

ImcGAMES reserves the right to change, suspend, or cancel the contest if, in imcGAMES discretion, intervening circumstances warrant such action.  
 

Contest Overview:

This contest is held by imcGAMES and is open to all Tree of Savior fans.
Artist interested in participating may submit a design of fan artwork. 
Please keep in mind that vote selling of any kind is discouraged and could result in disqualification. 


General Contest Conditions:

By entering this competition, you are granting us a non-exclusive perpetual license to reproduce images of your artwork into in-game loading screens and in posts on the forums (forum.treeofsavior.com) when introducing the works selected.
Artworks selected might undergo modification when applying them to loading screens.
Artworks will not be used for any other purpose than that which is stated here.
Loading screen images are subject to change without prior notification. 


Original Work of Authorship:

By submitting your work you hereby warrant and represent that your submitted art is, in fact, original works of authorship on your part and have not been copied, in whole or in part, from any other work and do not violate, misappropriate or infringe any copyright, trademark or other proprietary rights of any other person or entity. 

You may not post materials that are sexually explicit, offensive to certain groups, or generally inappropriate for the game’s T rating.

Artists who violate these policies are subject to disqualification from entry and should plagiarism or IP theft be confirmed, imcGAMES holds the rights to revoke all benefits and prizes given to the artist.

[Aoi_Kanashi]

well, to prevent no effort works and plagiarized works. a better screening effort from the staff and community is needed.

though, it doesn’t necessarily have to be an in-game reward, but a proper recognition for the effort (by that, i don’t mean something like “thank you all”) the artist made. i mean, the theme is a form of client request afterall ‘w’/

by doing so, it may (unless trolls[but those are moderately easy to detect]) prevent no effort work since artists are going to be recognized for it.

[lilblkrose]

Ah, I forgot to add in to Pro: more participates would have more viewers, meaning suspicious entries can be easily called out.

Many people aren’t good at spotting entries that look obviously traced or editted, even for some artists as I have found out. It may be asking a lot of the staff ability and time, so it’s up to the community to point out these entries.

On the reward part, titles on forum would be nice if we had such option, but I can’t think of anything not in game that can be a reward (other than being featured in a gallery, maybe?) I’d be happy with a cookie or an expiring item… I’m not sure what others would like as a prize that is reasonable and fair in the game.

Actually, a gallery or collection of the entries be nice since many are lost to the forum pages and only winning entries survive >_<

[Aoi_Kanashi]

yah, mebe an smol section in the popolion post that feature an smol piktyur an link tu de forum entry or sumthin leik dat

[lilblkrose]

That be nice, but if there is too much entries, it’ll become cramped to the point of unnoticable. I’m not sure what’s the page limit the art section can have or be privileged to have.

[Aoi_Kanashi]

i guess if it’s too many, then credit user and a link to their works next to them. i mean, im not very sure, but i think even in kr communities, i think only the winners are featured

[lilblkrose]

Mmm I think people would skip the effort to click at each entry that way… A separate gallery would be better so people can see any thumbnail of interest they may like to look closely at.

Or a rolling credit of images lol

I thought KR website had their own gallery page, tho it has been a while since I last looked

[Aoi_Kanashi]

if it’s not oo much to ask, that would be nice OwO

i mean, i saw some kr pages that features the itos art winners ‘w’;;

[mathias_cronquist]

It’s kinda unfair since many of the most voted artworks are usually just encouraged by their guildmates and friends instead being voted for their talent

[Ardien]

Although it is true for some entries, we have the Staff’s Pick to balance it out.

[mathias_cronquist]

Yeah but it takes almost half of the entries i guess or even more. And still cannot believe that cringy stuff like this won:
Btw, is there any chance to edit the ToS files to change that wallpaper to something else or at least a black screen? srsly, I feel the cancer comming through my eyes…

[Ardien]

They are subjective on how they select - based on their “thoughts” regarding their chosen art. Just so happened that the staff who picked it doesn’t share the same sentiment as yours. It’s more of a “Love me, Senpai!” rather than “Notice-Like me, Senpai!”

You can access the loading images here :
[ C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\TreeOfSavior\release\loadingimg ]

Haven’t tried replacing them so I dunno if it would work.

[Aoi_Kanashi]

oh come now i think that entry’s nice ‘w’/

[mathias_cronquist]

It’s the most cringy thing i’ve seen, its like that Kanon anime, I just can’t stand it…
I get the cute stuff people is used to, and it’s ok, but the artstyle is so poor… the anatomy is so weak, awful perspective, looks like he made it using those DeviantArt anime molds… its wrong on so many levels…

[Csiko]

It’s the most cringy thing i’ve seen, its like that Kanon anime, I just can’t stand it…
I get the cute stuff people is used to, and it’s ok, but the artstyle is so poor… the anatomy is so weak, awful perspective, looks like he made it using those DeviantArt anime molds… its wrong on so many levels…

If you don’t like anime, why on earth are you playing this game?

What’s cringy is that you think your subjective opinion on an art style matters.

[mathias_cronquist]

is anatomy and bad perspective something subjective? stop being a weeb and loving everything anime-related
There are plenty of great wallpapers that deserved to be in the loading screen but THAT one in special, doesnt, lacks of an own style (looks like a cheap Deviant art TEMPLATE), lacks of any kind of charm, its cheap vanilla style with mediocre anime trope
I don’t hate anime, i like anime, but i hate mediocricity, specially with that thing being near a work that took a lot of effort from others who searched for their own style and practiced a lot to develop it

Just compare it to these:

This one ain’t anime but… dude… his style is there

And there was one i liked a lot too, the one with the 2 dragoons which i can’t find right now but yeah, i hope the point is clear now (it was already clear but damn, u kid need stuff to be teached with pictures and everything)

[Kihseki]

Skill and talent was never the criteria for these contests anyway. I guess your point is that you have a biased preference?

There’s a lot that can be improved in these contests but trying to filter out and exclude participants is not one of them. (except people who try to cheat and/or steal artwork of course)

[Aoi_Kanashi]

i like the kanon anime though ; w ;

anyway, if you’re going to be very critical about anatomy, you may wanna take another look at the double dragoon entry ‘w’;;;

[lilblkrose]

PLEASE DO NOT CRITICIZE ON OTHER PEOPLE ENTRIES HERE.

I understand the unfairness of having your guild mates and friends vote your entry, but it would mean they would have to have a LOT of friends/guild mates to win either way… Also, if they get their guild mate to vote, that means they play the game thus choosing what to see plus other people will add to vote if it they like the entry as well.

Please do not complain about winning entries or make comparison, that is disrespectful to the artists who worked hard on their entries for a competition they may or may not win.

[Arcelle]

It’s always difficult to judge art contests since art itself is really subjective. There are some good points here and I do hope IMC at least gives this thread a look. Thanks to all of you trying to improve the system on behalf of the rest of us!

Also, while I personally don’t mind being blasted for my entry (within reason, and constructively), there are others who would take it more to heart so it’d be nice not to have them singled out, going forward.

@mathias_cronquist Thanks for the criticism all the same. I know there’s still a lot for me to work out – especially perspective and backgrounds in particular. Hopefully I’ll get better at them someday.

And thanks to everyone else for sticking up for me, I appreciate it.

It’s important for all artists to keep in mind that we can’t appeal to everyone, sadly. Even within my own circle of friends, there are some entries I really liked that my friends disliked. x: